Highline to Rock Creek Basin

[Pfrosty]

Had the perfect 4 day trip this week (Mon-Thurs). It was nice to get a 30-40 mile hike in without scouts in tow. I took off on Monday morning with my wife, her Dad and her 4 siblings starting from the Highline trail off the Mirror Lake highway. The weather was perfect. Within the 1st mile of the hike we had some rain and hail but it was brief and the rest of the trip was dry.

Day 1: We hiked from the TH up and over Rocky Sea Pass and camped on the South end of Brinkley. We pulled in around 6:45 PM and did not do any fishing for the night. Just set up camp, ate and hung out resting the legs and backs.

Day 2: The plan was to hike an hour to Lightning Lake but part of the group had thought we missed a turn off up to the lake so we ended up bushwacking around the basin. We did evenutally find the lake after a 2-3 hour romp through the woods. It was great fun but the fishing at Lightning turned out to be a dud. Probably wrong time of day and the wind was kicking up. 2 of my bro-in-laws decided to head up to Helen, Gladys, Rosalie and back to Brinkley while the rest of us headed back to camp. On the way back I decided to kick up to Rosalie for some more fishing and hook up with my bro-in-laws that would be circling back that way. The fishing was fantastic there. I pulled out a good 10-12" from the stream that is the outlet of the lake and cought a couple more just slightly smaller on the North side of the lake. I kept three and brought them back to camp for dinner. Tried fishing at Brinkley which also proved to be very good. Since I had already kept the three, I threw back a really nice fish caught at Brinkley.

Day 3: We made a much larger loop hike in the basin. 1st stop was Ouray where we caught a fish on every cast although they were all very small but fiesty. The best fishing was definately at Jack where we pulled out the largest fish all over 12". No luck at Jill although we could see the fish swimming close by. From Jill we headed through awesome meadows and made our way above treeline to scout out Reconnaissance Lake. Very pretty lake tucked around big peaks. From there we bushwacked westward until meeting up with the trail that took us back to Helen, Lightning and back to Brinkley. We started this hike at 9:30 AM and hit camp at 2:30PM. We packed everything up and left the basin, back up and over Rocky Sea and spent out last night in Four Lakes Basin. BEWARE - This basin produces the vast population of mosquitos. Good thing we were only there for the night. I had a little time to try the fishing on Dale Lake with only one small catch. I gave up and did not try Daynes.

Day 4: Back to the TH. We left Daynes Lake around 8:30 am and were back to the cars by 1PM.

It was a fun trip. If you are out in Rock Creek and like to fish, you might have best luck with Brinkley, Rosalie and Jack Lakes.

All stream crossings on the Highline and anywhere else were manageable:


We took a nice break at Pigeon Milk Spring before heading up and over Rocky Sea Pass:


Rocky Sea Pass is great for anyone on foot. I can't imagine horses can make it over there. Maybe a lama...but I'm not an expert. There are some snow crossings still on both sides of the pass:










Here are some of the fish I caught at Rosalie:


Fish at Jack Lake:




Reconnaissance Lake:




View from Rock Creek looking west at Rocky Sea Pass:


Four Lakes Basin:

[Dr. Nebz]

Nice TR!

This is an area we have been looking at. Thanks for the heads up on the fishing, this is very important to our crew.

[ibenick]

Very, very nice trip. Rock Creek is one of my favorite areas in the entire Uinta range. Rocky Sea is actually cake for horses when there isn't snow on it. The usual path through the rocks is not nearly as bad as the name implies.

[Pfrosty]

I was able to take a few panoramics.

This one is at Lightning Lake:


This one is looking up at Yard Peak (which I think is the peak further back on the right). I'm not sure the peak on the left has a name.


And this one is taken below Reconnaissance looking over Rock Creek basin to the South & West, again with Yard Peak on the right of the pic next to the peak with no name:

[gloo]

looks like a sweet trip!

[Scott P]

It was great fun but the fishing at Lightning turned out to be a dud.

Once when I went to Lightning Lake, it was the best fishing lake I have seen yet to date. You could catch fish after fish in a few seconds. Another time we only caught a couple of fish in an hour. How hot the fishing is seems to come and go there more than at other lakes.