the title was supposed to be...

the title of this diddy was supposed to be "i went fishing, and didn't even loss a fly!" but alas it is not to be. i went up to rocky mountain national park (about 45 min from boulder) today to fly fish the small but beautiful upper big thompson stream. the water was "gin" clear, and i saw a few trout, but they were quite small. so how did i bumble things up this time, you ask? well.... i forgot my fly box! so i ended up being out there with one fly (which was not the right one for the time of day) trying to convince the wary mountain trout that they should live a little and try something different. needless to say, they begged to differ. i hung my fly up a number of times on the high alpine grass, but managed to delicitely coax it free until the end of the day when i got to greedy and once again snapped my line. if you haven't been fly fishing, it's really something else than what i think of as "regular" fishing. which americans incidentally call "spin" fishing (the more you know). you tie a line called your "backing" to your real. tie your "flyline" to that (which is the heavy line that you cast). tie a leader to that (with a knot that was only invented to cause sunden seasures and premature baldness in those unlucky enough to have to tie it) which is transparrent, and tie a "tippet" to that. sound complicated. well, it is! at least for us humble norwegian hobunks placing nets and casting rusty lures that say "german democratic republic" on them. not to mention that your tippet has a strength weighting of five measly pounds. which means you have to be very delicate. but enough ranting, let me give you a little sensory exploration of this amazing place called the rocky mountain high country. it was a big meadow with long reads and grasses. the river cut through the middle of it, cutting through the alpine tundra. when i walked up to the river, there was a herd of moose (i think) on the other side of the river being lazy. i got pretty close to them before they moved a little farther off. high mountains with snow fields permanently painted on their sides in every direction. truly wonderful. after some uneventful fishing i took off the old shirt and jumped in the stream (it has a number of reasonable deep holes that made joly good swimming. ok, so i didn't exactly "jump." this snow melt stream where i can almost see the snow field it's melting off isn't exactly warm. i just finally decided to fall under, and came up sputtering. reminds of being in monteray bay body boarding (mom). also, i have been contemplating taken a short trip up to montana to do some fly fishing and kill some time before my wife comes home (me lonely :( may leave tommorrow and fish the madison river in yellowstone national park. on the job front, i haven't heard anything from lowe's and it's time to call, but i think i may just take a job with a local sandwich place. anyway, have a good one y'all. peace and good fishin!