Thank You, Franklin Roosevelt (And Jayson)

I love the first big snowfall of the season. After looking at the snowless Mt. Bachelor and the Three Sisters for a good part of the summer, it's great to gaze west this time of year -- after a big storm goes through -- and see those peaks covered in newly-fallen snow.

In fact, the only time I really don't like the first big snowfall of the season is when I am on a backpacking trip and am camping at a lake with an elevation of over 5000 feet when the storm hits.

That's what I was doing this last weekend with six friends. Our destination was a lake in the heart of the Three Sisters Wilderness. The weather was great on Thursday afternoon when we set out from the trailhead on our nine-mile hike. After about four hours of hiking, we reached our destination and set up camp near a leaky old shelter which was built during the Franklin Roosevelt administration by FDR's Civilian Conservation Corps. And thank God that shelter was there.

Thursday evening (pictured at right) was great. Dan caught a fat, 15-inch rainbow trout just as the sun was going down and then caught a smaller rainbow that he released. Nick and Jayson also hooked into fish that evening. Then the moon came out, and we had a nice campfire. We were expecting some snow or rain to come in about midnight, but when we went to bed the sky was clear and we were hoping the weatherman was wrong.

He wasn't. His timing was just a bit off. The snow started falling around 5:30 am on Friday morning and it pretty much snowed all day long. Thankfully, Jayson had brought several tarps with him. He positioned them inside the leakiest parts of the shelter and then moved the fire pit closer to the shelter's entrance, so our group had a dry, warm place to congregate. If it wasn't for that shelter and Jayson's tarps, we would have been pretty miserable.

We fished hard on Friday, but the snowy weather apparently kept the bite down. I caught a 16-inch cutthroat trout early on Friday morning right in front of our camp -- that's me at right holding the fish -- and Dan caught a nice fish later in the evening, but those were the only two we landed that day (we did, however, miss many bites on Friday). Both those fish made excellent hors d’œuvres to go along with lunch and dinner that day. We briefly discussed whether we should hike out on Friday due to all the snow, but we eventually decided to stick it out.

The weather cleared on Saturday. At left is a picture of Dan, Liz, and Chris enjoying the improved conditions. We experienced a brief snow shower on Saturday morning, but then it warmed up and we even had some sun breaks as the day wore on.

And the trout bite improved with the weather. Dan caught an 18-inch cutthroat off of a peninsula about a third of a mile from our camp -- at right is a photo of one of Dan's fishes cooking -- and Carl followed Dan's fish by landing a 17-inch cutthroat (pictured below) about an hour later.

We then moved over to a cliff area on the other side of the lake and tangled with some nice trout there. I briefly hooked a fish that nearly pulled my rod into the water, then Dan lost one that he got right up to the bank before it broke off.

Up to this point, we were mostly fishing bait off of the bottom, so I decided to mix it up a bit and do a little bobber fishing. I casted out a worm/powerbait combo beneath the bobber, and within 30 seconds after my bobber hit the water, a nice cutthroat hit me hard then proceeded to jump a couple of times. The cool part about this fish was that I got to fight him from an elevated level about 10 feet above the lake's surface, which meant I would have more control over the fish in that I could keep him out of the submerged logs.

After a spirited battle, Nick landed the 17-inch cutthroat for me then gently released it back into the lake to be caught another day. That's me on the right relaxing by the lake while enjoying a delicious cigar after battling that fish.

The bite shut down after that. We landed one more cutthroat trout later in the evening, but that was it. We fished for several hours on Sunday morning while we were packing up, but we didn't get a single bite.

Despite the weather and the slower-than-expected fishing, we had a great time. In fact, the only time I didn't enjoy myself was on the hike back out (pictured below). The trail on the nine-mile hike out was a slushy, slippery, snowy mess, and it was pretty miserable. But we reached the trailhead in about three-and-a-half hours, and the trip was over.


I am looking forward to next year's trip and hopefully some better weather. I'll post some more pictures later.