Provo river

So I find myself just outside Salt Lake City with a Saturday free.
Google gives me a couple of flyshop listings close by, one called
Anglers Inn also with a shop in Orem. I can't leave until after 9am, I
call the shops as I drive in -- one closed and the two Anglers Inn are
out of business. I was hoping to find a tip on smaller less-crowded
water, but with no info I'll have to go with what I found on the web,
the Provo river.

Oh well, there must be a flyshop somewhere on the main road up to and
up the Provo -- but no luck at all! I end up buying a license in KMart
in Orem, driving up the Provo to Heber City, not seeing any flyshop up
there so driving back down to the lower Provo (the Web said the middle
Provo, while looking better for flyfishing, has lots of private land;
without a map, I'll just stick to the lower).

It's about 11:30 by the time I start fishing, and I need to stop about
3:30. Not much structure down the middle where I am, and the river is
flowing pretty good, so I start fishing the little pockets up the
bank. A dink hits and flops off at my feet, then in a nice little bank
hole a fine 16-17" brown hits my brown san juan worm, fights hard and
comes to hand. Cool!

I find a slighty wide spot in the river, and wade across, angling
downstream in the strong current. There's an island on the other side
with some interesting water around it. A few more dinks and I work my
way to this nice flat along the island, and as I get closer there's
some nice fish in _very_ shallow water, lined up feeding.

I pop the split shot off my rig -- still what I started with, a brown
san juan worm with a #20 pheasant tail -- and sight fish. Spooked the
first but eventually got to watch the second inhale the pheasant tail.
Another nice brown, about a twin to the first. He fought hard, even
jumped once. Landed and released (when fishing alone and releasing, I
generally don't take pictures, just get the fish back in. Sorry!).

I worked down the far bank, caught and missed a few dinks, then worked
back up to the flat. This time I rigged up a hopper with the pheasant
tail dropper. I fished a couple of the fish on the flat, but maybe
they were still a bit shy from when I fished through earlier, because
none of the nicer ones would take. At the very top of the island there
was a nice little hole into a cutbank. On about my second drift
through there, I watch a nice brown come up and hit my dropper.
Another nice fighter, and again about a twin to the first two.

I fish a bit more but time is running out. I work my way up to the
wide spot, wade across again, and walk back to the car. Nice fishing.
The downside of it was the road noise -- I can't believe the traffic
up and down that canyon all day long! -- and the huge hatch of tubers
and rafters. It wasn't too bad until about 2pm, then it just got a bit
crazy. I was a bit isolated from the main current around the island,
but the rest of the river got to be unfishable with all the tubers.

Oh well, the best trout of my year so far (my third day fishing this
year).

Jon.

In article
,
wrote:

So I find myself just outside Salt Lake City with a Saturday free.
Google gives me a couple of flyshop listings close by, one called
Anglers Inn also with a shop in Orem. I can't leave until after 9am, I
call the shops as I drive in -- one closed and the two Anglers Inn are
out of business. I was hoping to find a tip on smaller less-crowded
water, but with no info I'll have to go with what I found on the web,
the Provo river.

Fish tech wasnt open? Trout bum 2? Fish west fly shop? Park city Fly
shop? WTF is Anglers inn?? There are a ton of MAJOR fly shops and you
choose #(*@(*(*#@?

wrote:
So I find myself just outside Salt Lake City with a Saturday free.

Nice TR snipped


I would love to pretend that had you given a bit of notice I would have
been able to shake myself free and at the least help you find a fly shop
and maybe even join you for a bit of casting on the Provo and engage in
some casual banter about the endearing qualities of mules. But, I
wouldn't have made any difference. My wife has lots of family visiting
from Brazil for much of the summer and my life is not my own right now.
It would have been a welcome escape however.

I have not fished the Provo for years. It was my main fishing stream
twenty five years ago. Then it got discovered and became way to crowded
for me. Had we been able to hook up I'd have probably tried to talk you
into going somewhere less crowded and noisy.

Russell