Snake River Float Trip

[Gerry Zagorski]

Did a National Park tour of Glacier, Yellowstone and Tetons for me and Ruth's Birthday's. It was spectacular with only 2 regrets, not having done it sooner and wish we had another day in each of the parks just to relax and take it all in. Most days were spent in the car running and gunning to the next must see sight in each park or getting to the other park, we logged 2000 in the rental car.


Decided to spend my Birthday doing a half day float trip in the Tetons on the Snake River and it did not disappoint.

We launched at the Jackson Lake dam and fly fished which was something I hadn't done in several years. By sheer luck we chose 1 of only 3 float companies allowed to fish the National Park waters and that stretch of the river. After some casting lessons and getting to know how to present the flies, we set out on a 4 mile float with the Tetons as a back drop targeting the native Cutthroats and Mountain Whitefish the area is noted for...

The river is crystal clear and varies drastically in depths from 1 to 25 feet so we used both dry and wet flies, dry flies in the shallower rifts and tail waters and wet flies in the deeper holes with indicators. I probably missed 10 or so fish while getting used to fly fishing again but managed to get 3 Cutthroats and one Mountain Whitefish to the net.

Although there weren't any hatches of note going on, there was one particular part of the river that made the day. A huge eddy was formed by a deep cut in the bank and even from a distance you could see a concentration of fish constantly rising. Man that was so cool to see and the anticipation put me up in my seat and my level of excitement over the top.

A few things of note here.... These fishermen and fish and game are super protective about their native Cutthroats and Mountain Whitefish and don't want any other fish in their waters that are not there naturally. For this reason they do not stock, you're not allowed to fish with any live bait and your boat and bilge are inspected before you are allowed to put in. They had stocked in Rainbows and Lake Trout in the past which was thought to be a huge mistake and encouraged you to keep anything that was not native to the river system.

All in all one of my most memorable fishing trips. Not because the fish were huge but because these fish have been here naturally for 1000s of years, I got to meet a few of them personally and the scenery while doing so was beyond compare! Orvis fly fishing set up is on order for next time