gawdamn!!...you've described fishin thunderhole creek with pj, exactly!!
except, the dog belonged to a landowner in the backwoods and wasn't
none too friendly. fortunately, the dog recognized the prime canine.

jeff (who's enjoying vicarious trips to alaska and wyoming... so far)

Willi wrote:

Last week I drove up to southern Wyoming for a day of fishing with Rusty
Hook.

We stopped at a flyshop where we were supposed to meet. I bought a
license and bull****ted with the owner while I waited for Rusty. A local
was in the shop and he was looking at me with daggers and making some
snide remarks because I was a "greenie" (CO resident) and I had the
audacity to come to Wyoming to fish. Rusty was late and I had enough of
the shop (actually the shop and owner were nice). I figured I goofed up
the plans again and went to call him when found I had forgotten his cell
number. So I walked down the road to a pay phone and called Sue to get
the number when Rusty showed up.

We had a nice drive up through some beautiful country while Rusty played
tour guide. Rusty was showing off a map he had gotten for free and when
he was getting close to our turnoff, he pulled over to consult the map.
We went on and Rusty turned down the side road that the map indicated.
We drove down (and up) a 4 wheel drive "road" for about 5 miles when it
dead ended far away from the stream we were to be fishing.

So we went back down (and up) the 5 miles to the junction where we
turned back the way we came and tried another 4 wheel road. After a
couple miles, Rusty pulls over and parks in a small turnout, but
comments that he doesn't remember the trees that were growing where we
were parked.

We get out, get loaded up and start walking down the road toward the
river. After about a mile, we come to another turnout. This one Rusty
recognizes as THE parking place. Another half mile walk and we're at the
creek.

Beautiful little creek!

We walked downstream about half a mile and started fishing upstream,
hopscotching our way up. The stream was filled with eager, FAT, little
Brookies and Rainbows. Fun feisty fish on a light rod and dries. After
having two flies chewed up, I put on a foam beetle and fished it the
rest of the day. Very sturdy and effective small stream fly.

Had a great day with Rusty and his personable and well behaved dog, Zippy.

We started out for the truck up a small trail. The trail didn't look
familiar to me and I asked Rusty if this was the right way. He responded
yes and commented, "Look at Zippy up the trail. He knows where he's
going. So I followed Rusty who followed Zippy up the steep trail.

After about a mile, we decided that we had gone the wrong way because we
hadn't reached the road. We bushwhacked our way one direction hoping to
cross the road, but no. So we decided on another tactic. We climbed up a
couple ridges so we could get some elevation and maybe see the road.

At the top of the second ridge, we spied a road and bushwhacked our way
to it. Wrong road. We climbed a couple more ridges and saw another road.
We bushwhacked our way to it. Right road.

We finally made it back to the truck, had a couple beers, some smoke and
stood around bull****ting for awhile. Then we headed home.

Fun day!

Willi