White Rocks & Uintah River

February 25, 2012 White Rocks & Uintah River. I just want to know how hillbillies living in mobile home shanties in the boonies train their dogs to make a mad dash for your car and attack your tires. The first dog who rushed us on a dirt road in Neola (small town in Basin) came out of nowhere. It freaks you out when a Blue Healer/Pit Bull mix, bolts for your car. Your natural instinct is to swerve out of his way—which is exactly what the little beast is looking for. I must admit, it takes a brash & bold beast of only about 70 lbs to attack a speeding car, making it swerve away from it. Dogs that do that really piss me off though, and it gets me thinking, if I come back the same way, I’m gonna run that bastard dog over.

Well I get the chance, not 5 minutes later, because another dog pulls the same maneuver, just down the road. This time it’s actually two dogs—another pit mix and a Rottweiler. I’m not caught off guard, and I give them as much tire as I can without going off the road. I hit both of them at the same time, one with the right tire, one with the left. I didn’t think I would hit them, let alone both of them, and I hit both of them solid. Adding insult to injury, I am going fast enough that the two back tires also roll over them. If they weren’t killed upon impact, the back tires for sure sealed the deal.  Just as fast as the dogs came at me, so does their master. He’s clad in a wife beater & over alls, and he’s jamming shells into his shot gun. I punch it, which was not such a good idea, my rear end slides out and we start going off the road. This guy starts running towards us; he’s huge, with this wooly mammoth beard. He’s still pulling his overalls on as he runs towards us, “I’m gonna kill you, you son-a-bitch," he’s yelling. He’s this frantic, hairy monster in motion.

He fires at us, and the back window just explodes. Glass and bb’s hits Johnny on the back of his neck. “Oh my God, he’s shooting us. Oh my God, go go go!” I hear another shot, and I hear the bb’s hit the back end of my truck; I just keep going, trying to get it back on the road. He shoots a few more times, but we are down the road by this time. Johnny is bleeding all over the place, screaming and swearing—its complete madness!

Okay... I didn’t run over the two hillbilly dogs, their wife beater wearing, shot gun toting master didn’t shoot us, and  Johnny didn’t take glass and bb’s to the back of the neck. But now you have an idea of what Neola and the town of White Rocks looks like. It’s safe to say “if you hear the banjo playing run like hell.”

On a serious note though, the Uintah and White Rocks are the two rivers on the edge of the South Slope that we have still not fished. Actually neither one of us has even been to either river. We realize that both rivers will probably be frozen over for the most part, and will not even be fishable. That’s not really our goal this visit, it’s mostly to see where they are, and get a lay of the land; and maybe get a few pics and video. From there we are going to drive back to Duchesne and fish the Strawberry. Maybe I should have taken some pictures of a few of the local homes and let you decide if my imagination has gone wild.

Concerning the rivers, I am right; they are mostly frozen over, White Rocks more than the Uintah. The access road to White Rocks is closed, and it looks tough to get up Uintah’s road due to snow. We are both happy to get a look at them, and now we know exactly how to return in the spring. As a bonus, we saw two golden eagles, one bald eagle, and a handful of hawks in less than two hours.

Our 2012 goal is to become really familiar with the whole south slope, and along with the rivers listed below, they will become the Utah rivers we place on the top of our list, worthy of getting to know better than all other rivers.

Now we just have to fish these rivers, and give the collection of rivers our own name:

The Provo, Current Creek, Pinnacles, The Strawberry, The Duchesne, South Slope (Lake Fork, Rock Creek, Yellowstone, Uintah and White Rocks) Jones Hole Creek and of course The Green. We have not fished Jones Hole, but we have heard amazing things about it.

The fishing the rest of the day was pretty brutal. The one true enemy of fly fishermen came to town—WIND! It is the one thing that you can do nothing with. When we got to the river, the air was calm and tranquil, and the river was low—very low. The first hole we got to we saw about 15 fish grouped up. I was thinking this is one of those days where man has advantage; all I have to do is not spook the fish, which was exactly what I did. I spooked all but one fish out of the hole, and he was not interested in what I had to offer.  Then it came, the wind, I mean wind! We tried high sticking, streamers, indicators—nothing would work because the wind was so strong you couldn’t read your line. We left disappointed and discontent.

We all have days when hillbilly’s shoot at us with shot guns, or at least have their dogs attack our cars. It won’t be the last time that I drive for hours to find a frozen river, or have the wind blow me off it.  Every day can’t be fame, fortune & glory, instead some are blame, torture & morning—but you’ve got to have the “Hillie’s” along with the “Billie’s.”