The move to Kalispell this weekend went swimmingly, so on Monday I decided to take a quick exploratory trip west of town to chase the fishes. I did a lot more driving than fishing but I did manage to catch one colorful brookie. I also looked for some small lakes to fish in spring, when runoff is high, but all I found was moderate sized lakes surrounded by resort homes.
After fishing at this relatively low position I moved higher into the snow. I wasn't even able to scare anything up in this spot but it did look really good.
In this spot the river flowed down the side of the mountain, a series of short falls and pools. The pools averaged a little over a foot deep with some spots close to three feet deep. I did pull one nice little brookie out of a good pool. I hid behind a big rock and tossed a caddis dry into the water. I watched the lethargic brookies in this cold mountain stream lightly nip the fly. After numerous missed hook sets I switched to an olive hares ear. This did the trick and the trout took the fly just long enough for me to set the hook. I grabbed my camera and prepared the settings. As soon as I snapped the photo the camera shut off, never really capturing the picture. I fished this area for about 20 minutes and continued on to check out a few lakes.
Today I decided to go out for a short drive to kill some time before my interview this afternoon. First I stopped at a fishing access site on the Flathead River around five or six miles from our new place.
After a short walk at this spot I decided to head up to the mountains for a closer look.
The higher I got the nicer the houses became. I also ran into some idyllic settings.
It was nice to get out and explore, but all of the lakes that I found today ended up being private.
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