Rio Bravo de San Felipe

It was way to long since my last visit to the Rio Bravo de San Felipe, September 2008. I have a love hate relationship with this river, my hate for the river comes in the way of seeing so much trash all over the place from the visitors with a total disregard for the environment. I could spend an entire month going and picking up trash but it wouldn't even put a dent in the problem. The love I have for the Rio Bravo de San Felipe come by way of it's Fall fishing. By far Fall is the best time to be on the river. The summer crowds are gone, the weather usually gets cooler, and the fish are on the chew.

As I make my way towards my fishing destination I notice that I'm getting really close to the one hundred thousand mile mark on the odometer, I own a 2003 Silverado that has been fairly good to me over the past eight years.



I actually pulled over to take a photo of my odometer, I was on hwy 178 near the entrance to the canyon that winds pretty much all the way up, more than likely I would have not been able to pull over to take the not so epic photo.

As I continue up the canyon road I start to see road signs, construction ahead, prepare to stop, single lane ahead, oh no! I continue and as I round a bend I see a line of vehicles stopped on the road.



The line of cars was a bummer, not to worry though, the wait was not as bad as I had expected, maybe about five to ten minutes of a delay. It was worse being behind all the cars as they all slowly moved up the road, being held back by a large propane truck was worse than being stopped. After a few really slow miles, the propane truck found a turnout big enough for his rig and I was back on the accelerator speeding up the winding road.

Finally I make it up to the river for some fall fly fishing. The only thing is that the calender says it's fall, and mother nature says it's summer all over again, 98 degree heat, what is going on... An Indian Summer perhaps, who knows. I loaded up the waders when I packed all my gear, there is no way in Hell that I'm putting them on in this heat. They are Simms breathable waders but even though they are breathable it's insanely hot. I opt to wet wade.



Luckily I have some neoprene wading socks and my convertible Norhface pants. I unzip the legs and I have instant short pants. The water seemed really warm, if I had to guess I would say it was in the high 60's. Very nice for wet wading, probably not the best for the fish.

I get geared up and string up my Hardy fly rod, it's a ten foot five weight specifically designed for nymphing. It perfect for this freestone river, there is so much pocket water and this ten foot Hardy rod helps get the flies in the zone. I tie on a size 14 flash back bead head pheasant tail and a size 16 micro mayfly nymph as the trailer. Both of these flies I'm fishing under an indicator for those that would like to know.

The river was looking fantastic, flowing just under 400 cfs, clear but not gin clear as one would say. There may have been some thunderstorms over the last few days that muddied up the river a bit, it is clearing though and very fishable.



The image above is the first shot I took when I first reached the rivers edge, looks good to me.

I had my DSLR strung over my chest and shoulder and quickly realized that my wading boots were not going to work out on these super slick moss covered boulders. I bought into the hype of the new sticky rubber soles by Simms. Well let me just say that they do not stick to these boulders, felt soles would have been a much better choice.

I flog the water and after my second cast my strike indicator dips, but I'm to slow to react and miss the first strike. Well this seem to be the story for most of the afternoon, I miss strike after strike. As they say in baseball a swing and a miss!

I finally make the connection and stick a fish, it turns out to be a small pike minnow, ugly little suckers for sure. Well I guess I'm not going to be skunked. I keep roll casting as the vegetation is fairly thick on this stretch of the river. My white Thingamabobber dips and it's another fish on, a small but extremely feisty rainbow. I wish I had my camera with me to take a quick photo of this little guy or gal. At this point I opted to leave the camera in the truck, I didn't want to chance it and take a dunking with my camera. The rainbow was very nicely colored, with rosy cheeks and beautiful spot patterns.

I ended my day with four rainbow trout and two pike minnow. Lots of swing and misses, but that's what happens when you don't fish certain waters for long periods of time.

The weather is still a little to warm for my taste, I'll wait a few more weeks with hopes that the heat will subside and we get some cooler temps. I had a great time on this day, it's been way to long since I had been on the Rio Bravo de San Felipe, it did not disappoint.

Some parting photos of the river. These were all taken with a Canon 7D and ND filter to slow down the exposure.



I was trying for the soft water look, I somewhat like these. I think I still need some work on my composition.



Cheers
The SoCal Fly Fisher