Whitefish range Montana

       You know, sometimes I get stuck in a fishing rut, and go to the same places over and over.  Now, when the starting point is Montana, almost any place you choose is way above the average river in anywhere USA.  The advantage of going to the same places often is one becomes familiar with the river, hatches, and watering holes of the familiar zone. 

sure is purdy up there in Montana!

 Well this is a story of my balancing act between two loves.  First of course, is my beautiful wife Julie, and the other is second best thing in the whole wide world.......... you got it fly fishing. 4 days off... Montana... summer... What to do? Gotta keep the missus happy..... but fishing would be cool, What to do....?  I know I can do both!

         

I call it the Montana double weekend, not to be confused with another of my favorite Montana doubles.

The folks at kettle house do it right! 

         Back to the rut thing I started with, it seems most of our camping weekends are spent on the Thompson river. this is because it is one of my favorite places on the planet, and Julie doesn't hate it because it is beautiful and there are good places to hike and run. (not to mention, but my fishing friend Jim just bought a cabin on the

Thompson, but that's for another time).  But this time we pack up the family truckster and head north instead of southwest.

On the divide

The big loop, up grave creek over the divide, down trail creek (yakinikak), to the North Fork

       First weekend an overnight into the Whitefish Range.  Camping at Tuchuck campground, up the North Fork of the Flathead, then 20 miles up trail creek road. 5 miles as the crow flies to Canada, this was the staging ground for many a mountain bike adventure in my younger days. A sort of young-life crisis of mine. When I tore my meniscus in my knee skiing, the doctor put the scope in my knee, and told me I had the knees of a 50 year old. And to make them "last as long as you can" So what was my answer to this news? well after the percodans ran out I decided I wanted to ride my bike (or sometimes carry it) to the top of every peak in the Whitefish Range. with people like Chris "tele" Miller, Crazy Joe (always the favorite for the "first blood award"), and Jon Pyle.  At least three of these rides were accessed from Tuchuck campground.  These included, Tuchuck Mtn, Review Mtn, and Mt Thompson Seton. I do have lots of pictures of these rides, but it was pre-digital days, so they won't be in this post.

since no one else was there we really spread out at Tuchuck Campground.

      
     Talk about isolated we saw no more than 3 cars once we left the semi-main road, and not one other person at the campground.  Since this is usually a fishing blog, I will say that of course I always pack some sort of rod, my big fishing moment came on day 1 when I caught a bull trout on a size 18 elk hair caddis in Grave Creek, unfortunately he was  under six inches. Still counted though.  

Fishing Grave Creek with Maggie.  

headwaters

  
 Generally tiny creeks = tiny fish

        At the campground Trail creek was closed to fishing, presumably to protect the Bull Trout. But, all I saw was cutties that time of the summer. I normally stop using waders in June, but I wished I would have packed them as trail creek couldn't have been more than 45 degrees.

who would want to fish here anyway?

         The next day we headed back to the North Fork, and decided to take a side trip to Canada (only about 5 miles out of our way), to the now defunct North Fork border crossing.  Which has been closed for a long time. I remember reading an article in the local news paper titled something like; "the loneliest job in America" or something like that. This article said some days zero people would cross and a busy day was six or seven.  All in All it is still very cool at the end of the road. My favorite is when you stand on the border you can look in either direction and see where they have cut down all the trees, maybe a 50 foot wide swath all along the border.

"Road don't go nowhere"

    

Don't even think about sneakin' into canada they have infrared sensors. Notice the swath in background

        As far as a "no-fishing weekend" maybe not quite.  But certainly nice to go explore the beauty of Montana off the beaten path and hopefully keep harmony in the family.  Oh yeah, we also had to observe another long standing tradition when adventuring in the Whitefish range. That is to stop at the Polebridge Mercantile for a wonderful fresh baked pocket sandwich and a beer, (we chose the Tamarack Hat Trick Hop, mmmmmm beer). 

Maggie, saving her energy for the next adventure.

stay tuned next time part two of my double weekend a seldom done float on the Blackfoot river.

Hermit out