My fly-fishing adventure ... minus the fish

In an attempt to say yes more often, I decided to go for it this weekend when our friends asked if we wanted to go fly-fishing. I donned some rented waders, and with a borrowed rod went to Moraine Park in the Rocky Mountain National Park to learn to fly-fish in the creek there. At first, casting was difficult. I kept getting the line tangled. But I eventually caught on, and successfully cast without fear of scaring any fish away.


Fly-fishing required more coordination than what I term "regular" fishing, but it was also more fun. You don't have to just sit there waiting for a fish to bite; you get to keep casting, and moving about in the water thanks to the waders. (One downside: I nearly fell in once ... I somehow saved myself from filling up my waders with water. I'm sure it would have given all the tourists walking around Sprague Lake a good laugh!)

While I had a good time, I caught no fish. We got kicked out of Moraine Park by a big bull elk and his harem of female elk (but not before we had given up for lack of fish); we had more luck at Sprague Lake, where my man caught two fish; our friends also caught some. I could not go as deep as they could, given my rented waders that only went up to my thighs, so that may have hurt my chances of getting a fish. Or I'm just not very good at fishing. One of those two ...

Some shots I took of the day:

Our friend, the elk. I kept a close eye on him the entire time.

Tying a fly ... they were much smaller than I expected. Hard to believe
a hook that small could catch a fish.

Our friend and my fly-fishing teacher. What a beautiful place to not catch fish!