We returned to the Current this year on the same weekend that we came last year in hopes of encountering the same fishing conditions. The plan was to leave Tulsa on Friday evening, drive up, then fish saturday, and sunday. The weather forecast showed scattered showers for friday night so we had to stow all our gear under a tarp in the back of my truck. We crossed our fingers and prayed the tarp would keep our gear dry over the extent of the 5 hour drive.
We drove through the rain almost the entire trip but after a few quickstops at Wal-Mart for licenses (and some people watching) and Wendys for a healthy dinner, we arrived at Eagles Park Campground where the rain finally tapered off. There was a huge sigh of relief as we un-packed the gear and found all of it to be dry as a bone. We set up the canopy, tent, got a fire started, and broke out some adult beverages to celebrate our arrival to the fabled waters of the Current. We walked down to Tan Vat with flashlights and saw that the river was in great shape which got us pumped up for the next day.
For this trip, we had added another member to the crew, a newb to the sport of fly fishing. Chris was excited to come along after hearing all the great fishing stories from last years trip. Well, along 2:00 am on friday night, we came to the conclusion that Chris needed to be initiated into the group. I'm not exactly sure who came up with the idea but the next thing I know we're all walking back down to Tan Vat because it was decided that Chris had to walk across the river buck-naked to complete his initiation. I really didn't think he'd do it but he was a trooper. After a few more big drinks of liquid courage, he had stripped down to his boxers and began his trek across the Current River. With flashlights ablaze to light his way and his naked ass, he crossed all the way over to the opposite bank and then came back. I don't think I've lauhed that hard in a long time, I was laying on the streambank...crying because I was laughing so hard. He made his way back to the bank and quickly got back into his clothes before the early signs of hypothermia set in. We hiked back to camp to settle around the fire before we finally went to bad...which was about 3:30 AM. Not our smartest choice....
The next morning we awoke to the sound of gobbling turkeys off in the distance...not a bad way to start the morning. We were all slow to get out of our sleeping bags with only a few hours of sleep but the thought of rising trout and the smell of Dereks campfire breakfast burritos was enough motivation to get us going. Derek is the designated camp chef (or "cookie" as he's called) for all of our trips, his campfire food is the stuff of legend to say the least. After the normal routine of eating breakfast, drinking SEVERAL cups of coffee, gearing up and rigging up rods...we made our way down to Tan Vat.
(On a side note, we started the day without Cole because he had retired back to the tent due to reasons related to the consumption of adult beverages.)
I decided to make the long walk upstream of Tan Vat to fish the area from just below the state park down to below the area known as the "Rock Garden". This area is an awesome stretch of water...full of nice runs, seams, big boulders, and lots of pocket water. Its also full of trout as well! I started the day out with a #12 san juan worm with a #16 caddis emerger as a dropper as there wasn't any bugs coming off just yet. Chris and Derek were fishing similiar rigs but with different lead flies just to change things up. It didn't take long and we were all hooked up with some nice Current River trout...
We continued our trek downstream from the state park boundary, fishing every bit of the quality water that the Current had to offer. We were picking up fish mostly on the caddis emergers and pupae but I was also plucking a few fish from the river on a dark brown sowbug pattern that I actually tie for Taneycomo but after kicking over some rocks to find lots of sowbugs I figured it was a good choice. The dry fly action never really took off for us throughout the morning, although, there was hoards of caddis and mayflies coming off. This happened to me a few weeks earlier on my "scouting trip" to the Current as well, not really sure why the fish weren't keying in on all the bugs on the surface. We were able to hook up with a handful of fish on a size 16 CDC Caddis by targeting specific rising fish. This was very fun because the fish weren't holding a consistent rise pattern so it was quite the challenge, but we were able to succeed!
We finally arrived at the tail-end of the Rock Garden area and the fishing had began to taper off with the sun finally reaching its mid-day position. We decided to call it quits there and make the trek back to camp to get some lunch and to see if Cole was alive. We'd all caught our fair share of trout and were more than content with the mornings fishing. The upper stretches of the Tan Vat area is some awesome fishing and the scenery isn't too bad either. Its one of my favorite stretches of water to fish in the whole state of Missouri, with only the upper section of Crane Creek edging it out. Can't beat this river!!
We hiked back to camp and found Cole fishing just above the Tan Vat access point, casting a dry to a couple rising fish. He'd tangled with a few trout in his short time on the water due to his mid-morning nap. We pulled him out of the river and headed for the campsite. After some time in the camp kitchen, Derek had whipped us up some pulled pork sandwiches with baked beans from a wild feral hog he had trapped back home. It was delicious to put it lightly, everyone felt better to have some grub in the ol' belly. After lunch, we made a run up to the state park store to pick up a few flies, tippet, and some ice for the ice chests to keep the food and the adult beverages cold. Upon arrival, we all crashed out in the tent to get a short nap in before driving down to fish the area below the Baptist access point...the nap was freaking awesome.
We got up from our nap an hour later, geared up, jumped in the truck, and headed towards the Baptist access point to get in a few hours of fishing before darkness set in throughout the valley. We got down to the water and the caddis were, once again, coming off like crazy! Just hoards of them flying up the river! But, once again, there wasn't a fish rising anywhere on the river! So it was back to drifting the emerger pattern under an indicator, searching for big trout. The bite was pretty slow throughout the evening. I caught a few fish on my sowbug pattern and Cole actually caught a few fish on an elk hair caddis...but that was the highlight of the evening. I did do some scouting and walked downstream to check out how the river looked further down. I must say, there is some sweeeeettttt water downstream of Baptist. Big deep holes and some nice riffles everywhere. Bet there is some big browns hanging out down there...just got to find 'em! I will be back to test my theory...
We packed up and went back to camp so we could check on the pork shoulder that Derek had wrapped up and slow cooked on the coals of our fire. Luckily saturday night was pretty un-eventful. We ate like kings with pulled pork, baked beans, and potatoes all cooked over the open flame of our campfire. Shortly afterwards, we all retired to our sleeping bags to get a full nights sleep after spending the day doing what we love....chasing the dream!
Whatcha doin paperboy?
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