Between Rivers: March 2018

A rambling story of a recent day trip fishing Brokenback Run with my cousin, John. The pictures are at the end, I know they are fuzzy, I'm kinda dissapointed, but what do you expect from a $15 waterproof phone case...

Heading west, early on a Monday morning, I was excited to be heading to some new water in Shenandoah National Park. Last year, John and I fished the Hughes River off of Nicholson Hollow trail with limited success. Fish were caught but I wouldn't call it a stellar day. Today we were going to be fishing Brokenback Run, a tributary of the Hughes.

I arrived in Washington, VA shortly after 8:30 AM and John and I were streambound shortly after. I had a new fly that I wanted to try and had high hopes for, a Dyret, size 12 tied with foam in lieu deer or moose hair. We arrived at the Old Rag Mountain parking lot and were happy to find that there were not too many people there yet. Even though there are 200 parking spaces in the lot, it fills up almost every weekend and can get crowded on a weekday. We saw no other anglers suiting up or cars plastered with Orvis, Patagonia, or Costa stickers, a good sign.

Wadered up and rod in hand, I showed my pass to the park ranger and we were off. The trailhead for both the Old Rag summit trail and Weakly Hollow fire road are 0.8 miles beyond the parking lot, all uphill and man did I feel it. Once we reached the fire road there was a false sense of relief as we still had 1.3 miles to where we wanted to start fishing. I'm not in the worst shape but seeing John walk the 2.1 mile incline and barely seem to break a sweat is pretty telling.

Along the fire road, we passed a lot of good looking pools and runs but the copious amount of social trails and makeshift campsites were a good indication to move on. Our goal was to get in the water at the junction of the Corbin Hollow trail. We reached a bridge on the fire road and looking at a map, I decided that I was close enough and that I was going to start fishing. The foam Dyret was already tied onto my leader and once at the bridge, I tied on a size 16 tungsten bead Pheasant Tail nymph on a 12 inch dropper. I was not fond of nymphing or using droppers until my short trip to PA last year where they proved to be quite productive.

I noticed on the first pool that I fished that the recent wind storm we had really knocked a lot of debris in the water and I was hanging up on sticks or leaves on every cast. I shortened my dropper to about 8 inches and the game was on. The first brookie hooked was just a little guy, around 4 inches, but he had plenty of spunk in him and I performed a "remote release" on him. Shortly after I hooked into a 7 or 8 inch fish that was just as frenzied but I was able to bring it to hand. The biggest takeaway for me that day was to always carry a net, my hooked vs. landed ratio would have been much better if I had brought one along.

The morning went quite well as we leap-frogged our way up the stream. Lots of fish were caught, the vast majority on the nymph. The little guys seemed to really like the dry which worked out, seeing a tiny little fish rise to a fly, a little restraint on the hookset keeps them from becoming a tree ornament. Stream-side lunch consisted of a peanut butter and apple butter sandwich, trail mix, and beef jerky. I really need to carry a pack that would fit my little canister stove because a cup of coffee would have really hit the spot with the chilly breeze coming down the hollow.

After lunch, I jumped back in where I left off and came to a pool that looked just about perfect. I was right in my judgement as I pulled 6 trout out of one long, wide pool. Pleased with myself, I found a nice rock to lay on and enjoyed the afternoon sun for a bit and studied my map, we really had not covered much water yet. I decided to pass John and head up to where Corbin Hollow trail jumps to the south side of the stream. First thing I did was break off my nymph that had been doing so well for me all morning. Oh well, re-rig and keep on fishing. Above the trail crossing, the stream seemed to widen a bit and the pools got smaller and more shallow. I'm sure there were still plenty of fish to catch upstream but I wanted to hit a couple of the nicer looking spots on the hike out to test my suspicions about the social trails (I was right, we caught nothing on the way out). Right at 3 pm, we started to head back down the trail. Along the way a group of Old Rag summit hikers passed us, they asked about the fishing and I probably would have said it was great, even if it wasn't. I feel that people who don't fish just ask out of politeness, most don't really care to hear your excuses for a fishless day.

Saying that I lost count of how many fish were caught wouldn't mean much because I lose track very quickly but plenty were brought to hand... I lost count.

Back at the car and among a cloud of wader funk, I stuck that little foam Dyret in my hat and thanked it for a great day on the water. It will never get fished again, it had done its job. Now it will just be a conversation starter "Hey man, there's a bug on your hat"... "I know, its a fly for fly fishing".