L.A. June 2007

Well, after a one year hiatus from posting I thought I’d start again. No point wasting server space right?

That past year had been rough, with the culmination of most of my tackle lost...(a long story not to be retold..). A month or so after my last April post, I went on a trip to Los Angeles and had a chance to fish for trout in the San Bernardino Mountains in Orange County. Below is an account of what I can remember of the trip.

Early morning on 1st June ’07 in LA, I left Torrance in a rented car without a GPS for the San Bernardino Mountains in search of trout. Browsing through the internet the weeks prior to this outing, I worked out that the nearest possible stream/river to my hotel would be in Orange County. So with just a Google Map printout with driving directions, I set off….

After an hour and a half I reached the outskirts of the National Park at the foot hills of the mountains. Going up on Highway 38 I reached Barton Flats where I purchased my Park parking fee (bought my fishing license the day before). Wandering down Glass Rd to Seven Oaks Rd I looked forward to see the Santa Ana River.

From my research, I know that the Santa Ana River was stocked. But when I finally got my first glimpse of the ’river’, I was shocked! It looked more like a stream…a creek by other standards.

Needless to say I was sorely disappointed. It was only about 2-3 metres wide. But, having already invested the time driving all the way up, I changed into my waders (overkill in the heat and size of said ‘river’). I set my trusty 6 piece 4wt and tied on a 6 ft leader and left it at that. Wandering down the banks I could see that the river was only a foot and a half deep on average with a few deeper pools. The side on the river was lined with lots of tree and shrubs. I decided to go into the water to wade up.

As you can see, this looks like a perfect setup for a 2 wt 6-6.5 ft rod.

Then I saw a rise… I knelt down and watched for a few minutes. Then I saw it again. Just a foot downstream of an underwater boulder…another rise. I then fumbled to tie on a 5 or 6X tippet (I can’t remember already) and a size 14-16 Parachute with my 15 fingers. After finally putting the terminal rig together, I cast out the line. The fluro pink parachute stood out well amidst the shadow patched water. After two casts, the pink parachute disappeared in a dimple of water and I set the hook. The fish put up a short but spirited fight and even leapt one or twice. Eventually, I bought the fish in to the bank and was very pleasantly surprised to see a brown trout! I was expecting to see a rainbow but I realized that the fisheries did stock brown in here too.

So, the rest of the afternoon went quite productively. Each pocket of water more or less held fish. I caught and released around 8 – 10 browns. Curiously only browns were caught. I tried a couple of nymphs but they weren't as effective. I met a few bait fishermen using Berkeley Trout Eggs and they were catching only rainbows. It was only after talking to these guys did I realize I was in rattlesnake and mountain lion country. Goes to show how tunneled vision I can get when in pursuit of fish.

Here are some more photos of the trip -