White Sulphur Springs and the Smith River

We love discovering new hot springs. So when Jack needed to fish the Smith River in Montana, we chose to fish a spot that was near White Sulphur Springs. Before we left Livingston, we stopped at the fly fishing museum there, which had been recommended to us by the couple, Sherry and Doug, we met at our last campsite. Sherry is on the board of the museum, and she gave us a tour of the place. Some amazing flies and antique fishing equipment there. We ended up joining the International Federation of Fly Fishers, which is an educational and conservational organization that sponsors the museum and a lot of other programs. (Jack is excited because as a member he will receive a great fly fishing magazine every month.)

The drive to White Sulphur was scenic, through valleys and ranches and sagebrush. We saw whitetail deer, mule deer, and a few antelope along the way. We also stopped to photograph a neat roadside statue of a mountain man, waving at us. These fur trappers and traders arrived in this area not long after Lewis and Clark passed through here. We had to wave back--felt like a farewell wave to bygone years of the West.

Thunder Jack

 A tiny town that we drove through had a sign on an old stone building saying "Bank" and "Bar"--interesting combo that we also had to photograph.

Cash a check, buy a beer.

In White Sulphur Springs, we booked a room at the old spa motel for two nights. It's a very good value, maybe the best we've ever found. The price (cheap) of the room allows you access to all the pools any time (they're open from 6 am until 11 pm). This is a beautiful hot spring with three separate pools. The temperature of the one right next to our room is 102 degrees F, about the same temperature as our hot tub back home. This pool has a waterfall, water jets in each corner and mood lighting for evening and night time soaks. On one wall is a large mural depicting Indians gathering and bathing in the hot springs long before the white man showed up. The temperature in the second pool, another large pool, is 96 degrees F. This pool is also surrounded by a large mural depicting all the wildlife that can be found in Montana. The artist who did these murals was pretty good. Beyond the second pool in a separate room is the third pool, whose temperature is 106 degrees F. This is a smaller pool and when you open the door to this pool, you are walking into a steam bath. We can only stay in this pool about 10 minutes. At night, blue-pink mood lighting is in the water and shimmers down a walkway leading to other guest rooms. When we awoke this morning around 7:30 am (July 31st), we headed for the 102 degree pool to get in the mood for Jack's fishing adventure on the upper Smith River.

View from the doorway of our room. This pool is 102 deg. F

This is the 96 deg. F pool,

The 106 deg F steam bath and pool.

 

The 102 pool again. Our room 16 is on the left.

Fishing the Smith River (by Jack)

Turns out that this is the third Smith River that I've fished in Top 100 Trout Streams in America. The first was the Smith River near Martinsville, Virginia where Carol grew up. This is a nice tailwater river and I fished it often when Carol and I would visit her Mom and Dad. The second Smith River is in Northern California above Eureka. This is a beautiful river but, as my fishing buddy Bud Hennessey and I discovered, it is a river where all the rainbow trout leave to spend their time in the Pacific Ocean and only return once a year as steelhead trout.

The Smith River in Montana is most famous for its guided float tours along an isolated 60 mile long canyon. There is a lottery that you must enter once a year to get a permit to float it, and then you must use a state approved guide to float the river. Wading access to the river is almost nonexistent. But there is one isolated spot upstream of Camp Baker (where lucky lottery fishermen put in with their guide to float and fish the canyon) that can be accessed and fished from the bank. Carol and I targeted that spot and got up early so I could grab a good spot on the river, which is about a 25 mile drive from White Sulphur, 15 of which is along a dirt road. No problem getting there with our RoadTrek equipped with the "aggressive" tires our mechanic in Covington, VA put on for us!

When we arrived I was surprised and pleased to see that I was the first (and only) fisherman on the stream. No trout were rising and, having learned my lesson, I immediately tied two very small (size 20) nymphs onto a 12-foot 7x leader. It wasn't long until I had my first strike. Unfortunately, that strike and the next three strikes led to the fish getting off. Long distance releases like this are OK, but you can't tell which nymph the trout hit on. Moving downstream I found a very deep hole and a long bend in the river near a towering cliff. I knew there had to be trout in there somewhere. I noticed one or two trout rise to take a nymph and noted it was around 11:00 am, the time when the mayfly called a Pale Morning Dun (PMD for short) sometimes starts coming off the river. I tied on an emerger pattern and the "Usual" pattern the guide I met on the Armstrong Spring Creek gave me. A long cast up against the cliff resulted in hooking a big jumping rainbow trout that was around 14-16 inches long. Another Top 100 river checked off my list.

A Pale Morning Dun is on the cover of my new IFFF Flyfisher magazine. All mayflies have 4 states: The egg, the nymph, the dun and the spinner. This picture shows a mature male PM. What appears as a red cap are the male's large eyes so he can find a female and grab her with his large front legs. The female lays her eggs in the water and then dies (becomes a spinner). The male dies also and some become spinners. The eggs hatch and the larva (nymphs) grow by eating moss and other stuff found on the stream bottom. A year later the nymph rises to the surface (becomes an emerger), dries its wings and flies off. This dun changes once more into the mature adult shown above. All this happens in one year. The male and female adults have no digestive system and no mouth. So they can't bite you. Their sole purpose in the day or two they live outside the water is reproduction. Wonderful and strange.

Here I am on the Smith River fishing with nymphs that look like the PMD nymph.

I fished a bit more downstream but, as it was getting hot and I saw no more trout rising, I quit fishing and went back to the RoadTrek. I had planned to fish a tributary stream called Sheep Creek with the hope that I could catch some brook trout for dinner. My Delorme topo map book is an old (1997) edition and even though it indicated a fishing access point on Sheep Creek, it doesn't seem to exist anymore. Carol and I decided to head back to the hot spring for soaking.     

Fishing Armstrong Spring Creek with Swans

We drove to Livingston on Monday (July 28th) so Jack could check out the two famous (among flyfishermen, at least) spring creeks that flow alongside the Yellowstone River about 6 miles south of Livingston. We already located a KOA campground in the area and decided to stay there for two nights. We stopped first at the Nelson Spring Creek to check in and pay the stream fee. [Carol aside: These streams are on private land and the rancher owners charge a fee and limit the number of rods per day on the stream. You have to reserve your space months in advance. The creeks are very clear, cold and grassy and full of wily, big trout who are notoriously difficult to catch, because they have all kinds of natural bugs in the water to eat. People come from all over the country, indeed the world, to test their fishing skills in these spring creeks. The pressure was on.]

Jack purchased some flies, got some tips on fishing these spring creeks, and made arrangements to have a guide for the evening of  August 2nd. Then we headed over to Armstrong Spring Creek to check in, pay the stream fee and scout out the stream. Finally we drove to the KOA and settled in for the night.

Morning Fishing the Armstrong Spring Creek (by Jack)

I wanted to get up early so I could get a good spot on the river. We arose at 6 am, had breakfast and headed over to the Armstrong. I was the first fisherman on the river.

As I entered the river I noticed off to the left two big blobs of "foam" on the far bank downstream about 100 yards. I had already rigged up with a long 12-foot, 6x  leader with two very small (size 20) nymphs. I waded up to the head of a riffle and cast in. The wind was blowing upstream, quite strong. It seemed that every time I cast, my flies would end up blowing about 5 feet upstream and creating a big bend in my line that caused my flies to drag. Dragging flies through the water is a real no-no and tells the trout that these are imitations. Trout that have been hooked several times won't touch them, let alone eat them.

To try and get a drag-free drift, I waded into the middle of the stream, where the fish usually are feeding, so I could cast into the wind and hopefully get something that resembled a drag free drift. No such luck. After numerous attempts, I had no trout taking my flies. Once the wind suddenly picked up during a cast and blew the flies back at me. I got tangled in my own flies and fishing line. The smallest nymph got stuck in my middle finger and the other on my wader straps at my back. I had forgotten to crimp the barbs on my hooks, so I had to pull the one out of my finger, barb and all. Ouch! The one stuck to my back strap would not come out so I had to cut my leader and tie on new flies.

While I was tying on the new flies, I noticed about 7 fisherman arriving on the water. I mistakenly thought that only 6 rods were allowed on this stream per day. Turned out 12 rods were allowed. So here we were lined up on the river separated by 100 to 150 feet apart. Trout began to rise to the surface taking emerging nymphs. They were not taking mine and I noticed that they were not taking the flies of other fishermen, except one. This fellow looked like a professional fishing guide. He had no trouble casting across the wind and he was hooking fish about every 3 to 5 casts.

My feet got so cold that I had to leave the stream for awhile. When I got back in, I had lost my place and had to move downstream to where I noted no one was fishing. I soon found out why. The two blobs I thought were foam were now big swans, and they were not too happy that I had invaded their space. About every 5 minutes they pretended to take off, beating their wings on the water, then circling back, leaving waves and feathers all around. It quickly became obvious to me that they didn't want me around and planned to scare off all the trout I was trying to catch. I gave up and moved further downstream. The fellow I thought was a guide continued to catch trout.

The two white blobs were two very large wild swans.

Downstream I had no luck either. I had been in the water almost 6 hours and finally headed back to have lunch. When I arrived at the picnic shelter, Carol was talking to the fellow that I thought might be a guide. Turned out he was a great person, also from Virginia (!), and he WAS a flyfishing guide. He too had come out of the water with nearly frozen feet. He was a schoolteacher and basketball coach from Loudoun County, Virginia. He used to live in West Virginia and was a full-time guide on the Elk River, where I had fished a decade or so ago. Now he still guides part-time on the Elk although he had moved back to Virginia to be a full-time teacher and coach. When I asked him what he was using, he responded that he was using a dry fly that he called a "Usual." I had no idea what he was talking about so he opened one of his many fly boxes and showed me all the variations he tied of a mayfly called a Pale Morning Dun (PMD for short). He even gave me one.

We chatted for a while and then it seemed that all the other fishermen decided it was time to have lunch too. Carol made me a sandwich and we sat on the picnic table benches with eight fishermen, swapping tales. The guide went off to eat elsewhere with his Dad and a friend who were upstream at another table.

After lunch I decided to relax a while and wait until later afternoon when a small mayfly called a "Sulphur" was supposed to be hatching off the stream. Carol and I drove up river and noted the guide and his father and friend were at the second parking area. We continued upstream where the stream was smaller and I fished a grasshopper imitation, with no luck, no bites, no nothing.

The upper stream is small and the surrounding grass is full of grasshoppers. But no takes on my imitations.

Evening Fishing the Armstrong Spring Creek

Around 5 pm Carol and I drove back down to the second parking area and noted no one was there now. Trout were rising and the wind had died down. I assumed the rising fish were feeding on tiny Sulphur mayflies emerging from the water. I tied on one of the tiny size 22 Sulphur imitations I bought at Nelson Spring Creek flyshop the day before. I remembered the woman (who will be my fishing guide on Nelson on August 2nd) telling me that the trick is to sight a feeding fish and then drift the fly down to the fish. I sighted several feeding fish near the bank. I took her advice and floated my fly down to the first fish. Almost to my amazement (and Carol's), the trout took my fly and I landed a 16-17 inch Brown trout. Carol was watching nearby and took photos.

Fish on! (at last)

While my face doesn't show it, I am totally elated. This is a good sized Brown trout.

This is the tiny fly I caught the brown trout on.

I continued to fish and was later joined by the guide's dad in the same big hole. I hooked a very large trout, but that one got off. Then I caught another Brown trout in the 14-15 inch range. Both trout were caught on a size 22 Sulphur imitation (a very tiny fly). I quit fishing around 7:30 pm when the sun got near the horizon and the glare on the water made it impossible to follow my fly. We packed up and headed back to the KOA to celebrate with cookies, a glass of wine, and some reheated pizza. For me it was a perfect ending. Many experienced trout fisherman come to these spring creeks from all over the world and don't catch any fish. Thanks to the advice of the woman from Nelson Spring Creek and the guide from the West Virginia Elk River, I wasn't one of them.

The Beaverhead River, Bannack Ghost Town, and Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway

We arrived in Dillon in the afternoon of July 24th. This town lies along the Beaverhead River, next on Jack's fishing list. Dillon is a well laid out town and we easily found the visitor's center and Chamber of Commerce. Outside the center was a masterful bronze sculpture of two cowboys or ranchers on horseback shaking hands, which gives the impression they are sealing a contract. We located a nearby flyshop and a nearby KOA that had access to the Beaverhead. We headed first to the flyshop where a lone woman was on the phone closing a guided trip deal. We noticed that a driftboat guide for  one day was going for $475 for two fishers and $415 if one fisher. Jack thinks these prices are ridiculously high and after waiting about 15 minutes for the lady to get off the phone, we decided to go to the KOA, which had a nice spot with access to the Beaverhead.

When a handshake was all that was needed to close a deal.

Beaverhead Evening of Fishing  beside the KOA (by Jack)

After claiming our KOA spot, Carol and I decided to first drive upstream to investigate water conditions and fishing access spots, and see the large Clark Canyon Reservoir Dam on the river. The dam is a large earthen dam that is there solely to collect and control water for irrigation of farmlands downstream. The dam does not generate electric power. The river was full to its banks and flowed fast through the prairie, making it appear to be a fast flowing canal. What I saw reminded me of the Owens River near Bishop in east central California. There the Owens River channels most of the creeks and mountain snow melt and pipes it to Los Angeles as drinking water in a canal and pipeline (another case of the long tentacles of a city altering the country landscape).
 
The Beaverhead has a reputation of being VERY hard to catch fish, particularly for a bank/wading fisherman like me, due to deep fast water and thick overhanging willows. My guide books call it a "trophy water," meaning it has large fish that are very hard to catch, and go to great lengths to emphasize how tough the fishing is, even for experienced anglers. Such a river is mostly fished with nymphs from boats. About 15 miles downstream there is another diversion dam that takes about half the water out of the stream for irrigation purposes.

Our KOA is even further downstream. The river looked better here except it was excessively full of floating river-bottom moss. Moss constantly gets on your lines and flies, requiring you to stop after every cast to remove it from your line and flies. Nevertheless, I found a nice spot on the river where trout were chasing rising nymphs. I fished for about an hour and and had one take that immediately broke my line. I decided to call it a night and make a new plan.

Dam Moss

In the morning Carol and I headed to the Poindexter Slough, a small tributary of the Beaverhead, just above Dillon and 22 miles below the dam. Here the water ran very calm and clear with a wavy moss bottom and moss floating by. Several times I could see trout taking nymphs, but I was unable to catch any. Very wary trout.

Jack and Carol starting the morning fishing and birding at Poindexter Slough.

Look at this! Wavy moss all over the bottom of the stream.

After lunch we went to a fly shop for advice. I got a batch of recommended smaller nymphs and some ideas on where to go to fish that evening. While there, Carol bought herself a Japanese Tenkara fly rod. The latest "zen" minimalist fly fishing craze (actually an ancient Japanese fishing technique that seems to be catching on here). It reminds Carol and me of the days when we were kids fishing with a line tied to the small end of a long bamboo pole. But, hey, now maybe Carol will get hooked on fly fishing.

Wow! Huckleberry ice cream. This is better than fishin' the Beaverhead!

That evening we headed up river to the spot where the fellow in the fly shop told us to go. Again fish were rising on the far bank. Cast after cast  produced only one strike that broke off my top nymph and dropper nymph. We fished until it was dark and we both were chilled, and then we headed back to the KOA.

The evening river access. A wet wade even before you get to the river.

 We discussed the fishing problems here, and decided to head for the next rivers, near Livingston. Maybe we'll come back through this area and try this river again later. [Carol: Jack could probably catch fish here if he sprung for a guide--and maybe a new fly rod, and different line, and different flies--but he doesn't want to spend the money because he doesn't really like the river that much. Too much like an irrigation canal.]

Carol writing now while Jack naps. The next morning (July 26th) we packed up and headed off, planning a side trip to tour the nearby ghost town of Bannack and drive the Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway. Bannack Ghost Town is a state park. It's a well-preserved gold mining boom town from the 1860s, and was actually the capital of Montana Territory for awhile, before it became a state. It's way out in the middle of nowhere now. Richer gold strikes were found elsewhere and finally everybody in the whole town just left for greener pastures. The buildings are mostly in great shape, for their age. It's a classic Western frontier town, with board sidewalks and a dirt main street lined with wooden and log buildings. Could easily be a movie set.

Bannack Main Street

The only brick building in town was once the courthouse.

Fancy staircase inside the courthouse.

With a nice view of the town.

It was a rip-roaring place at one time! In fact, at one point a group of vigilantes hanged the sheriff and two deputies -- the gallows is still there, visible from the main street. The sheriff was discovered to be the mastermind of a criminal gang of highwaymen and robbers terrorizing the countryside. They called themselves, with a certain ironic touch, "The Innocents." (Their password to each other: "I am innocent.") Bullets flying through these streets on a Saturday, or even a Sunday, night was commonplace, not even sneezed at. As one woman wrote in her journal at the time, everybody is too drunk to shoot straight anyway.

The only church in town.

We had a nice afternoon wandering through the town. All the doors are unlocked, so you can pretty much go anywhere you want. The nicest building in town was the Masonic lodge, which had the schoolhouse on the bottom floor and the lodge upstairs. This is still somehow an active "historic" Masonic lodge. The lodge is completely furnished and decorated with Masonic furniture and artifacts from the late 1800s. The carpet, covered with Masonic symbols, is original. A large portrait of George Washington in his Mason's clothing hangs on the wall. An older Mason was there giving tours of the lodge and explaining all the items. This lodge is supported by other lodges all over the area and once a year they have a meeting and over 200 Masons crowd into this relatively small room in a ghost town. Very cool.

Masonic Temple above and schoolhouse below.

All this is authentic Masonic furniture and decor of the period.

Next, leaving Bannack, we drove over the scenic byway, heading up to the Butte area where we would spend the night. This road closes to auto traffic on December 1 and becomes exclusively a snowmobile road into and over the mountains. It starts with rolling brown treeless ranchlands drained by Grasshopper Creek, and then becomes steep tree-covered granite mountains, the headwaters of the Wise River. Jack had to stop and look at the river a few times. His kind of trout waters--small, with boulders and tumbling rapids. Snowcovered peaks appear again. You're never too far away from snow in Montana, even at the end of July, it seems. The Scenic Byway was scenic, as advertised! (Forgot to take photos, for some reason.)

Pulled into Butte and decided to use a $45 motel coupon for a break from camping. This was at America's Best Value Inn. We haven't stayed at one of these before, and it met all our requirements--good Wifi, relatively quiet, comfy bed, and 6 pillows! Also had a good flatscreen TV with free movies. We watched the latest Star Trek movie.  Our loyal blog followers might remember last year's Epic Journey blog, when Jack got thrown out of the theater showing this movie, when the movie staff thought he was illegally photographing the movie screen with his iPad. (He wasn't--he was trying to photograph the fancy theater reclining seats for our blog. [Jack aside: Besides, it was Memorial Day, nice way to treat a vet.] So he finally got to see the movie...

The Nez Perce, Bighole River, Brookies and Graylings

Carol and I left our mountain retreat on the West Fork of the Bitteroot and traveled up the East Fork along route 43 to the little village of Wisdom, Montana to fish the Big Hole River. We took this route for two reasons. First we wanted to miss the city of Missoula and its 20 mile-long strip mall. Second... I forgot the other reason.

The Big Hole National Battlefield is on the North Fork of the Big Hole River and we stopped by to learn about the battle that was fought there August 9-10, 1877. This was a very nice park and the movie that explained what had happened was disconcerting. This was not America's finest hour. The 7th Infantry led by Colonel John Gibbon attacked the Nez Perce village at dawn and were ordered to fire low and into the teepees of the sleeping Indians. The 7th Infantry killed many women and children, as well as braves, in this surprise attack. Many braves escaped, re-formed, then charged the 7th Infantry, killing many of the soldiers. The few soldiers that were left dug in and held off the braves. The counterattack by the braves allowed their wounded to escape capture. Click here for more information on the plight of the Nez Perce and this battle.

Wisdom is a small, quaint, prairie cow town set on the upper reaches of the Big Hole. There is a small grocery store, a small trinket/art store that served latte-style coffee and had wifi, and a couple of restaurant/bars. Given our experience with the Bitterroot, Jack wanted to fish the upper part of the river. Plus, 20 miles upstream in the next, even smaller, town there was a hot spring that William Clark visited on the return of the Lewis and Clark expedition. After lunch we decided to stay at a free (donations suggested) American Legion campground where several motorcyclists were camped. Jack had been reading the Montana fishing regulations and noted that he could keep up to 20 brook trout each day. Brook trout are not native to Montana and apparently the state would like to reduce their numbers. If you have ever eaten trout, you might know that brook trout (which are actually a char, not a true trout) are delicious. So Jack decided he would keep any brook trout he caught and we would eat them. Jack suited up for fishing while Carol went birding, took photos, and worked on her latest book project.

Fishing the Big Hole at Wisdom

Our camp lay on the west bank of the Big Hole. A bridge crossed the river and led to the town. Fences and barbed wires were run on all four corners of the bridge to prevent cattle from entering the road. I had thought that the banks of all Montana trout streams were fenced up to 10 feet away from the river to prevent cattle from entering the stream and to provide access to the stream by fisherman. Apparently this is only the case on the sections of the Yellowstone River (outside the National Park) that I fished several years ago.

Knowing that the highway bridge was state property and once in a stream that fishing rules in Montana allow you to fish any river, I climbed over the fence, being careful to stay on the bridge abutment, and dropped into the water. I waded downstream and found a good spot to fish. It didn't take me too long before I had a hard fighting fish on a fly that was reminiscent of my "Big Gaudy" from last year's trip. To my surprise, the fish was a 12-inch brook trout so I kept it. Because I had stopped killing trout years ago, I only had my net with me to carry the fish. So I decided to stop fishing and head back to camp. Later that night after meeting and chatting with our motorcyclist friends at the campground, Carol and I enjoyed dining on that brook trout. Only thing missing was a nice cool glass of Chardonnay.

I caught the 12-inch brook trout on this fly. Note the bunch of white fuzzy material attached to the body.

The Big Hole in Wisdom is fairly large. I could reach the far bank with my flyrod and "Big Gaudy" fly.

The next day we headed headed north to Jackson in search of more Big Hole waters to fish and to test out the hot springs. The Clark expedition had broken all their thermometers so Clark came up with the idea of hanging a piece of meat from a stick into the water to test how long it took to cook through. Turns out the temperature of the spring is about 150 degrees F. It's cooled to 105 degrees F for soaking.

Before we soaked, we checked out a spot for fishing. All land looked like it was surrounded by private property. As Carol and I stood on a bridge on a dirt road puzzling over how I could gain access to the water, a ranching family came by in an ATV. I waved, and Carol stopped them and asked the rancher if we could fish from their property. The rancher graciously gave us his permission. It's really nice having Carol scouting places for me to fish. [Carol: I got excited at the prospect of actually eating some fresh trout! It's been YEARS since Jack has kept a trout, and brook trout are my favorite eating!]

We are about 20 miles upstream here. I waded in on the left of the bridge.

The Big Hole is much smaller near Jackson. Great water for brook trout.

I fished the stream for about 2 hours and caught a bunch of brook trout on a grasshopper imitation. I threw 6 fish on the bank for supper. After I finished fishing I could only find 3 of the 6 fish. I suspect when I was not looking, some bird or animal took off with the other 3 fish.

These were destined for our stomachs, after we got a chilled bottle of Chardonnay.

After fishing, Carol and I soaked in the hot spring. Ahhhh... A fellow came up to me and asked how I did fishing. Turned out that this fellow was a high school teacher from Spokane, Washington and was involved with a biology arctic graylings genetics project which involved 19 kids from his class. He explained to me that arctic graylings were in the nearby inlet and outlet streams of the Miner Lakes about 10 miles up into the mountains. These lakes and the grayling trout are left over from the last Ice Age and these fish are found only in a few spots in the U.S., mostly in Alaska. These are apparently the only river grayling (called "fluvial grayling") left in the lower 48 (there are lake grayling in other places).

Arctic Grayling about to be released back into the water.

Fishing the lake outlet stream in the morning.

I've always wanted to catch a grayling and Carol wanted to see one, as they have a spectacular large dorsal fin, like a sailfish. So we decided to stay another day and travel up to those lakes.The 10 mile dirt road was slow going, but well worth the trip. The place is beautiful. We found a path leading to the inlet stream for the lakes and Carol and I hiked the path. I almost immediately caught a grayling. Unfortunately, it was a female and so did not have the big dorsal fin that the males have. I hooked several more before dark, but they all got off. We spent a very cold night in the Roadtrek covered with three blankets. I tried fishing the outlet in the morning, but was not able to catch another grayling. Maybe in our next trip we will return to the Miner Lakes.

Then we took off in the RoadTrek and headed to Dillon to fish the Beaverhead River, next on my "bucket list."

Lolo Hot Springs and the Bitterroot River

Lolo Hot Springs had a certain fascination with us, as that was where Norman Maclean's brother Paul went to gamble in the movie A River Runs Through It. Turns out that gambling casinos are everywhere in Montana, since gambling is legal. They're at every gas station and on just about every corner (this is no exaggeration). The must do well for the state as there are no sales taxes in Montana. The hot springs were nice and very inexpensive. For $6 (all day senior rate) we got to swim in a 90 degree large swimming pool filled with mineral water, and soak in a 106 -degree indoor pool. Very nice and soothing. The trip up the mountain was beautiful and the rock formations around the hot springs were amazing. In one formation it looked like someone had carved a person sitting in a chair. On the way up and back a stream ran alongside the road, beckoning to Jack to come fish it. He resisted because the Bitterroot was next on his list.

The Bitterroot River - Fishing in the Missoula Suburbs - Bitterroot redemption

We started our trip to the Bitterroot from I-90, passing what we hoped would be the western and least travelled part of the city of Missoula. That didn't work; we had to mend our way through heavy traffic for miles, stopping at every stoplight.

We stopped at the second or third fishing access point so I could check out the river. The road to the access point was long and filled with the worst man-made speed bumps I have ever encountered. When we arrived at the parking lot I noticed a pickup with the word "Redneck" framed on the back window. Not a good sign, I thought to myself. As we approached the river I could see the tracks of ATVs. As we got nearer to the river, the roar of several ATVs greeted us. Seems like rednecks, pickups and ATVs go together. I don't like ATVs because they are dangerous and noisy. They certainly have no place on a Top 100 trout stream. I told Carol that I did not want to fish the river at this spot, so we moved on upriver.

As we travelled upriver we both noticed that we were passing a 20 mile long strip mall -- the suburbs of Missoula. This famous river was out there somewhere, but we couldn't see it.  Finally we passed over a bridge and got a glimpse of the river. A mile or so later we found a campground near Hamilton that had access to the Bitterroot. (But we were still in a strip-mall!)

As it was getting late in the day, I geared up and headed down to the river. This is a big wide river at this point with a swift current and the bottom is covered with football-sized boulders. I fished until dark with no strikes. No caddis flies or any other aquatic insects were coming off the river. I discussed my discouragement with this river with Carol. We agreed I would get up early the next morning, and try again for two hours. If I had no strikes by then, we would travel upstream, after stopping at a flyshop to discuss the fishing of this river.

Me fishing, and fishing, and fishing... the Bitterrroot River near Hamilton

I tried most every pattern I had, and all those that had worked on previous streams, for two hours in the early morning with no strikes. The guide at the flyshop we stopped at in Hamilton (there were at least four flyshops in this small town) told me the fishing was "off" last night but some of the guides had better luck further upstream.

The West Fork of the Bitterroot looked more like the kind of river I like to fish. There is an irrigation dam about 22 miles up the fork and I planned to fish above that dam and past the lake behind it, where the river was small and wild. It was a beautiful drive, finally far from the suburbs of Missoula. We found a nice little National Forest campground with hardly anyone there, with huge old Ponderosa pines. We took a site ($4) and I geared up and headed to the stream.

The irrigation dam on the West Fork of the Bitterroot. We continued on upstream of this dam.

Our campsite on the West Fork of the Bitterroot among the huge Poderosa Pine Trees.

This is my kind of trout fishing. A small, crystal-clear stream in the wilderness. Carol accompanied me and took photos of me fishing in the first hole. I almost immediately caught a 12-inch cutthroat trout. A beautiful native trout with two bright red gashes under its throat. The fish fought hard, ran my reel three times, and jumped out of the water. Carol took a picture of the trout jumping out of the water.

Me casting upstream into a nice pool.

Carol captured the moment when my 12-inch cutthroat jumped out of the water.

I continued to fish this wonderful little river for about 3 hours. I caught at least 10 more cutthroat trout in the 7- to 10-inch range and 2 whitefish in the 12-14 inch range. I used a barbless hook and returned all trout to the stream. We saw lots of wild life and the painted rock mountains were something to behold. The Bitterroot had redeemed itself.

On the way back down we snapped these photos

Painted Rock Mountains

There were two bucks with big racks hanging out together on the road down. Carol snapped this one..

Where A River Runs Through It and the Beautiful Rock Creek

At first, we planned to fish the Smith River next, but Carol called the hot springs near the Smith to see if they had camping and was informed that the road from Helena to where we wanted to get on the Smith was closed for the weekend for a bridge replacement. The only other way in was a long and rough dirt road, so we changed our plans and decided to head west and fish the streams around Missoula first.

The Blackfoot River (Saturday July 19)

The great book A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean and the equally great movie created by Robert Redford tells a story of a minister's family living near Missoula and fishing the Blackfoot River. What really makes the book and movie great in my mind is how it tells the story of why people love fly fishing for trout.  As a longtime trout fisherman I had to go see the waters of the Blackfoot and maybe drop in a line even though the Blackfoot is not on my Top 100 list and even though the movie was not actually shot on this river. Carol and I carefully read through the book again and noted  the spots where Norman Maclean mentioned in his book that he, his dad and brother had fished. I already knew the Blackfoot had been neglected over the years, but local trout fisherman and Trout Unlimited have been making efforts to bring back this once great stream.

Our first stop took us along a stretch downstream of where the Macleans fished. We travelled along a dirt road (worse than the one in Surber) in hopes of finding a wilderness campsite. Unfortunately it was Saturday and all the campsites were full of rafters who were floating, or planning to float the river in rafts and inner tubes. The water was beautiful but I did not want to fish a river full of rafters. We stopped for lunch and took a few pictures. At one point Carol broke me up in laughter as a couple of rafts full of kids in their teens or twenties drifted by and she said, "Can you see if any are texting?"

The Blackfoot--Anyone texting?

We next stopped at a point near the Clearwater Bridge where the Clearwater Creek confluences with the Blackfoot. To get there we traveled along a dirt road fenced on both sides by farmers. Here and above the Blackfoot River is where Norman says in his book his family most often fished. Parking was a real problem as there were only 8 parking spaces and we got the last one.  As we walked down to the rivers, we encountered a large family with many children playing  in the sand. Where the other car occupants were we don't know. I presumed they were fishing the river and I didn't want to fish with a crowd. We made other attempts to get to the river but all were in vain. I left the river feeling a bit sad and pondering how things had changed since the time the Macleans had fished these waters. (Carol's note: Of course, if we were rafting instead of fishing this time, we would have loved it!)

Rock Creek

We drove a short ways east from the Blackfoot along I-90 in the later afternoon to the entrance to Rock Creek, next on my Top 100 list. Near the intersection we found a lovely campsite setting right along the river (Ekstrom's Stage Station Cabins and Campground). Carol noted during check-in that they had a nice restaurant set in an old log building being run by a family who were the seventh generation of owners--it was actually a 150-yr-old stagecoach building that they had dismantled and reassembled, along with several other old frontier log cabins, on this pretty site. The grandparents down to the grandkids all work here. We decided we would finally get to celebrate Carol's 65th birthday in style (the style we like!) with an evening dinner here. After setting up the RoadTrek, I suited up and made off to the river to fish. I managed to hook a small brown trout, but was discouraged by the lack of caddis flies that I had expected to come off in the evening.

Evening fishing just behind our campsite. Where's Waldo? Can you find him? (I.e., Jackie the Fisherman)

We had a great dinner of grilled rainbow trout washed down with a nice chilled glass of chardonnay. For dessert we shared a large piece of warm huckleberry pie topped with vanilla ice cream. We both love blueberry pie, but it was the first time we'd had huckleberry pie, that we can remember. (Huckleberries are related to blueberries and they grow wild in this area on the mountains--Carol and I both always called the little wild blueberries in our area "huckleberries" but it turns out they're really wild blueberries, not actual huckleberries.) As I write this Monday morning, we will soon head over to the restaurant for huckleberry pancakes. (Carol's note: they were FABULOUS, as was the old-fashioned sausage patty on the side! Doris, the grandmother of the Ekstrom family, is an inventive and wonderful cook,  having entered and won numerous national, state and regional cooking contests over the years. For example, she won the regional and state Pillsbury Bake Off in 1965, and qualified for the Nationals, with her Shrimp Boat Supper recipe. This is one among many of her cooking honors.)

The restaurant where we celebrated Carol's 65th birthday, in an old log stage station building.

Carol savoring a bite of huckleberry pie a la mode.

An interior view of the dining room that used to stable stagecoach horses.

The next morning (Sunday July 20) I visited the nearby flyshop (Fishermans Mercantile) to get advice and flies. The owner was really friendly and obviously wanted to help me select the best flies. He also told me I had not stayed late enough on the stream last night for the caddisfly hatch. He said they don't start coming off until it's almost dark. I made a note of that. He also recommended a spot up river that he liked to fish.

Carol went to church at a little community church that was recommended to her by the folks at the restaurant/campground. (While driving there, we passed an osprey nest on a telephone pole overlooking the river, with both parents and a nestful of babies in residence.) After church, we headed for Rock Creek and an afternoon of fishing.

Ma and Pa Osprey and their four babies posing for my camera.

Clinton Community Church, on a dirt road. Reminds me of back home, with its small and friendly congregation.

The drive up Rock Creek is wild and wonderful. It quickly became obvious to us that this creek  had been carved long ago by a glacier. Both sides of the creek were lined by scree (giant piles of rocks of about 150 pounds each and smaller), chewed up by the glaciers and strewn along the bank several hundred feet high. Of course there are massive fir trees along the river. A dirt road runs along the stream for 35 miles or so. This is the most gorgeous stream I have fished. It made me ponder what makes a great trout stream. Obviously beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, but for me a great trout stream is a fast flowing stream of crystal clear water set in a gorgeous wilderness with many accesses and few fisherman. It helps if the stream is filled with trout that are protected by the state. There are four species of trout in this river: rainbow, cutthroat, brown, and bull. You must immediately return all rainbow, cutthoat, and bull trout. You can only keep a few brown trout as long as they are less than 12 inches. It would be fair for me to say that I adored this stream. Far, far away from the madding crowds of cities and suburbs.

That's me in the river. Trout hang out behind those boulders. No other fishermen in sight.

Rock Creek treated me nicely. I first caught a 8-9 inch wild rainbow. Hard fighting little fellow. Then I caught an 18-19 inch rainbow who fought so hard that I wasn't sure who was going to win the fight. I hung on because I didn't want to lose my rod. Both of these fish were caught on a bead-headed purple prince nymph that the owner of the fly shop had recommended. A great afternoon.

Just below this spot is where I caught the large rainbow trout.

While driving back to our campsite, we passed another herd of Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep, this time with a ram in the herd. All the other groups had been just ewes and lambs, so it was neat to see the bigger horns on the male.

Roadside buddies.

To top off the day, when Carol and I returned to camp, I waited until very late in the evening to go back to the stream near the campsite. Just as evening sky started to turn into darkness, caddisflies started coming off the water. A well-placed dry fly that I got from the nice owner of the flyshop was dropped onto the water and immediately taken by a 14-16 inch brown trout. As I released this trout, I realized I had one of the best fishing days of my life.