Fishing Trip: Northern NM & Southern CO

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flyfishermann1955
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Fishing Trip: Northern NM & Southern CO

#1

Post by flyfishermann1955 »


We pushed west on I-40 from just east of Oklahoma City. Then quickly we left the interstate and headed northwest on highway 270 through winter wheat territory for the flat, open ranch land of the Oklahoma Panhandle. Between Woodward and Guyman we passed through Slapout and wondered about the history of that name. Hay was being cut as the end of summer approached. A few fields still had corn standing, but it was brown and withered; a real contrast to the green fields of grain sorghum. The ranches are big and the houses are far apart. Scott’s pickup was loaded with gear for our week-long trip. Camping gear, water, and two 5-gallon containers of extra gas filled the truck’s bed. Food, clothes, even more water, and fishing equipment were crammed in the back seat. Often there wasn’t a single building in sight and not many other vehicles on the road. It was definitely pickup country and the number of cars we saw stayed in the single digits. The sun was bright and as the song goes: the wind was sweeping down the plain. Highway 270 became 412/64 somewhere in Beaver County. Looking north toward the Kansas border we saw the long string of windmills. Not the kind you see for pumping water in old Western movies, but the giant, modern white ones that generate electricity.
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The Panhandle is just over 30 miles from north to south and separates Kansas from Texas and then Colorado from Texas. The elevation is much higher there than back in Oklahoma City, but the land is still flat. We passed through Boise City in the middle of Cimarron County, then turned southwest with just 30 miles to go to the New Mexico border. In addition to cattle we started to see antelope grazing near the road. Image
We entered the Land of Enchantment and set our watches back 1 hour as we left the Central Time Zone for Mountain Time.
We were headed for the Valle Vidal Wilderness area in north central New Mexico. This would be the first stop on a 2-stop trip. It was a return trip for me, having fished there one day at the end of August 2009.
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The goal was for Scott to catch his first Rio Grand cutthroat. A life-long bait/spin fisherman, he would also be fishing for the first time with a fly rod. The section of the Rio Costillo we intended to fish is a small tailwater stream below a reservoir. No bait allowed and catch and release only. Fishing only opens on 1 July to protect the spawning Rio Grande cutthroats. It’s a long drive in on a dirt road, but then you can just park and fish; no 5-mile hike required. The stream passes mostly through open meadow, so the casting is pretty easy.
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Sure, we occasionally hung up on a small bush or in the tall grass, but then--who doesn’t? I’ve read the stream fishes best when water release is 30-40 units. On my trip last year the water was high, but fishable at 100 units. This year, it was better with the web site showing 71 units. In addition to the Rio Grande cutthroats, there are some rainbows and some cutbows. We also wanted to check out Comanche Creek, a small feeder steam that has been re-populated with cutthroats and the Shuree Ponds that hold much larger fish with no restriction against using bait. We set up the tent at the McCrystal campground near the Shuree Ponds. From the campground, it’s an 11-mile drive back down to the stream. The night sky was overwhelming! Not like the washed out version at home from the light pollution of Oklahoma City and Tinker Air Force Base. The aspens had started to turn and as an extra treat, we heard the elk bugling during the last few hours of darkness.
The last two days of summer brought great weather with daytime temperatures in the mid 70s and the morning low of 40. On Monday morning, we first stopped at the Shuree Ponds. One pond is for children (under age 11) only. The wind was blowing pretty hard, which made casting a real challenge. The pond was being treated for an invasive weed. It was growing all along the shoreline and you could barely cast out past the weeds. One of the three bait fishermen we saw took home two large (easily over 20-inch) rainbows. There was one other fly fisherman and he was using a float tube. I spoke with him briefly while he was re-rigging, after breaking off a nice fish on a black wooly bugger. He’s a regular there and said he often catches at least a few large fish.
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 After an hour, we headed down the gravel road to the Rio Costilla. We wore our waders, but did see a few guys wet wading in their shorts and boots. No flies were hatching and no fish feeding on the surface, so Scott started with a hopper/dropper combo and I fished a 2-nymph rig. He switched over to a single nymph after I caught the first fish. I caught a few fish each on the following flies: a # 14 prince, rubber-legged copper John (tied on a scud hook), peasant tail, and a # 16 scud hook with a red vinyl body and a silver bead. In one pool, I even hooked a rare double, but lost the fish on the dropper.
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Fishing did improve after I added two small split shot about six inches above my bottom fly. Scott did catch his first fish on a fly rod that day, but it was a rainbow, so our number one objective was still unmet. The fish I caught averaged nine to ten inches. The best fish of the day was a very chunky 13-inch rainbow taken from a stretch of fast water between bends in the stream. Monday evening it rained for two hours, and hard at times, but the stream stayed clear overnight.
On Tuesday morning, we packed away the camping gear then spent an hour checking out Comanche Creek between the campground and where it flows into the Rio Costillo. It’s very small; two to maybe four feet wide.
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They’re doing some restoration work to protect the banks from grazing cattle and re-establish spawning habitat. After Scott caught a 5-inch Rio Grande cutthroat on an elk hair caddis, we headed back to the Rio Costillo. It was about 11:00 AM when we parked the truck. We saw three other trucks and a total of six other guys fishing. This was double the number of people we saw fishing on Monday, but they were spread out over a couple of miles of stream and we found an area to call our own between two of the other groups. Scott caught his best fish in a deep pool along an inside bend in the stream.
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We stopped to make some sandwiches for lunch and were joined by local wildlife.
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After lunch, Scott picked up two other small fish, but was encouraged as we put away our gear for the drive north to Colorado and destination number two.
Next stop--Antonito, CO. No really direct route to get there and slow going at first on the gravel road out of the wilderness area. In the town of Costilla--if you can call it a town--we picked up route 522 and headed north. The land was flat and the dominate colors were sage and brown. Once in Colorado, the road changes numbers and becomes 159. Trees were hard to find! It was mostly open land covered with low brush. Every so often you would see one of those large, wheeled irrigation lines with the drop-down spray heads. They were connected to a Image in the middle of a circular field of green grass. We stayed on 159 until we reached San Luis and then headed west on 142. Passing through Manassa, the birthplace of Jack Dempsey, we continued to Romeo then turned left on 285. This took us past the oldest church in Colorado and to Antonito. Our plan was to fish Wednesday and Thursday then spend Friday taking the Cumbres and Toltec scenic train ride and drive back to Oklahoma on Saturday.
We planned to fish Elk Creek on Wednesday and the Conejos River on Thursday. The Conejos River Anglers fly shop was open, so we stopped in for some directions, advice, and a few locally important fly patterns. If Elk Creek sounds familiar, it was featured in the July-August-September edition of Fly Fisherman magazine. It’s listed as a 3-mile hike to the first meadow and an additional three or four miles to the second meadow. Definitely a commitment, but we wanted to invest a day checking it out. The weatherman was calling for a 70 percent chance of rain, so it didn’t look promising. First light on Wednesday revealed a very cloudy sky, but we still headed west on highway 17 and drove the 22 miles from Antonito to Elk Creek Campground. It seemed like a good plan to at least find the campground where our hike-in adventure would start. We could always fish the Conejos River, which parallels highway 17, instead and save Elk Creek for Thursday when the chance of rain was listed as only 10 percent. By mile 18 it was raining and after finding the entrance to the campground, we turned around and headed back toward Antonito on highway 17 to implement Plan B. We had seen the signs for the special-regulation, fly fishing only stretch of the Conejos River on the outbound drive. We headed east and were once again out of the rain. We pulled over at one of the marked areas and read the signs. Special wild trout area; no stocked fish. Fly fishing only; you could keep two 16-inch fish. It’s private land, but has stream access for fishermen. They even have these cool ladders so you can climb over the barb wire fence and walk down to the stream. I like that about the West. Having grown up in Pennsylvania, it’s very different; private land is just that--private. I’m sure you’ve seen the signs: No hunting, no fishing, and no berry picking allowed. They may not shoot you if they find you, but they will certainly have you arrested! We put on our waders, but before we had our rods together it started raining hard. The truck provided refuge and after only 30 minutes the rain stopped.
With our rods together, it was over the fence and down the path toward the river. We walked across the old wooden bridge and decided we would work our way upstream. The water reminded me of the upper Rio Grande near Creede, which is my only other Colorado fishing experience. Scott took the tail of the first pool and I worked toward the head where the fast water emptied in. We started with a big stonefly nymph called the 20-incher, a pattern that was productive during my earlier trips to the Rio Grande.
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I added a beadhead pheasant tail nymph off the hook bend of the stonefly. The water looked about five feet deep in the middle along the seam where the still water met the fast current. It took about six casts before the first fish had my rod bent in half. I wasn’t sure which fly he took and will never know. He raced below me, taking line and with the aid of the fast current was off in 10 seconds. Scott moved above me and hooked a nice brown in the next pool. His strike indicator was too far up his leader and as he struggled to net the fish near his feet, the hook came out and the brown was gone. It sprinkled a few times over the next several hours, but not even enough to make you wet. Scott lost his stonefly, but eventually landed a 10-inch rainbow on a pheasant tail nymph. I hooked five other fish and landed three of them. They were all alike; all 14-15 inch browns. Thick, heavy fish, starting to put
on their fall colors.
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About 1:00 PM, as we headed downstream, the rain started again and it was noticeably harder than earlier. By the time we reached the truck, we were pretty wet. We headed back to the hotel to dry off, then ate a late lunch. It rained all afternoon, so we drove 28 miles to Alamoso just to pass the time.
Thursday morning was as promised--clear and sunny; a great day for a hike. It was west on highway 17 again, but this time the road was dry. Elk Creek Campground (elevation 8500 feet) was actually already closed for the season, but you could access the trail that would take you upstream to the meadows. There was a sign for TR731 right where we parked the truck. We headed down the trail and over the foot bridge that crossed Elk Creek. Unfortunately, that was the last trail sign we ever saw. We followed the trail off to the right even though it headed away from the stream. After about 15 minutes, we ended up in an open field with about a half dozen cows and knew something wasn’t right. We headed back, actually making a loop and ended up back at the bridge. We just considered this extra mile as our warm up. We stayed by the stream this time, but weren’t really on a trail. Eventually we ended up back on the trail and recognized the place where we had gone off to the right. This time we went left, through the green cattle gate that didn’t look like a trail, but more like--private property. Would it kill them to put a sign there, marked TR731, with an arrow pointing to the left? Learn from our mistake; go to the left, through the green gate! The trail was steep, narrow, and very muddy from yesterday’s rain. It followed closely near, but well above the creek. It was a good distance down to the cascading pocket water. We kept pressing on up the trail. I was carrying the backpack with the lunches, my small camera, and six bottles of water. Scott had a can a bear spray clipped to his belt, which we fortunately never needed, but my wife was happy he had it. He decided not to carry the pistol and I was glad it wasn‘t in the backpack! We wore our wading boots, which made for interesting hiking on the muddy trail, and planned to wet wade. I couldn’t image actually wearing waders on the hike. It was the second day of fall, but with the walking, it was plenty warm. After a quick stop I peeled off my nylon jacket and long-sleeved shirt and was wearing just my shorts and a T-shirt. One hour and 45 minutes after passing through the green gate, we were overlooking the meadow.
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It looked much like the picture in the magazine. I quickly noticed the cows in the meadow and wondered what path they took to arrive at such a great place. We decended to the meadow and immediately saw several fish head for cover. We had already realized there was no way we would make it to the second, third, and fourth meadow and really have time to fish. We decided to fish a bit of the pocket water below the end of the meadow. Scott took the first pool and I moved downstream to the next. He quickly hooked and lost a fish on a nymph in that first pool. I went with the recommended Charlie Boy hopper and a green-bodied, beadhead caddis pupa dropper. Casting wasn’t easy, but halfway through the pool I saw a fish come up to the hopper. That 12-inch brown was the first fish I ever caught on a hopper. I also lost a fish in the pool where Scott started. The meadow was calling us and we moved back upstream to face the challenge. Very clear, still, and deep is how I would describe the water at the tail end of the meadow. You could see fish, but they quickly moved for cover when you approached the stream. Farther up in the meadow, we found some current that formed nice pools against the bends of the meandering stream. In one stretch of current my hopper disappeared and when I raised the rod, I had another brown; this time on the caddis dropper. That would be the last fish of the day for us. We ate lunch in the meadow and talked with two guys who were on the return hike to the campground after spending two days in meadows two, three, and four. They said they had the water all to themselves and caught fish up to 18 inches. We fished the pocket water above the meadow, but it was smaller than below, not as deep, and more overgrown; never had a strike. Not surprisingly, the hike out went quicker, but it still wasn’t easy! If I went again, I would take two days and overnight camp in the upper meadow area. Of course, that means carrying in more gear. If you can only go for one day, I would fish a lot more of the pocket water below the first meadow.
Friday was scheduled to be a non-fishing day. We had tickets for the Cumbres and Toltec scenic train ride. This is America’s longest and highest narrow gauge railroad. After a big breakfast, we headed to the station and waited to board the train. Departure was scheduled for 10:00 AM for the 50+ mile trip from Antonito, CO to Chama, NM. The train would take us on the westward run and a bus would bring us back. With a stop for lunch in Osier, CO, we were due back at about 4:30 PM and would cross the Colorado-New Mexico border about 10 times. We found out the Lobato tressel across Wolf Creek had been damaged by a fire, so our trip would be 11 miles shorter, ending in Cumbres, CO. This was a very relaxing trip with great scenery and the train staff sharing interesting historical facts about the railroad. The tracks never ran straight for long. It was back and forth, back and forth to allow the train to climb in altitude.
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We passed through two tunnels and over a few trestles. The Toltec Gorge was beautiful and we eventually were at 10,015 feet. You saw the landscape change throughout the ride. First the sage brush, then the Ponderosa pines, and eventually the deep green of the spruce trees with the contrasting golden aspens.
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 For a long stretch of the route, you could look down on the glistening waters of New Mexico’s Rio de Los Pinos. At one point we spotted two guys casting in the water below and they stopped long enough to Image.
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There’s something about riding the train I find very relaxing. This is a definite must do! We ended up back at the train station in Antonito at 3:30 PM and decided that since our 5-day fishing licenses were still good, a few hours of fishing back on the Conejos River was in order.
We pulled over by another one of those ladders for crossing the fence. Quickly we put on our boots and rigged up. I went with the same 2-nymph set-up from Wednesday: the 20-incher stonefly and the beadhead, flashback pheasant tail nymph. The path to the water below took us down a steep bank. We moved with caution, not wanting to take a tumble. To this point, other than one hook in Scott’s finger, the trip had been accident free. A second fence down near the water provided an unexpected challenge, but we managed to pass through the strands without snagging our gear. You could hear the water and the sound was inviting. Passing through a line of trees, we found ourselves at an S-turn in the river. The late afternoon sun was bright, with a lot of glare on the water. Scott took the deep pool off to the left and I took the pocket water upstream from him. It was 4:30 PM when we started. On the second cast my indicator hesitated as it drifted between two large rocks. The hookup seemed solid, but I was concerned when the fish headed downstream again toward the fast water. I wasn’t actually in the water and this allowed me to quickly move downstream along the shoreline with the fish. I kept the rod high and quickly had the line on the reel. I managed to get downstream from the fish and kept him from reaching the fast current. I could see the yellow side of another nice brown as I turned the fish toward me in the knee-deep water. He kept a nice bend in my rod, but I eventually brought the fish to the shallow water for a quick picture and release.
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Around the bend in the stream there was a long pool with the best looking water toward the far side. I waded out to mid stream where the water was thigh-deep and the current picked up. You could see the drop off in the water and another few steps toward the far bank would have you in water deeper than would be safe. I picked up two more browns here; one each on the stonefly and the pheasant tail. We continued working up the stream and eventually ended up on the far side. We found a place where we could wade back across, then climbed up the bank, and through the fence to the road. It was 7:00 PM and the light was fading, but we were only 100 yards from where we parked the truck. All-in-all, a good two and one-half hours on the stream--at least for me. Six fished hooked and three nice browns landed.
Once back at the hotel, we walked to the restaraunt next door and ended the day with a good meal and a cold beer. We knew the next morning would start early and consist of a 600+ mile drive back to Oklahoma. The 11 and one-half hour drive was uneventful. The trip was a definite success. We fished four streams and caught fish in all of them. Scott caught his Rio Grande cutthroat and saw his first success with a fly rod. I doubt he will completely give up the spinning rod and bait, but an old dog learned some new tricks. I could see myself going back to the Conejos River and the Rio de Los Pinos looked good from the train. Thanks to our wives for clearing us off on this adventure. Next year--maybe northern CO for some Greenback cutthroats, but I’m open for suggestions.

Thanks- Ken

Last edited by flyfishermann1955 on 10/11/10 09:46, edited 1 time in total.

rbaileydav
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Posts: 82
Joined: 12/20/04 19:00

Fishing Trip: Northern NM & Southern CO

#2

Post by rbaileydav »

rio costillo is absolutely gorgeous and it is as pretty as i remembered it but those rio grande cutts are some of the mostly slashingly quick strike artists on a dry fly that i have ever seen. so fast i bet i didnt even average a mjor league respectable .250 on hookups. oh well thanks for bringing back wonderful memories


DD

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