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San Juan New Years in the Old Years
It’s difficult to remember exactly when it began, our annual New Years fishing trip on the San Juan River below Navajo Dam. We had hair and it wasn’t gray, and some of us still had muscles. We brought our kitchen kits and coolers, cooking our meals and washing dishes, then staying up half the night playing cribbage,…
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Fishy people stories
We all know that some people have a transcendental ability to find and catch fish. This ability typically derives from an unteachable, instinctive feel for the water and how its piscine residents move and feed in it and is honed by years of dedication to the craft. These people are often referred to as “fishy.”…
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Fly Fishing and Backpacking the Bob
Those of use who have the good fortune of living in the West might take for granted the public lands at our doorsteps—we literally have millions of acres of American lands spread out before us that offer some of the best fishing and hunting on the planet. And a lot of that acreage is designated…
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For the love of the Animas
By Ty Churchwell No one in Durango nor Silverton, Colo., will ever forget Aug. 5, 2015 — the day of the Gold King mine spill that sent 3 million gallons of ugly, toxic mine water down the Animas River in southwest part of the state. To say the accident was highly visible is an understatement. In today’s digital world, photos of the orange…
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The passing of two giants
The calls came 24 hours after each other. I was driving down I-95 on New Years Day. Brian Cowden, a former Trout Unlimited employee, called to say that Rick Ege, a former chapter president and council chair had passed away. I last spoke with Rick a few years ago. Another New Jersey guy had mentioned…
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Beavers in heaven
By Bradley Thornton Riffee We crept up a beaver creek on a cool fall day filled with nothing but sunshine. The colorful leaves in all their glory brightened our world as we set out to find our native brook trout friends patrolling their mud-packed ponds. Dragonflies of October danced across an eastern breeze as we…
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The Beetle, the Hare’s Ear, the old man and the cutthroats
Years and years ago, while attending college in western Colorado, I drove up the shoulders of the Sawatch Range between Salida and Gunnison as far as my old VW Beetle would make it on a road it had no business traversing. After reaching a stretch of two-track I could no longer navigate, I pulled the…
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