Fly Fishing - Crested Butte, Colorado

Fly Fishing Photography

Crested Butte, Colorado - Summer - San Juan Mountains

Crested Butte, Colorado is hands down one of my favorite places to go fly fishing in the country. It’s just one of my favorite places period. Combine the stunning views with their mountain town culture and access to all sorts of fly fishing, and the place is hard to beat. Summertime anywhere in the San Juan mountains will seduce you whether you’re aware of it or not. The images are from a recent backcountry fly fishing trip with friends to a small creek that shall go unnamed for obvious reasons. There is plenty of easy fishing access around around Crested Butte on the Taylor River, East River, and Gunnison River, so blowing up such a remote spot like this would cause me to lose sleep. Just looking at these photographs is FOMO inducing. Can’t wait to get back out there.

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Summer fly fishing near Crested Butte, Colorado

Fly fishing in Crested Butte, Colorado

Photograph of two friends fly fishing a small creek in Colorado

Fly fisherman wading up a river in Crested Butte, Colorado

Photograph of a fly fisherman climbing over a pile of logs along a stream

A fly fisherman climbing over a pile of trees and branches on the side of a river outside Crested Butte, Colorado

Photograph of a fly fisherman casting in a beautiful section of stream near Crested Butte, Colorado

Fly fishing a picturesque stream in the San Juan Mountains

Photograph of beers cooling off in a pool off on the side of a stream in Colorado

Cans of Coors Banquet chilling in river water during a fly fishing trip in Colorado

Catching trout on a backcountry stream in Colorado

Backcountry fly fishing in Colorado

A fly fisherman netting a trout in a small stream surrounded by canyon walls in Colorado

Fly fisherman laughing after a fun day on the river in Crested Butte, Colorado

Fly fishing wading boots and wading socks drying on a tree

Los Angeles River Fly Fishing

Los Angeles River Fly Fishing

Urban Fly Fishing for Carp - Photography

It’s hard for a lot of people who have never been in LA to believe that there is a river running through the city. Even harder to believe that said river actually holds fish and people are willing to stand in the water to try and catch them! Here is proof! This particular day was with my buddy Tyler Vanosdell of Mission Bay Fly Fishing and Lino Jubilado - aka the Mayor of Los Angeles River fly fishing. We had a great time, but it was one of those days on the water where you do everything right but it still doesn’t add up to anything. Perhaps that’s what keeps people coming back? Go pick up a copy of The Drake Magazine to read the article.

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Photograph of a fly fisherman casting into the LA River

Los Angeles River Fly Fishing

Fly Fishing Deckers Canyon

Fly Fishing Photography - Colorado - Deckers

There is no end to the pleasures that fly fishing can provide a person once they get past the initial suffering that comes along with the sport. That’s not to say it ever gets easy, you just learn how to screw up less. For me, one of the great pleasures is watching the way light, or the lack thereof, can transform a river. Might not look like it, but this was a cold December day on the South Platte River in Deckers Canyon. The solitude a canyon brings is great. It also brings endless shifts of light that can be equal parts beautiful, tricky, and frustrating from a photography perspective. One of my biggest difficulties with fly fishing is a positive one; deciding whether to fish or to photograph. After years of deliberation the obvious conclusion presented itself - fish when the light sucks.

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Fly Fishing - Crested Butte, CO

Taylor River Fly Fishing

Fly Fishing Photography - Colorado

Sometimes you think the sun is going to help with the cold and on certain days is does. For all the rest of the days, it’s easiest to just accept the fact that you won’t feel your hands again until you get back to the truck. At which point you’ll need to put a koozie around your beer just so they don’t get any worse. Thankfully this wasn’t one of those. It’s only the middle of October but that doesn’t matter. If you spend time in the mountains then you know an early summer morning can feel oddly similar to winter. It’s got to be part of that whole love/hate thing.

It’s safe to assume that most western fly fisherman, in the beginning at least, are only concentrated on the rainbow trout. It’s put up on a pedestal. The trophy. The goal. Won’t deny having those same feelings, but that’s all changed over time, as everything does. Now, in my opinion, brown trout are king. Their colors and markings are really special.Now, In the name of transparency this isn’t my fish, but my friend caught it while I was shooting. Which means I was sort of catching it vicariously through him. That’s the only way I’ve found to calm the urge to set the camera down and replace it with a fly rod. It’s a vicious cycle that I’m trying to be at peace with. On the scale of problems, it’s a good one to have. Snowboarding is the only thing I do that absolutely won’t involve a camera unless it’s the one on my phone. Fly fishing on the other hand is a constant battle.

Good times on the Taylor River that day.

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Fly Fishing Photography

Alaska Fly Fishing

It’s a shame that I’m not better with words to accurately describe the experience of fly fishing in Alaska. Never done it down in South America, so I can’t compare, but nevertheless Alaska is on a whole different level than most places you’ll ever experience. A lot of the reason for that is the remote locations you go to fish that are only accessible by float plane. The plane rides alone are worth the price of admission, but they also let you know just how isolated you are from the rest of the world. I love Alaska. More to come from this trip soon…

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11 Mile Canyon - Fly Fishing

Fly Fishing Photography

11 Mile Canyon - Colorado - Trout - Fly Fishing Culture

The last 2 months of travel/shooting have been so full that I literally forgot about these images for a while. My turnaround on posting images is usually 6 months to a year though, so this is uncharacteristically quick. These are from a rare trip to Colorado when I opted for a plane instead of driving, if that tells you anything about my recent schedule? Not complaining at all. The last two months have been great and I couldn’t be any more grateful to be busy after the black hole of 2020 which consisted of almost zero commercial work. Enough of that talk. 11 Mile Canyon near Lake George is a special place, but don’t tell anyone. I’ve been hearing about if from friends for years and was finally able to experience it first hand. All the guys in our crew were catching monster Rainbow Trout. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get up close to photograph them, although I don’t care much about those kind of images. There are more than too many of them on the internet as is. Hope to make a yearly trip to this canyon.

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