Day 3

Posted on | October 5, 2010 | 1 Comment

Wednesday, September 15th aka "Brad Day":

I awoke this morning after my only restless night sleep while in YNP. For some odd reason I went to bed feeling warmer than usual, which prompted me not to wear a hat, which led to my dear friend sleep's demise. B woke me up at 6:15 geared in his waders with fly rod in hand saying - "do you want to get up?" Crabby me responded with a snide comment or two but I managed to leave the warmth of my sleeping bag, trekking down to the river with three layers on that did not quite hide the 20 degree chill. But let me tell you something - despite my sour attitude upon rising, my Nikon and I were happy we could greet the sunrise.

A crane decided to join the fun

At this point my camera died. I learned a trick once (last time we were in yellowstone!) to warm up the battery and usually you can get a few more photos out of the mix. So I continued shooting, taking my battery out & blowing on it while holding it between my wool mittens for each & every single shot the remaining half an hour. A group of female elk were feeding upriver from me the entire morning.

B in his element

After a successful morning of photography (not so much in the fishing department) we heated up breakfast burritos on the grill and inhaled our coffee. B was a bit indecisive on where we wanted to fish in the park, so we got out a few books & reflected on past fishing experiences. I kept repeating "Lamar and Soda Butte, Lamar and Soda Butte' - a confluence of two rivers in the northeastern section of the park where we have had success years ago. B teetered between that & the Yellowstone, so I suggested we simply drive towards both and decide later. We hit the road at about 9 am.

Of course, we had to make a stop in Mammoth Hot Springs (not my idea, I swear). Okay maybe it was.

By 11 we were on our way to fish, a joint decision to head to the Lamar Valley and see how it goes. The drive was gorgeous with wildlife everywhere. We stopped close to our destination and hung out with this pronghorn for a bit. He wasn't really in the mood to move, however. He just stared at a group of buffalo about 30 yards away.

We got to our destination at the oh so bountiful Lamar and Soda Butte confluence & heard the sound of grass hoppers flyin' about, which more than excited my husband. We got out every hopper pattern you could imagine and chose the very best and most similar to the current hatch. So dry fly fishing we began (see 'A River Runs Through It' if you don't get the whole fly fishing idea, or if you just want to see a young hot hunkalicious Brad Pitt)...

Disclaimer: We catch & release all of the trout!

B caught a cutthroat on the first cast!

Mmm, styrofoam grasshopper.

I can catch, just not land the fish

Another one of B's

This one cracks me up - the foreign tourists love fly fisherman, and taking photos of them, so the van above rear ended the truck while watching me fight a fish.

We fished for about 7 hours, finishing the day with at least a dozen and a half fish caught. I had to convince B that we should leave before the sun sets so we can make the drive back to camp and grill up dinner along the way (teriyaki chicken and rice!). B left with about as much enthusiasm as I had that morning upon waking.

The drive home was long & beautiful, with a herd of buffalo in their lamar valley territory we met them at exactly 5 years ago as well.

A little assisted scratching

Hope you don't have to be somewhere in YNP

After the herd moved off the road we decided to pull over and grill up our grub. After some time we noticed a herd of pronghorns grazing near us while we dined.