11 September 2008
We woke up early to pack, grab a thermos of coffee, and head out from Wisdom to
have breakfast in about an hour in Anaconda on the way to Rock Creek. I make a
call from our hotel room to the ranch foreman who left us a note yesterday
shortly after 7 am (figuring they were cowboys and would be up early) but a
sleepy sounding little girl answered the phone and said her dad wasn’t home – so
I elected not to leave a message but will try to connect later. [By the way,
this is the day my cell phone goes off-line while it is being replaced for me at
work so I no longer have a cell phone for the rest of this trip.]
Heading over the mountains from the Big Hole River to Anaconda we encounter
below freezing temperatures and black ice on the road. Careful driving
required!!
At the Copper Bowl Café in Anaconda we have another great breakfast.
Reading the MT Standard newspaper we note Hegben Lake is
now down 5 feet and is falling 5 inches per day. People are being advised to get
their boats out of the lake as there is no end in sight at this point. Another
headline reads, “Man Shoots Car” – makes sense in Montana – great stuff out
here!!
We elect to head for the Clinton/Rock Creek area via I-90 and Deer Lodge rather
than go via the back roads. Turns out to be a great decision! We arrive at 10:50
am at the Rock Creek Mercantile (Carolyn & Doug Persico). We have two
cabins/rooms with them for the next two nights.
Doug shared the “on-hold” status of a proposed 36 homes site between Rock Creek
Merc. and the Clark Fork River (where Rock Creek terminates). Doug said he had
been fighting the development for three years on the permits. The key issue that
got a lot of attention was the intent to dig a big hole and put in a trout pond
that close to Rock Creek and the Clark Fork River. The local Trout Unlimited
chapter came “unglued” at this according to Doug. The County Commissioners won’t
accept the current plans until the stakeholders work out an agreement – Doug
won’t go along until the trout pond is gone from the activities. So there sits
the stalemate.
We picked up some more flies - hoppers, mahoganies, bwo emergers, mahogany
emergers, Oct Caddis, etc. Doug and Carolyn have a wonderful Golden Retriever,
Hawkeye – he apparently likes to sneak off and go swimming in Rock Creek! I
think this is something Goldens like to do as my pup from years ago was a
purebred Golden/river otter cross also.
Driving the rutted bumpy dirt road as we head from Rock Creek Merc upstream, we
encounter some wild mountain goats running around the homes – everything seems
to know when it is hunting season and when not.
While the road is rough, it is very slow going and we need 4WD in a couple places. We have almost 30 miles to cover to reach the top of Rock Creek – glad it was dry, if it had been raining, that road might have been quite treacherous and not just a long slog to drive. As we go along, it seems like every pullout has a rig in it – bummer! We reach an area that Doug mentioned to JR – there are two rigs in there but we decide to at least go look at the stream! Again the water is high this September so crossing the stream in this area looks to be out of the question. We find two gentlemen, quite separately fishing areas of this huge flat run. Looks like there is some room to expand but we would make it quite crowded if we all tried to go in. Coming back we meet up with a couple from the UK – Gary and Jaqui Bell. Gary runs a fishing syndicate in Southern UK (I have in-laws down by Bournemouth!) while Jacqui is in personnel recruitment (ie a headhunter of sorts). Jacqui has a pink Sage rod – the first I had ever seen. Apparently they made them in support of breast cancer research and prevention. Gary and Jacqui were heading next to West Yellowstone where they were going to stay at the …..One Horse Motel with Becky!!! (see notes from 3 Sep 2008 where we stayed there also!!). What a small world to meet up with a couple from the UK in Montana (and us from the west coast of the US) to find out we stay with the same folks in West Yellowstone!! We elected to head on up stream and leave this water to them – I hope they did well!
We continued on up stream and finally located an unoccupied section of Rock
Creek, spread out to fish (finally!), and suddenly we were into fish!!
We caught Cutts, Browns, and whitefish. AM kept hooking up with fish with the ever reliable parachute adams!!
AM explored a bit and located other branches of the stream in this section but we had stumbled into the best water.During the exploring, we did discover some interesting stream restoration approaches of using old cars as part of the rip rap for bank control. I really don't know the environmental significance of that but a few cars are probably OK and they are better there than trying to run around polluting the air. However, recycling them still looks like even the better solution but you do what you need to do I guess. Anyway if you need a few parts from the old cars we can help you locate them!!
JR finds a small chute and hooks up on a really nice Cutthroat. Then follows up
with a nice Brown trout….he’s finally got his Brown Trout photo for his IGFA
Trout Slam application. Yahoo!! And congratulations JR!
AB & GK also find several nice Cutthroat in this stretch. AB hikes downstream
looking for new water and finds the stream quite braided into little channels
with great pools and lots of wood. Spotting a small pool with a huge root wad
right in the middle he pitches a hopper pattern upstream of the wood. It drifts
around and behind the root wad…..WHAM….a big Cutty slams the hopper. He races
downstream in a flash, but quickly realizes he’s out of deep water, so he turns
and runs back upstream right under the root wad. Damn….this isn’t good. AB lays
the fly line in the downstream current trying to pull him out using the line. It
didn’t work; he’d already deposited my fly onto a root. Hummm…smart fish!
Searching other parts of the stream, AB finds several smaller and willing Cutts
and Browns that jump all over a parachute Adams.
Coming out at dusk, we elected to have dinner at Philipsville at the “Station”
Family Dining, Tavern, and Casino – pretty good food that guarantees continuous
and hefty paychecks for local cardiologists and EMT’s. Others in the dining area
were largely hunters and in the Tavern, I think is where you could find a
different kind of hunter and maybe even some willing huntees – not sure of that
however – might take a different kind of license than what I was carrying.
Rather than go back down the Rock Creek Road, we drove up through Philipsville
to I-90 and then to Clinton/ Rock Creek. It took about 80 minutes for the 79
miles so we made pretty good time.