Bwag
06-14-2013, 09:24 PM
Just want to make sure that the road to Deep Creek Campground is open. Anyone Know? I've never been there but me and a buddy are headed up for three nights. I searched the forum and found these directions in another post:
To get there, take 299 east from Redding, then turn north on Big Bend road. Right when you get into Big Bend take the road that goes east. I think the sign says "Pitt River" or "Pitt 4" or something like that. That road goes past Tunnel Resevoir and then on to the dam at the bottom of Pitt 4 (I guess that's Pitt 5 dam). Right before the dam you'll see another road that goes to the right with a sign that says Deep Creek Campground. You can see all of these roads on the Delorme map, but only the Big Bend road is marked.
Will it be that easy to find? I've got a GPS, Delorme map and have downloaded some directions off of Google (never can really trust those).
Any help would be appreciated.
Headed up Saturday night and made our way down the forrest road off of Clark Creek Road, we passed through a few dispersed camps and there were a few campers in each. We ended up just pulling over in a meadow off of Pit #5. Woke up early Sunday and headed up to #4 and set up camp at the Gravel Bar Access dispersed camp.
After eating breakfast we hit the second access (Forgot the name) it was closest to Pit #5. Pretty good hike down in there and tough wading but worth the effort. My buddy and I landed about five a piece in about an hour of nymphing with indicators. Most averaged 12"-14" and I hooked one about 18".
Around noon we headed out and went upstream to fish a few more holes. I hooked into what felt like a small fish and fought like one as well, then suddenly got a huge pull and the fish just went straight down breaking my line. Couldn't figure that out other than maybe a bigger fish had lunch on what I originally hooked.
We kind of felt like if you found a good spot, fish it out for a while rather than trying to find another one, as access took a while to get to and you could spend more time getting there and hiking in than fishing.
Monday we decided to hit Oak Flat access on #4. Pretty easy hike in and lots of fish in that run. The fish were about the same as the day prior with a few larger ones at the tail end of that riffle. I was indicating and my buddy ran without one. After a few hours we hiked out and headed back to camp and ate lunch and decided to cross the river right at camp and head downstream to see if there was any good holes. We saw what appeared to be a few good riffles but didn't manage to pull any fish out except I hooked a nice sized sucker that went airborn once then dove down. Later in the evening we headed up to the top of Pit #4. That was by far the best section for us. We were swinging rubber legs and got into some nice fish. All were in the 16"-18" range and they were hitting hard, fighting harder and even tougher to land. My buddy got broke off once and lost 5 just in one small spot at a good sized run. I managed to land one and he managed two to the net.
All of these fish hit hard and fought harder than any trout I've caught, (Which admittedly isn't near as many as most people reading this). The hiking in and wading was brutal in most spots. I wore shorts (like an idiot) and the berry bushes are everywhere, I'm pretty sure I've got poison oak. I've never waded a river where I took as many dunks and wedged my boots between so many rocks, I wouldn't fish that river alone. The crowd was minimal, although Sunday the camps had people in them, we never ran into anyone on the water. Choosing flies wasn't difficult, almost anything dark with some rubber legs seemed to work for us as well as throwing on a bead head nymph.
My buddy and I agreed, although it was some tough fishing the catch is worth the effort and we said we'd be back next year for sure and hit some of the other sections.
Thanks to all who replied it was very helpful. Here's some pictures of our trip.
To get there, take 299 east from Redding, then turn north on Big Bend road. Right when you get into Big Bend take the road that goes east. I think the sign says "Pitt River" or "Pitt 4" or something like that. That road goes past Tunnel Resevoir and then on to the dam at the bottom of Pitt 4 (I guess that's Pitt 5 dam). Right before the dam you'll see another road that goes to the right with a sign that says Deep Creek Campground. You can see all of these roads on the Delorme map, but only the Big Bend road is marked.
Will it be that easy to find? I've got a GPS, Delorme map and have downloaded some directions off of Google (never can really trust those).
Any help would be appreciated.
Headed up Saturday night and made our way down the forrest road off of Clark Creek Road, we passed through a few dispersed camps and there were a few campers in each. We ended up just pulling over in a meadow off of Pit #5. Woke up early Sunday and headed up to #4 and set up camp at the Gravel Bar Access dispersed camp.
After eating breakfast we hit the second access (Forgot the name) it was closest to Pit #5. Pretty good hike down in there and tough wading but worth the effort. My buddy and I landed about five a piece in about an hour of nymphing with indicators. Most averaged 12"-14" and I hooked one about 18".
Around noon we headed out and went upstream to fish a few more holes. I hooked into what felt like a small fish and fought like one as well, then suddenly got a huge pull and the fish just went straight down breaking my line. Couldn't figure that out other than maybe a bigger fish had lunch on what I originally hooked.
We kind of felt like if you found a good spot, fish it out for a while rather than trying to find another one, as access took a while to get to and you could spend more time getting there and hiking in than fishing.
Monday we decided to hit Oak Flat access on #4. Pretty easy hike in and lots of fish in that run. The fish were about the same as the day prior with a few larger ones at the tail end of that riffle. I was indicating and my buddy ran without one. After a few hours we hiked out and headed back to camp and ate lunch and decided to cross the river right at camp and head downstream to see if there was any good holes. We saw what appeared to be a few good riffles but didn't manage to pull any fish out except I hooked a nice sized sucker that went airborn once then dove down. Later in the evening we headed up to the top of Pit #4. That was by far the best section for us. We were swinging rubber legs and got into some nice fish. All were in the 16"-18" range and they were hitting hard, fighting harder and even tougher to land. My buddy got broke off once and lost 5 just in one small spot at a good sized run. I managed to land one and he managed two to the net.
All of these fish hit hard and fought harder than any trout I've caught, (Which admittedly isn't near as many as most people reading this). The hiking in and wading was brutal in most spots. I wore shorts (like an idiot) and the berry bushes are everywhere, I'm pretty sure I've got poison oak. I've never waded a river where I took as many dunks and wedged my boots between so many rocks, I wouldn't fish that river alone. The crowd was minimal, although Sunday the camps had people in them, we never ran into anyone on the water. Choosing flies wasn't difficult, almost anything dark with some rubber legs seemed to work for us as well as throwing on a bead head nymph.
My buddy and I agreed, although it was some tough fishing the catch is worth the effort and we said we'd be back next year for sure and hit some of the other sections.
Thanks to all who replied it was very helpful. Here's some pictures of our trip.