Rio Guadalupe, July 14, 2017

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456 AM comes around early every day for me.  That’s the time I programmed my clock radio to wake me each morning for work.  We want to get an early start on the river so I didn’t change my wake-up time.  This morning I got right up; not the usual lie in bed for an additional 10 to 15 minutes readying my brain for work.  Today we are back to fly fishing, the first time since our weekend on the San Juan this past February; too long.

Byron and I are still searching for the Guadalupe box.   He has been there but did not have a GPS to mark the location.  While he says it’s there it’s still an imaginary location for me.  Today we plan on covering a section of the stream.  I have my GPS along so if we find it we will know where it is; if not we can eliminate this portion of the stream in our quest.

Rain is forecast for the day, it is early in this year’s dismal monsoon season so if we get rain it is somewhat expected but not anticipated.

The Gilman Tunnels are closed, for construction we are told, so we have to take the long way around.  In the end it’s better for us.  Only dedicated people will go this far to fly fish the Guadalupe.  On our drive in there is only one other vehicle of fly fishermen to be seen.  They are rigging up as we pass, giving us a wave.

Passing one of the open meadows we spot a small heard of elk enjoying the morning sun and having breakfast.  Slowing down to get a closer view their heads turn our way and they start paying attention to our movement.  Once we stop for a photo they slowly start their retreat.

Based on previous waypoints we park at our selected spot, put on our waders, hiking a half mile down the road looking for an easy access point to the river. We have fished the river at this point once before but only in the immediate area.  This time, using the GPS, we will wade upstream to a location close to the truck then hike back out.  Once back home I plotted our track; the half mile hike down the road translated to almost a two mile upstream fishing expedition.

The river is not much more than a dozen feet wide and closed in; trees and shrubs line and overhang the river banks.  There will be no big long casts; as seen in the classic fly fishing advertisements.  The Guadalupe is flowing well, the water somewhat clear, I can see down into the river but not the bottom where it’s over a foot deep.  This is good, maybe the trout won’t see me either, a two edged sword.

The geology along the Guadalupe is volcanic; the Valles Caldera, remnants of a super volcano, is less than 20 miles from here.  Volcanic rocks and boulders make up the valley and litter the stream bed.

As we are rigging up we can see hatches of insects coming up from the water surface congregating above the stream; a good indication that trout should be looking upward for a meal.

Byron and I share casting into the many pools formed by the rocks along the stream.  After a half hour or so Byron makes his first catch, a brown.  My turn comes about 90 minutes later.  I start out by catching lots of twigs barely sticking out of the water and an overhead tree limb or two as a warm-up to catching trout.  I lose a fair number of dry flies to twigs, rocks and tree limbs.

Image courtesy of Byron

As the day proceeds I continue catching my share of trout.  I consider this one of my best days because this is a decent size stream that is accessible to fishermen.  Byron is trying different types of flies using his excessively long nymphing fly rod.  His experience shows by making almost every combination work.  His directions to me on where to cast fortify my observations, increasing my confidence about what I am doing.

The skies change from bright blue to puffy white clouds to rumbling gray clouds then back again.  This cycle happens two or three times throughout the day and we plan what we will do if it starts raining, but it never appears.

Famished, we stop for lunch.  The only problem we consistently encounter with stopping for lunch is our fishing rhythm seems to break.  It happened again today; both of us went for some time before landing our next trout.

As the afternoon progresses my steps in and around rocks become wobbly, probably due to this type of hiking/fishing/wading for the past six hours.  As I traverse from one side of an almost waist deep pool to the other I decide to take my camera in hand before continuing.  Nearing the opposite side one foot slips and I go into the river almost to my chest.  Fortunately there is a downed tree I am able to grab for support keeping myself from in going deeper.  I am wet; water, not much, makes it into my waders; but most importantly the camera remains dry.  For the balance of the afternoon I feel one foot squishing against a wet sock.  Step, squish, step, squish.  All is well.

Finally we get our fishing mojo back and are starting to pull trout in with some regularity.  Over the two miles we fish the river changes very little.  It is a continuous series of pools, only occasionally does it have a long run.  Each pool has its own trout allowing us to sneak up on them giving us the opportunity of landing one.

By late afternoon I am starved again.  I have to stop to have a protein bar, being hungry a second time is new to me.  Usually lunch is enough even on longer hikes.  My GPS also tells me we are close to the truck so I break down the rod and break out my camera for a few last shots of the river.  Byron has had it too.  He stops for additional nourishment passing me his fly rod for a few last casts.  One or two casts later I hook a trout but I am not able to bring it in; I am left handed using a right handed fly rod.  I have to reel the trout in with the wrong hand.  I suspect the trout saw its opportunity diving under a rock breaking the line.  I think I heard it chuckling as it swam by.

Image courtesy of Byron

The climb out of the stream is a bit steep made more challenging wearing waders.  The GPS led us right to the truck, thank goodness for satellites and electronics.  Looking at my watch I see we have been fishing about 8 hours.  No wonder I was hungry and now, tired.

Peeling off the waders I find that with the exception of one sock my clothes are dry.

Driving back through Jemez Springs we see the results of the cloud buildup we saw while fishing.  The San Antonio Creek looks like a thick red chile sauce from the red sand washed into the stream bed.  We also saw areas where red gravel and sand washed across Hwy 4.

It was a good day.

Thank you for stopping by,

Mark