Family in the Uintas

Earlier this year, while there was still ice on most of the lakes, I told myself I'd spend more time in the Uintas. Well as of Sunday, I still hadn't been up there with 75% of the year lost forever.

That simply wouldn't do, so off we went to visit the high country. First stop, Provo River Falls. Not for any serious fishing, but it's always nice to see. James (my 2yr old son) got really excited when he first saw it, letting out a big "Wow!". He saw it last year, but he wasn't as coherent then.

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So with the obligatory stop out of the way, we set off to find a lake on the other side of the pass.

We turned onto an improved gravel road and traveled for several miles before turning onto another side road. I had to do some fancy driving to weave my Sentra between the tall rocks that looked hungry for an oil pan. There were several stretches that were craggy like that or rutted, but the majority of that road gave me hope of passage.

It wasn't meant to be. Not this trip, anyway. I estimate that we came within a half mile of our target, but I hit a rocky patch of road on a pretty good downhill grade that forced my better judgment to take over. I was tempted to hike the rest of the way, but with a pregnant wife and a small boy (that I'd have to carry most of the way), that didn't look very probable.

We turned around. I was quite disappointed since I've had plans of visiting this particular place all year, but it will have to be another time when I have some higher clearance or someone else driving.

It was still nice to visit that area though. I hadn't seen it since I was a little kid when my Dad took me to fish the higher stretches of the Bear River.

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At this point, I was without much of a plan and itching to fish, so back to the pass we went. I enjoy the higher altitudes more anyway. :wink:

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With all the traffic everywhere and the family with me (no hiking), I started to settle into the idea of catching dink planters instead of girthy holdovers.

We have always enjoyed Teapot Lake, so that's where we went. Usually, we fished the South side, but this time we walked to the North side where the water drops off a little better.

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I flipped a spinner for awhile as my wife drowned a worm and we didn't have much luck for quite some time. Finally, I got a small rainbow on the Blue Fox.

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The surface was exploding and the spinner wasn't working very well, so I rigged up with a mayfly (I saw a couple earlier) behind a bubble and launched it.

First cast and I had a scrappy little bow of about 13 inches that even had full fins. It didn't last long in my hand before squirming out, so no pic. I'm sure we all know what a small bow looks like. I got another with that fly that was also released and then decided to let my boy try for a bit. He's never caught a fish, but he can reel, so I threw out the fly/bubble combo and let him have at it.

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Meanwhile, Mom finally hooked into one.

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The powerbaiters around us were nailing them left and right, so I searched the box and found my old jar of rainbow sparkle PB. A few minutes later and I had a small keeper.

After spending about 3 hours at Teapot, our stringer held 4 small rainbows and our fishing appetites needed a change of scenery.

We decided to hit Pass Lake and knew our time was running out when we rounded the pass again:

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Pass Lake snubbed us after missing a few bites. Again, the powerbaiters were reeling them in constantly, but we already had our dinner and didn't feel like bait fishing. We saw a lot of albinos swimming around in Pass.

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We didn't spend a whole lot of time there with the clouds looking the way they did. Back to civilization we went, but I had to stop at the river for a chance at a little brookie.

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I love the Upper Provo. What a great place to be:

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Got my brookie:

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And that was it for our day of fishing. Despite the disappointment at first, it's hard to stay bummed out in the Uintas. I'll be sure to visit that lake someday.

Happy Fishing, Humans.