Looking For Fishable Water, Finding Only White Stuff (Whitewater & Snow)

This was a small stream reconnaissance — a trip to a couple small streams, a lake and a summit to see what was fishable (or even reachable).

I had a fly rod tucked away in the corner of the truck and Wally the Wonderdog panting in the front seat, but when you’re on a reconnaissance, you have to be prepared to leave the fly rod in the tube.

Otherwise, you stop at the first stream on the list and end up fishing right up to your deadline (“I’ll just see what’s around this bend…“), which isn’t exactly the goal.

On a reconnaissance trip, you fish on the way out, ensuring you’ll learn more from the trip than the fish weren’t biting at the first place you stopped.

And that’s assuming the streams in question can be fished, and despite the fact the Upper Sacramento has fallen below 1800 cfs, I doubted these little freestoners were in fishable shape.

And I was largely right about that.

Right now, you’re much better off on the Upper Sacramento or the McCloud, which has — astonishingly — fallen below 400 cfs at Ah-Di-Nah (rumor has it the hatches are wildly good).

We found ourselves high in the drainage, the truck halted a few hundred yards short of the summit by snow drifts across the road, so the Wonderdog and I got out and hiked to the top.

For the truck, the road ends here. For the Wonderdog, this is where the fun begins...

The Wonderdog rolled around in the snow like a puppy (he hasn’t seen snow for a couple months, and it was the last thing he expected in 80 degree temperatures), but the sloppy, melting snow left me happy I owned Gore-Tex hiking boots.

Still, even the latest in high-tech footwear wouldn’t get me to the lake, which might as well have been in another mountain range.

Hiking in wet snow tends to take its toll on disgustingly unfit legs, and I was quickly reminded I’d spent the winter cultivating pneumonia instead of xc-ski trips in the forest behind the house.

One benefit of a snowed-in road? Nobody’s around to see you puffing like a turn-of-the-century locomotive.

On the drive out I stopped and fished a couple of the better-looking runs, but they were still too high and too fast and far enough apart that the Wonderdog would fall asleep on the back seat in the interval.

I finally gave up and made it home just in time to fire up dinner while the Wonderdog flopped wetly on the patio, attentive to the possibility of a pork chop accidentally flying off the grill, yet expending the absolute minimum of energy in the vigil.

Us outdoor types appreciate nature’s subtle rhythms.

Fortunately, the trips aren’t all like this; a real fishing trip looms this week, one where fish are the goal (not intelligence).

See you on the river (really), Tom Chandler.