My wife and I have wanted to go camping with the kids for awhile and this weekend seemed as good a time as any. She wanted to either go to Red Fleet Reservoir or Millsite and we chose the latter, since we've never camped there. With a full tank in the Rodeo, we set off on our adventure.
About 3 hours later (family trips take longer), we arrived to Millsite State Park.
Once we got ourselves situated at the campsite, we tried our luck at the fishing. There were constant ripples by the far corner of the dam, but we couldn't get anything to bite anything. It was nice to actually fish this place without a ton of wind for a change.
Watching the clouds erupt over the desert was pretty neat.
We ended the night with a surprise skunk, and I took a pretty bad fall from a boulder on the dam, but all was well. Just some scratches and bruises (and wet shoes/pants). We couldn't figure out the fishing though.
Back at camp, we grilled some hamburgers, hot dogs, sausages, and marshmallows until we couldn't bear any more. We brought a lot of food for this trip and it didn't go to waste.
The moon was pretty cool that night. Too bad we couldn't catch it when it was full.
The next morning, I took a walk and fished for about an hour and a half without a bite. Vowing to catch fish on this trip, I decided to bag Millsite (the wind was already howling anyway) and take everyone a bit upstream.
The only problem was that when I marched back to the tent, everyone else was still asleep! How anyone can sleep that long in a hot tent after sunrise is beyond me. While they slept a bit longer, I prepared breakfast and got most of our stuff packed up.
After the family was served their breakfast in bed, we finally got moving and headed up the canyon in search of fish lips.
See ya next time, Millsite.
Our first stop was Willow Lake, where I had experienced mass quantities of hatchery rainbow a couple of years back, on almost every cast.
After wasting about a half hour, I gave up and drove a little further. More stops ensued and more skunkings were dealt. It wasn't until I reached a fun tiger lake and I finally tricked something into biting my gear.
Although small, it felt good to catch at least one fish on our big adventure.
Knowing the lake might actually cooperate, I insisted that we stay to try and crack the code, as to what they were biting. Time ticked on, but my one fish remained as the only fish so far.
Enough with that, there were more spots just up the road and pretty soon, we basked in the spectacle of Skyline Drive's high point.
As was the case last week, there were many photo opportunities at the top that were practically identical to some that I exploited a couple of years ago. The flower below could possibly be the same one I framed on that trip.
It's so pretty up there. Looking out from the top is a great feeling.
The last time I shot this sign, I took the Sentra. The Rodeo proved to be needed though, a few miles to the north.
From the high point, we headed north until we came upon Snow Lake, which looked magnificent and even showed sign of some fish activity.
Still cursed, we struck out at Snow as well. Though we witnessed 2 definite rises, the fish wouldn't go near anything we threw. It was demoralizing to get skunked at such a pretty lake. I walked around much of it, looking for takers.
Another spot I had always wanted to visit was somewhat close. Cove Lake lie 4 miles south, by way of a very bumpy road. This is where the 4WD was needed. Getting to the lake took quite awhile, considering the distance, mostly because we had to crawl in so many places.
Our reward was to find a totally vacant venue at Cove.
Though beautiful and serene, it was incredibly shallow. The entire shoreline was walked without even seeing a fish, looking everywhere for them. The only life I found in Cove were salamanders, which is odd, since Cove supposedly gets stocked.
Considering the luck I was having though, there were probably hundreds of hold-over brutes just out of sight but they wouldn't hit anything.
My wife wasn't pleased to know that we would have to return via the same road that led us there. The deep ruts and large, uneven dips really put the tilt on us and made her nervous. Here's one of the easy spots on the road.
Collecting yet another skunk, we continued our journey, intending to leave the mountain at the next connecting road.
A quick goodbye to Jet Fox and we were on our way.
More vistas from Skyline Drive required a stop and then we took the North Fork of Manti Canyon to get down.
My last fishing stop of the trip was on a small creek, where I missed a pretty good sized brookie that liked my jig.
Gorgeous creek. Too bad it wasn't as fishy as it looked though.
Sonia and the kids took a moment to get a refreshing wake-up call before we saddled our hides for the rest of our trip.
Regardless of the fishing, it was a great trip and we all stayed in pretty good spirits while we enjoyed seeing new places together.