Where did Summer Go?

Wow! Where did the summer go? I had so many things I was going to do this summer and now it looks like Autumn is beginning. Did I go to Zion? No. Did I go fish Slough Creek in Yellowstone? No. Did I fish the Owyhee River in Idaho? Not Yet! So, there are still some excursions that I may get in before the snow flies.

Two weeks ago, Dick Hauch and I went to Idaho to fish the Salt and South Fork of the Snake Rivers. We stayed with Hasty and Grace Arnold in Irwin, Idaho in their beautiful home on the banks of the Snake River below Palisades. Dick and I were interns together at L.A. County-USC Medical Center in 1973. We try and get together to fly fish at least once a year. This time we fished our first day on the Salt River above Palisades with our guide, Travis Taylor. His father, Bart has been a fishing guide in the area for over 30 years. We had a great day fishing on the Salt and the next day we fished the South Fork from Conant to Byington, 9 am to 9 pm on the river. It had rained the night before which put a damper on the really hot fishing, but we caught fish nonetheless. We just had to work harder. The two main flies we used were a Chubby Chernobyl that imitated a large stone fly or grass hopper. Behind this we trailed a Hemingway, a size 16 caddis imitation that we fished wet or dry. We tried other flies but we always seemed to come back to this combination. On our last day, we bid goodbye to our wonderful hosts and stopped at the Grey's River to fish in the morning before we drove back to Salt Lake. I put Dick on a plane and that marked the time to officially start planning our next year's trip.

Riley in coming for a visit this week and after that Diane and I are headed to Mesa Verde and Hoovenweep for a few days. I will report on that after that. Or, I could just make up some shit now. Nah, I'll wait.