West '05 Trip - Day 29

Posted: 2007-06-15
By: Randy Cochran

I've lived the last 20 years or more of my life waiting to experience the Wind River Range in some way, shape or form. This torture is facilitated by an old Outdoor Life article on Finis Mitchell and his crusade to establish high mountain fisheries in the area.

Now that I was in the area, I figured I'd try to cut through my mania and see what was really what.

Meadow Lake is supposedly home to very large Arctic Grayling. I tried to find those grayling, and instead saw a plethora of crawfish and a couple rises off in the distance, well beyond my casting range. With rain approaching and the thought of an even worse muddy ride out - how the hell did my Ford Focus make it in here?... the road was 4x4 by most standards - I made like a tree and got the f*** out of there.

Fall Creek is a lovely little meadow stream that just happens to have a steep gradient in areas. It is also a fun place to catch the small, brilliantly-colored wild 'bows that reside there. Not so much fun to do it in steadily growing rain though. The Green River called me away anyhow.

Quite a few whitefish can be had when your nymphing a river. Whether or not this is your intention, it is a likely outcome while on many Rocky Mountain rivers. The Green in Wyoming is no exception. Sure, there were a few browns and rainbows about, but the whiteys easily outnumbered them by a ratio of nearly 5 to 1. This was not desirable to me. Tired and hungry and a little PO'd, I pitched my tent, ate a Chi-style red hot and a chicken sandwich, then hit the sack.