Fishing in Arrowstone Park

Hi Blog! As you know, we are staying in Deer Lodge, Montana.  The famous Clark Fork River runs right through town.  This part of the river is surrounded by industrial sites - pulp mill, electric plant, rail yard, etc.  It is not the most picturesque part of the river, but it does hold really big brown trout.  We decided to take our bikes along the bike path that runs alongside the river into Arrowstone Park.  We noted a number of riffles and pools that we wanted to try.  We found Mr. Heron staking out his favorite fishing hole.

There was a boat ramp from the parking lot.  The river is really deep here.  We saw some rises and figured it would be a good spot to try first thing in the morning.  We did try, but the fish just ignored our flies.  We ended up moving further downstream.

Here is Kathy checking out the Clark Fork from the Main Street bridge.  You can just make out the Welcome to Deer Lodge sign on the right.

The bike bath goes right by the old train yard.  Here are a few of the historic engines they have as part of their museum display.

Here's Dave getting ready for battle.  No waders today.  Just the wading boots.  Parts of the river are shallow enough you can cross over in water up to your ankles.  The fun part was riding our bikes holding 8 foot fly rods!

That big splash to the right is not a fish rising, but a muskrat going for a swim!

We spent about four hours poking about, trying the different spots we scoped out yesterday.  It was Dave's day today with four nice brown trout, including one monster.  Kathy bagged two.  By noon, it was getting too hot to stand around in the sun.  We rode our bikes back to camp and then hit the bakery for some sweet treats to help celebrate Drew's birthday.

It's moving day tomorrow, so we probably won't have anything to report.

Happy Hump Day!