Fishing in Church: A Fish Report
The title of this post is deceptive, it should actually read “Fishing in THE Church,” as in the Frank Church Wilderness in Idaho. Since I am of humble means and I am a hard-core DIY kind of guy, I have never hired a guide, a wrangler for a string of mules to carry my gear, or a rafting company to float me down a river so I can fish. If I want to explore a big wilderness area, I do it the old fashioned way: I hike in. I did a similar trip about three years ago into the Bob Marshall Wilderness in Montana, so I decided to take a look at the second largest wilderness area lower 48 and do some exploring of the Frank Church Wilderness in Idaho.
https://i.imgur.com/M4ZZnRX.jpg
Welcome to our church!
The hike was pretty straightforward, but rather hot, since a lot of the shading vegetation was, shall we say, “well done.”
https://i.imgur.com/Pw8IZwz.jpg
Easy views of the stream almost the whole time
https://i.imgur.com/jFRyqO2.jpg
The fishing was good, not great, but I was able to catch plenty of these:
https://i.imgur.com/kHnwzFR.jpg
Juvenile Steelhead
https://i.imgur.com/5BORDFi.jpg
West Slope Cutts
And a few of these:
https://i.imgur.com/6dH3tRE.jpg
Rocky Mountain Bonefish
Not to mention some of these:
https://i.imgur.com/1lvTz3Z.jpg
Juvenile Chinook Salmon
There were some other tributaries of the many forks of the Salmon River that I fished as well, one pictured here
https://i.imgur.com/sO2vi5Y.jpg
There was a very small town way out there in the sticks, which actually did have its own gas station. I wonder if they had full service?
https://i.imgur.com/w3eNhRC.jpg
After a couple of weeks, I moseyed my way back to California via Oregon, so I could stop and visit some family. On my way back home, I stopped and caught a few salmonid species unique to our state.
https://i.imgur.com/jyMzX75.jpg
The Goose Lake Redband
https://i.imgur.com/w2Z9qf3.jpg
The Warner Lakes Redband
https://i.imgur.com/np3wDXv.jpg
The Sheepheaven Redband
It was a good trip, plenty of fishing, relaxing and communing with nature, but it’s nice to sleep in my own bed and eat much better food for my meals. I’m also starting to think about where I’m going to go next year…we’ll see.
