Fifty Shades of Grayling
The steamiest part of our chilly weekend on the water was a streamer that looked suspiciously like Kelly Galloup’s ‘Sex Dungeon’ fly. Hmmm…
So we have just returned from a fantastic Memorial Day in Montana where summer kicked off with hail, lightening, and snow – as it always seems to do on our Memorial Day trips in the 406. And at this point, I truly wouldn’t have it any other way. Certainly puts all the gear to the test.
We fished the Big Hole for two days with friend, Eric Thorson who is co-owner of Sunrise Flyshop in Melrose. For me, the highlight of the weekend was catching my first-ever grayling! The Big Hole is the only river in the lower 48 with native grayling, descendants of the original strain. The iconic fin was too cool. I particularly loved the little red spots outlined in white.
It was a multi-species trip. In addition to the grayling we caught brook trout, rainbows and browns. Day Two offered much more cloud cover and the grey skies had the fish moving to eat a little better.
This trout was over us pretty quickly. Here is Mr. Brown exiting of his own accord stage right (=river left.)
As expected and predicted, late afternoon brought extreme weather and once again we found ourselves drenched on the Big Hole. Talk about fifty shades of grey…everything went dark as the big skies of Montana opened up on us. But thankfully the rain cleared an eerily sunny-ish path for our bumpy drive home along the High Road.
As we kicked off summer in wintery temps we sang songs from a Springfest 2011 playlist. (Can anyone make out the song and/or band playing?)
The trip ended with fifty shades of technical gear hanging out to dry as we toasted another great Montana trip.
Meanwhile, housewives across America who only read my gimmicky title and skipped the remainder of this benign post are googling ‘grayling’ with sweaty palms and clamoring to book their first ever fly-fishing trip.
Comments
- Loree, that is a GREAT story! thanks for helping me get my day ... by The Fly Fish Chick
- Nice! The first fish I ever caught on a fly was an Arctic ... by Loree Hart
