One of the nice things about visiting Albuquerque is that it puts the fishing waters of the Jemez Mountains in range for a day trip. A few years back I took advantage of the proximity for a trip to the Rio Cebolla. On that journey I made a pit stop at Battleship Rock on the way and a fly-fishing couple who was there almost had me almost convinced as we talked in the parking lot to forego the Cebolla and fish the East Fork Jemez. I didn't. I had my adventure and caught a few fish up on the meadows of the Rio Cebolla, but the East Fork was the first destination I had in my mind last Tuesday.
I don't think I could feel anything less than awe even if I drove up NM 4 into the canyon of the Jemez River everyday. The sight, immediately washes away the petty frustration of wanting to get out and get fishing and having to mind the posted speed limits on the way.
I got there about 8:30. Battleship Rock was still cloaked in shadow, while the cliffs high above were brilliant in the morning light.
No one was around as I walked down the stairs, crossed the bridge and headed to the stream. I followed the real trail for short ways but when it went up high, I then headed off down one of the many fisherman's paths that line the sides of the creek exposing the red soil wherever they go. It's rough going down on the stream. There's chokecherry, red osier dogwood, and willows that thickly line the banks and nary a level spot to stand on that's not in the water. Luckily my boulder hopping skills are still top notch, although who knows for how much longer. I would also be remiss if I didn't mention that's there's poison ivy too, so leave the shorts at home. Above, pines and firs cling in the volcanic cliffs that look as dry as the river is wet.
The water was a definitely a bit high, with a lot of froth about, tea colored, but not overly murky.
Alan Bray has written a book Fishing the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico (2nd Edition). He sent me a free copy after I let him use one of my pictures of Cañones Creek. His advice seemed to tend towards using dry flies, that's all I needed to read, because really I want to use dry flies all of time anyway. I tied on an elk hair caddis. I caught a seven inch brown from the middle of the creek within the first few casts. Then I hooked and landed a really a nice brown of 12 inches or so drifting the fly blind around a boulder that sat on the edge of river.
I moved upstream, using the paths, balancing on boulders, and occasionally plunging right in. I caught a couple of more small browns, hooked and lost a couple of others. There was not a lot of calmer water for casting dries, and they only occasionally darted out with that speed that always astonishes in the riffles and turbulent water below the many little falls.
There were couple of ideal, slower, deep runs close to each other though that I spent a lot of time on. I hooked, fought and then lost what I'm pretty sure was rainbow (I could see the red band ) that I"m sure would have exceeded the bigger brown I had caught earlier, and had hook-ups with some that were bit smaller. I eventually caught a 10-11 inch rainbow on my return pass through. It had the dull colors of a stocker, but since the East Fork is not stocked anymore, it must have moved upstream from the main Jemez. The larger rainbow, I feel had to have been a stream bred fish,
I got to a point where I could no longer move upstream, at least not on the side I was on because of falls, deep pools and cliffs. I backtracked and found the real hiking trail, but when I realized it was only going to take me high above the water, I decided to cross the stream instead.
There I followed paths up and down, with infrequent stops at places that were amenable to casting and had good holding water. I caught one maybe two more small ( 6-8 inch range) browns. I could feel the high elevation sun toasting my neck and my casting arm and six relentless hours on the steam was wearing me down especially after the previous day's long hike. I rested in the shade and ate my egg salad and crackers.Then I turned around and headed downstream. I tried a bead head prince nymph towards the end of my fishing day, just to see if I had been missing out on some fast sub-surface action. I wasn't. I met a kid with a spinning rod and briefly chatted. I heard shouting a few minutes later. Maybe he caught that rainbow.
The clouds moved in and as I drove away the afternoon rain started just as if we were having the monsoon a month early.
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