Henry’s Lake Idaho October 2022
I believe that the success and experience of an adventure is connected to your expectations and context that you bring to the trip.
I was fortunate to be invited on a four-day trip to Henry’s Lake in northeast Idaho to fish for Yellowstone cutthroat trout, brook trout, and hybrid cut-bows (a sterile cross of a cutthroat and Rainbow trout). The fish are known to run big, make that really big, with hybrids in excess of 10 lbs. not unusual. That’s steelhead class.
Henry’s Lake is one of Idaho’s great high mountain lakes and considered one of the finest trout fisheries in the West. Located at an elevation of 6,476 feet it is 15 miles from Yellowstone National Park and surrounded on three sides by the Continental Divide. This was shaping up to be an epic adventure: big fish, stunning setting, and great companions.
This was the third fall trip for my hosts. The previous two had been story book: huge fish, huge numbers and blue bird weather. Trip three brought different conditions. The brutal summer that seems to have affected all the west had its impact. The lake was perhaps a foot lower than optimal, and the summer heat have left it turbid with clumping algae. Couple that with two cold fronts bringing wind, scattered rain and dropping temperatures and it certainly seemed fall had arrived. The fish were there but just hard to find and not much interested in the contents of our fly boxes.
Regardless, this was a group of fishermen. A lesser crew would have settled for a little lodge lounging. However, for four days we put in 11-hour shifts using all our flies, tactics and wiles and had fair success. We did not find the thirty fish a day numbers as previous years, but we scratched out a high of 16 per boat on day four when the weather stabilized. All in all, we are probably better fisherman for the experience because we know what works under difficult conditions in one of the finest trout fisheries in the West.
As to context? While they would never admit it, some of my companions, all excellent fishermen, seemed a little down about the trip. Honestly, conditions were less than ideal, better suited to winter steelhead, and the fishing was tough. Throw in a 24 hour round trip to get there and I believe they deserved to be a little low.
Me? I was thrilled. The last day I had 10 fish: maybe 25 overall including many huge cutthroats to 21 inches. Top fish was a 21.5-inch hybrid that came aboard as part fish, part salad. And I achieved the Henry’s Lake Slam: a brook trout, cutthroat trout, and cut-bow. I even caught a Utah chub on the fly in keeping with my ‘trash-fish’ streak. The setting was stunning, I had excellent company and more fish than I deserved. And I was not skunked. For me the trip was fantastic. Its all in the context.
Sign me up for next year.
