I got out to Rocky Ford creek a bit after sun up for my first real fly fishing trip with my good friend Dave. Boy, what a humbling experience! I was quickly schooled by Dave / Sensei on how to do battle with a fly rod as we walked to the creek. Experienced in the art of teaching new recruits how to survive their first day of fly fishing, Dave demonstrated how easy and effortless it is to cast a fly more than 10 yards. With this new knowledge, and now knowing everything possible about fly fishing, he turned me loose. He smiled and quickly distanced himself out of self preservation and embarrassment of having any association with me.
This proved wise, as I stood poised with my rod behind some low bushes. With Ninja like moves, I took my first shot at a twenty plus inch trout looking back up at me from the other side of the bush. I am sure I looked deadly to that fish as it watched me untangle my fly line from the bush. With that said, I continued on throughout the day catching my limits of bushes, cat tails, fences, back packs, rocks and of course myself. Seeing all this through binoculars, Dave returned to the scene of the battle where I stood bleeding from where I had just remove the last fly that I had attempted to cast. He took pity on me, as I look at him as if I was about to be defeated, and decided to pull out his secret weapon, a Scud he called it, which he presented to me before diving for cover. I quickly became rejuvenated because I vaguely remember a number of years back that some Israelis, I believe used them with great success on trout or was that Iraq. With this in mind I worked back to my post behind the bush and began whipping the water like my life depended on it. As the rain began to reduce visibility, I miraculously nailed a fat rainbow in the sixteen inch class. This was followed a bit later by another one! I figure this had to be skill and not the fact that a hatchery truck had pulled up close to me and was restocking the creek with fish of similar size.
Any who, feeling like I was no longer cannon fodder, I went to see how Dave was doing. He had landed at least a dozen well fed rainbows and probably lost an additional twenty. I believe he was using Scuds, black Woolly buggers, and Streamers. You can see from the picture I posted of him with one of the larger rainbows he caught that he was a very happy Soldier. All in all I believe we both left the creek at the end of the day with our expectation exceeded. I am really looking forward to fishing this creek again and if I am really lucky I will have my Sensei along to teach me a bit more.