Uintah Road Trip

Uintah Road trip

I have to go to Vernal to look at a few jobs. So, if I’m going to Vernal, two things must happen:  one I must fish; because the Basin is the holy land. Brigham Young said “This is the place” referring to the Salt Lake Valley. But I say the holy land for fly fishing is the Basin, starting at the upper Provo and ending past Vernal at the Green or Jones Hole. If you consider the entire state, there are some great rivers, rivers that can hold their own with any other western state—for trout that is. But no other area has such an abundant amount of hallowed rivers as the Basin.

The second thing that must be done… ride the bike instead of drive the car. My plan is to take Wolf Creek Pass, then go past Altamont, Roosevelt, on to Vernal.  I will look at the jobs, then either stop at Uintah River or White Rocks. The only problem is that I think there are a few fires burning up Uintah canyon and I’m not really sure if they are contained. So maybe I will stay up Rock Creek canyon then decide what to do the next day. If my buddy Stan reads this I know he's saying out loud, "what why didn't you hit Jones Hole?" Honestly Stan I really wanted to so many rivers, so little time....

The drive up Wolf Creek could not be any better, all the way from Woodland to Altamont I have to pass one car, that’s it. Did you hear what I just said? I had only one car ahead of me through the whole canyon!  The ride was total bliss. The day was hot so reaching the peak which is almost 10,000 ft. was cool and refreshing. If you know Wolf Creek, you know how each turn screams out motorcycle; it’s winding and scenic and calm. When you get to Hanna and Tabby I love the rolling green fields of alfalfa, the cows and the whole simple farm life feel.  The Duchesne River follows the road at some points, which also helps cool the ride.

When you ride there is a point where you sort of forget that you are on a motorcycle and you just sort of go with it. It’s kind of like your body melts into the bike, and it melts into you, and you’re not really on a machine. I know it sounds like I am being dramatic or maybe trying to sound cool, but it’s not that, it’s just this feeling you get when you have a long amount of road ahead of you, and you really settle into it. You can smell everything from a dead skunk to flowers to the irrigation sprinkler water. You can feel the really green areas because they swell and make the air thick while the arid dry areas are thin and hot. I have my I-pod on which adds to the feelings of being in my own private little world.

 At any rate I just love the hell out of the basin. I know I am the first one to throw the locals under the bus for being cheap “Deliverance” rejects, but I should shut my mouth. The land and the rivers are that good; and honestly most of the people out there are very nice.  My favorite aspect is the transition from pinion pine and sage brush desert to rolling green farm hills.  When you go from Duchesne to  Mountain Home it is literally 15 minutes from this transition from desert to farm hills to pine and quakes’. Note: check out some of the picks the light is really strange due to all the fires burning. I think riding a bike through the Basin may be just as much fun as fishing one of its premium rivers.

I spent the night under the stars at a little spot in Rock Creek. I just put a sleeping bag on the back of the bike, and rolled it out on the ground. I could not find my little foam pad before I left—big mistake the ground is called “the ground” for a reason. But all in all it was fine. I fished literally into the dark. I figured why not. I had already eaten dinner. You could not build a fire because they already have enough burning out of control. So, I had nothing else to do. I put on a green drake, and I was using the golden reflection of light on the water to see my fly. I could just see a little dot hit the fading reflection off the river. I was casting way farther than I usually do; I was really throwing some line. I figured what the hell, let’s make this about as hard as possible, after all I am a fly fishermen, it’s what we are into right?

 I slept like hell; the bed of rocks was just a little different than my bed and lovely wife. But whatever at least I was awake at the crack of dawn; and if you are up that early without any coffee, then what should you do? You guessed it—fish. I was a little too wimpy to put my shorts and Teva’s on and get into the water. I fished with my pants and boots from the bank for about two hours, just long enough to let it warm up. By the way have I mentioned how much I love Rock Creek? In the fly fishing world there is nothing better than catching fish on dries. Some guys nymph almost exclusively because that technique gets you down to some big fish. But when you have fish like the ones at Rock Creek that slowly rise up to slurp in your dry—it doesn’t get any better.  The water is so clear, and with a lot of big rocks on the bottom to provide cover for them, you can see a lot of the fish coming off the bottom to come get your fly.

I decided to head to Uintah Canyon, even if fires are burning. Actually I heard they were pretty much contained in that area. The ride out to Uintah River was tops. There is one stretch of road through Neola that is long and straight and just bad ass. I am not even going to say how fast I was going. Fishing Uintah is also sweet, it’s just like Rock Creek, except surprisingly there were some spots that were pretty deep to cross and the fish were smaller. Other than that it was every bit as scenic and active as Rock Creek.

The ride home was almost as good as the ride out there. But when is the ride home ever as good as the one leading to the adventure? I was “good tired” when I got home.