Henry's Fork Report: Third Day

We were up bright and early again. We checked on the Henry's: still in the throes of high flows. That was OK. We were in a hurry to get back to the Teton.

It was a real multiple use kind of day on the river. There were many floaters coming through in flotillas.

And then there was a moose. John had moved upstream around a bend, thinking of exploring up river a ways, and when I followed him, there he was standing calmly next to it.

John, as a long-time Mainer, is familiar with moose, and respects their large bodies and small brains. A few years ago when a moose wandered into our campsite one morning John was in favor of giving it time to think things over while we waited in a vehicle. This time John just kept fishing as though he fishes with moose all the time.

Eventually, though, the moose wanted to stand where John was standing, so John wisely let him.

We decided to postpone our exploring. We fished out the morning, catching small trout, then took a break for lunch. The weather had changed, and the fishing was slower than the day before. John got out his trusty gps and found another access point nearby. We decided to go look at it.

We followed a long rutted dirt road to a nice looking place on the river. We discovered it was posted downstream. I fished a little upstream, swinging a beadhead nymph, and caught only whitefish.

It was a great place to watch the weather roll over the Tetons.

But we headed back to familiar waters. I think both of us were remembering John's big trout of the evening before, and both of us wanted another shot.

I spent some time searching the bank John had fished when he hooked up with the fish of a lifetime. He had pulled him out of one of those alcoves. Conditions were different today, though, and rises were scarce.

John gave it a go, too.

We fished right into evening waiting for a hatch like we had enjoyed yesterday, but it never came.

We packed it in at dark and drove straight to the drive-in. One more day to fish. We decided over cheeseburgers to come back to the Teton again, and, moose or no moose, to explore upstream as far as we could to see what we could see.