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It’s a long drive from Victor, Idaho to Fort Smith, Montana and
the famous Bighorn River. About eight hours even if you don’t make a
wrong turn. Personally, unless I have a
week on the Bighorn I stay home to enjoy my own fantastic trout waters. But ask me if I’d drive eight hours to see
common carp rise from the depths to crush a huge dry fly on the Bighorn Reservoir side of the Yellowtail Dam - I’d say yes.
July 5, 2012
I met up with Brooks and
other friends in Fort Smith
at about 7 PM on Thursday night. My
drive took me nearly ten hours because I tried to take the famous Route 37 from
Lovell, Wyoming
across the Crow Indian Reservation. The
route appears on many maps yet it doesn’t exist. The funny thing, I made the same mistake 20
years ago. Actually it wasn’t funny because
I had to backtrack then make a three hour detour all the way up to Billings, Montana then over
to Hardin and finally south to Fort
Smith. I was in
my old Explorer that already has 260 thousand miles and runs hot as the sun because
of a leak in the radiator. At least I
made it and after a beer and good meal it was like the driving ordeal never happened.
July 6, 2012
Neither Brooks nor I had ever
laid eyes on the Bighorn Reservoir before Friday. One could call that a huge disadvantage going
into a tournament. Nonetheless we were
fearless and counted heavily on our “carp is a carp” skills. At 10 AM the starting horn went off and
Brooks and I and 34 other teams (this is a huge event) took off rowing for carp. Two minutes in I spotted a rising carp. Brooks steered towards him, literally racing
a couple other competitor boats to the quarry, and I launched a long cast
hurling a yellow grasshopper pattern. My
fly landed three feet in front of the feeding carp and he accelerated, swirled
and ate my fly. I set the hook but there
was nothing but loose line. Too much
line and I was too quick on the draw. I
missed the first chance of the tourney.
It needs to be noted that the
results of the 2011 Bighorn Carp Tourney were mind boggling. Carp are normally challenging on fly but
there were hundreds caught. The winning
team actually landed an incredible eighteen!
This stat alone is the reason I drove so far for this event. I had to see such a carp venue with my own
eyes. So when I missed this fish it was
like, let’s go find another. Well, every
year is different. Brooks and I went on
to see only five rising carp all day.
Thanks to Brooks and his amazing patience to wait until the carp fully
inhales his dry fly, we caught two carp before the 4 PM finish time. But with only two we rowed into the docks with
our heads hung low.
Based on last years results, our
two carp did seem terrible, but it turned out the winning team this year only
caught four, second place caught three and Brooks and I tied with several other
teams for third place with our two fish.
Most teams did not catch a single carp this year. We were stunned and pleasantly surprised all
at once. If only I hadn’t missed the one
in the morning along with two others I don’t want to talk about. The real good news was that the first carp we
caught won us the big fish award. We
kicked butt in this deal!
The Bighorn Carp Tourney 2012
will go down as one of the toughest. The
famous rising carp simply weren’t rising this year. Perhaps the extra warm weather (It’s in the
mid 90ºs) – who knows.
It should be noted that everyone saw a bunch of carp cruising down deep
in the crystal clear water and we all tried subsurface flies of every kind imaginable,
but plain and simple, the carp weren’t eating.
July 7, 2012
Yes indeed I’d drive 400
miles to catch rising common carp on big dry flies, but yesterday’s tournament
didn’t provide enough satisfaction. At
least not nearly ten hours one way of drivings worth. So very early this morning
Brooks and I got up and tested our
carp skills at the Yellowtail Dam Afterbay
on a flat recommended to us by Steve and J.J. Hilbers, owners of the Bighorn Trout Shop.
When we got to the Afterbay
of the Bighorn Reservoir, basically a small lake like body of water, it was
glassy calm, all except for the rings from free-jumping carp that is. There were no other boats or anglers and
Brooks and I felt like we pretty much died and went to heaven. Like anyone hunting carp would, we rowed
across the lake towards the free-jumpers.
I know from past experience, it’s rare that you can coax a free-jumper into
eating a fly but we played around with them for awhile anyhow.
After a half hour of looking
at carp cruising down deep below the boat I stood up high on Brooks’ custom
built fishing platform that he made just for flats fishing for carp and in the
distance I could see some tailing carp in the shallows. It was exactly what we were dreaming of. Brooks stealthily rowed me over and on my
third cast I hooked up with a damsel nymph.
The common carp ate the fly in very shallow water, literally about 8
inches. The frightened fish panicked and
smoked me out into the middle of the bay on my 5-weight Ross. After a few minutes of muscling him hard I
scooped up the pesky carp.
During the next three hours
we hooked about eight carp both on dries and nymphs and landed a respectable
four. It was a spectacular session of
fly fishing for carp. What was easily as
exciting as our fishing, was when a black bear and cub wandered out to the edge
of the bay a mere 75 feet from our boat.
Funny thing is, judging by the direction they came from, they must have
walked right through our campsite moments after we left this morning – good
thing we got up early!
The Bighorn River Alliance Carp Tournament 2012 was a blast and well worth the long drive. The fun event was actually my last until the
Jackson Hole One Fly Contest in September.
I’m relieved! It’s been a busy
year till this point with one big event requiring some sort of travel after another. For the next couple months its home sweet
home. Don’t worry, I’ll still be
fishing, but it will be within two hours of home. Next on the agenda will be a two day trip to
the boonies with Granny starting Monday night.
I can’t wait!
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