spilunkr
08-10-2007, 11:14 AM
Wednesday I went a little further from home to fish, I visited the North Platte River. Specifically, I fished in the North Gate Canyon stretch in Colorado. The North Gate Canyon is about 20 miles long, with the first five miles in Colorado the rest is downriver in Wyoming. The North Platte River originates in North Park a large plateau area with an elevation of about 8,500’ surrounded by three mountain ranges. The mouth of the canyon where I fished is about 125 miles from my house.
The canyon area is in the Routt (CO) and Medicine Bow (WY) National Forests and is a popular area for a variety of outdoor activities. But, surprisingly there were no maintained access trails where I was, just a well worn footpath for the first half mile. The footpath petered out just before a large vertical rock face that disappeared into the very off colored water in the middle of the first set of rapids.
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b7d628b3127cceb8a1b203a06900000026109AZM2bZu2ba
Being my first time there, I wasn’t sure how best to proceed further at this point as the water looked to be over my waist high waders. It looked like I might be able to bypass the rock face by climbing up the canyon a couple hundred feet and going over the top of the rock face. But a half hour later I’d found that approach wasn’t working as I’d tried to get back down to the river in three spots only to find all three times I ended up with a sheer drop of 20’ to 30’ to get back down to the water.
In looking for a way back down to the water, I wound up back where I’d originally started climbing up. Based on the sign in information at the F S register in the parking lot, it was obvious there should be a way to continue, so I decided to try wading along the edge of the rock face even though I could not see the bottom. It turned out that the water was barely crotch deep close to the rock face. So I continued on for another mile or so before turning around to fish back upstream to the parking area.
As I said, the water was pretty off color, probably due to the rains in the higher elevations over the last 10 days. Water clarity was barely 2’. So it looked like it wound be an afternoon of nymphing as during the entire walk in I had not seen any insect activity, rises or in fact fish, although I had flushed 5 grouse, information which was filed away for hunting season. During five hours of fishing, I saw two pale morning duns, one unidentified grayish #14 mayfly and one rise.
I decided that big, black and ugly was likely the way to start prospecting. So I started with a cone head black wooly bugger on the bottom and for contrast a golden stone nymph a foot above the WB. After two rafts and four tubers floated by I waded in and started casting into the tail of a run formed between two large rocks. On the third cast I was hooked into what would be my largest fish landed for the day, a 17” (by tape) 2lb (by scale) rainbow that hit the golden stone nymph.
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b7d628b3127cceb8a1b2f221a800000026109AZM2bZu2ba
After that the fishing was slow but consistent. My next two fish were 14” and 15” browns again on the golden stone, so I changed my set up to a Chernobyl ant with a golden stone nymph on a 2’ dropper. My next fish was fat 15” brown on the ant; my only hook up on a dry all afternoon although I did get one more hit on the ant.
By the time I stopped fishing around 5:30 I’d hooked a dozen fish landing 10. The regulations for the canyon in Colorado allow 5 fish per day to be kept only one of which can be over 16” and all fish between 12” and 16” must be released. As a result most of the fish I landed were between 14” and 16” with the 17” rainbow, a 15.5” brown and 16” cutbow the best by specie. I’m told there is no stocking of the N. Platte so these are all wild fish and conditions must be pretty good as everything I caught seemed to be pretty fat in relation to length!
By about 5:00 p. m., I was back at the base of the rapids. At the end of the first set of rapids is a deep pool formed by three converging currents. I occasionally lose fish due to a poorly tied knot but rarely have I had a trout just flat out break me off unless it gets around an underwater obstruction. But, I had a fish hit so hard it almost pulled the rod out of my hand and broke me off after about 5 seconds despite the fact that the fish was in the middle of the pool with nothing for my line to hang up on. When I got my line back I checked to see if it was a bad knot but the leader broke between knots. Oh well, hopefully that fish will be there on my next visit.
This was my first visit to the N. Platte but it definitely won’t be my last. In talking to people here in Ft. Collins; instead of heading south to fish waters like Cheeseman Canyon on the S. Platte, the Roaring Fork, Arkansas, Gunnison or other well know waters most everyone heads north to fish particularly the North Platte River either in the North Park area or across the border in Wyoming (especially Wyoming in the Grey Reef and Miracle Mile stretches where 20” fish don’t even raise eyebrows). I can now see why.
Guy
The canyon area is in the Routt (CO) and Medicine Bow (WY) National Forests and is a popular area for a variety of outdoor activities. But, surprisingly there were no maintained access trails where I was, just a well worn footpath for the first half mile. The footpath petered out just before a large vertical rock face that disappeared into the very off colored water in the middle of the first set of rapids.
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b7d628b3127cceb8a1b203a06900000026109AZM2bZu2ba
Being my first time there, I wasn’t sure how best to proceed further at this point as the water looked to be over my waist high waders. It looked like I might be able to bypass the rock face by climbing up the canyon a couple hundred feet and going over the top of the rock face. But a half hour later I’d found that approach wasn’t working as I’d tried to get back down to the river in three spots only to find all three times I ended up with a sheer drop of 20’ to 30’ to get back down to the water.
In looking for a way back down to the water, I wound up back where I’d originally started climbing up. Based on the sign in information at the F S register in the parking lot, it was obvious there should be a way to continue, so I decided to try wading along the edge of the rock face even though I could not see the bottom. It turned out that the water was barely crotch deep close to the rock face. So I continued on for another mile or so before turning around to fish back upstream to the parking area.
As I said, the water was pretty off color, probably due to the rains in the higher elevations over the last 10 days. Water clarity was barely 2’. So it looked like it wound be an afternoon of nymphing as during the entire walk in I had not seen any insect activity, rises or in fact fish, although I had flushed 5 grouse, information which was filed away for hunting season. During five hours of fishing, I saw two pale morning duns, one unidentified grayish #14 mayfly and one rise.
I decided that big, black and ugly was likely the way to start prospecting. So I started with a cone head black wooly bugger on the bottom and for contrast a golden stone nymph a foot above the WB. After two rafts and four tubers floated by I waded in and started casting into the tail of a run formed between two large rocks. On the third cast I was hooked into what would be my largest fish landed for the day, a 17” (by tape) 2lb (by scale) rainbow that hit the golden stone nymph.
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b7d628b3127cceb8a1b2f221a800000026109AZM2bZu2ba
After that the fishing was slow but consistent. My next two fish were 14” and 15” browns again on the golden stone, so I changed my set up to a Chernobyl ant with a golden stone nymph on a 2’ dropper. My next fish was fat 15” brown on the ant; my only hook up on a dry all afternoon although I did get one more hit on the ant.
By the time I stopped fishing around 5:30 I’d hooked a dozen fish landing 10. The regulations for the canyon in Colorado allow 5 fish per day to be kept only one of which can be over 16” and all fish between 12” and 16” must be released. As a result most of the fish I landed were between 14” and 16” with the 17” rainbow, a 15.5” brown and 16” cutbow the best by specie. I’m told there is no stocking of the N. Platte so these are all wild fish and conditions must be pretty good as everything I caught seemed to be pretty fat in relation to length!
By about 5:00 p. m., I was back at the base of the rapids. At the end of the first set of rapids is a deep pool formed by three converging currents. I occasionally lose fish due to a poorly tied knot but rarely have I had a trout just flat out break me off unless it gets around an underwater obstruction. But, I had a fish hit so hard it almost pulled the rod out of my hand and broke me off after about 5 seconds despite the fact that the fish was in the middle of the pool with nothing for my line to hang up on. When I got my line back I checked to see if it was a bad knot but the leader broke between knots. Oh well, hopefully that fish will be there on my next visit.
This was my first visit to the N. Platte but it definitely won’t be my last. In talking to people here in Ft. Collins; instead of heading south to fish waters like Cheeseman Canyon on the S. Platte, the Roaring Fork, Arkansas, Gunnison or other well know waters most everyone heads north to fish particularly the North Platte River either in the North Park area or across the border in Wyoming (especially Wyoming in the Grey Reef and Miracle Mile stretches where 20” fish don’t even raise eyebrows). I can now see why.
Guy