Fishing in New Hampshire was kind of disappointing over the past months, after a great start of the season, the drought took over and except the small mountain streams, most of the rivers soon became dead for trout. Smallmouth filled the gap a little bit, but despite being a very strong, spectacular fish, for me it will always be one step lower than trout and salmon.
Anyway, instead of fishing for smallmouth I decided to try some other waters that I never fished before and which are not really too far from me. And after the last weekend I wish I did this long time ago. Thanks to my friend Bob, who's been fishing in Vermont for a lifetime, I got the information I needed to have a successful trip.
I mainly targeted 2 rivers: Winooski and White River, both pretty big for what I'm used to, but relatively low secondary to the drought of this year. Winooski was a little cloudy, which allowed me to get closer to the fish, but White River was incredibly clear and required close to perfect approach and long casts.
But let's get to the business: fish! I started Friday around noon on Winooski and used streamers. After I caught a couple of rainbows the things calmed down and I switched on nymphs. I had some new designs that I wanted to try out. And it worked. Biggest fish of the day was an approx. 18 inch rainbow, followed by a 16-17 incher a few minutes later. And a bunch of smaller ones.
The prettiest of the day was a brown trout caught on one of the tributaries that is managed for wild trout.
Sunday I attacked the White River which is an incredible beautiful river. It required more work, every fish required some effort. I had to switch between streamers, nymphs, wets and dries as the hatches were coming and going and fish behavior was changing constantly. One minute they were hitting the ants at the surface, another they will chase a streamer or a wet fly and five minutes later they would be at 10 feet deep tasting nymphs.
I noticed there were a lot of wild fish, crazy fighters, despite the fact that they were not as big as the ones on Winooski.
Biggest regret of the day was that I could't take a picture of a decent size trout that took my nymph, jumped out of the water right after I set the hook, then got in the current and escaped before I was able to take full control. When I retrieved my flies, I noticed the hook was actually straightened, which explained why the fish got away. Probably an older fly from last year and the hook was weaker, but the fish did most of the job. I don't feel bad when I lose a fight like this, that fish deserved to be free again.
First stop: Ausable Chasm, one of the world oldest natural tourist attractions.
Then we moved inside the Adirondack Mountains, towards Lake Placid, host of the 1980 Winter Olympic Games. Sunday morning brought to our sight some of the most astounding views we ever encountered.
There was a little fishing involved, but the only fish willing to taste my flies was a little brown trout, way bellow what Ausable river is renown for. And it didn't really matter, the beauty of the landscape compensated for it.
Words are just useless, I think the photos do a better job describing this incredible trip. Strongly recommended if you are in the area!
