Just got back from one heck of a road trip with my good fly fisherman friend and photographer Louis Cahill. All I can say is we were on a mission. We hit several of the blue ribbon streams before our funds ran out.

We left straight from the Fly Fishing Retailer show in Denver, CO and drove straight to the South Platte River.

My lord there are some big wild trout in that river. We fished the tailwater stretch that's between Spinney Lake and Elevenmile Lake. Trico spinners were on and I landed a 20+ inch Rainbow and a eighteen inch cutthroat that had a larger girth than length in three casts. All on 6X tippet and my gosh they fought like crazy. Frog Hair flourocarbon is the shizzle. You better go small with your flies. And when I say small you better have a large assortment of midge larva down to size 26. This fly pattern suggestion is for September anyway, but I wouldn't hit the river anytime without these patterns.

Louis and I hooked into several other trophy trout that day before we packed up our gear and headed to Aspen to fish the Frying Pan with Jared Darnell. It's a day I'll never forget. Colorado fly fishing kicks ass.

If you haven't fished the South Platte River I highly recommend it. Just like in GA, try to hit the river during the week. Sight fishing for these big boys is the norm and it was one of the best places I found in CO to do this on our trip.

Keep it fly

Kent Klewein
To be continued.....