West Virginia Trout Fishing, Elk2

My pal Matt and I arrived at the
Back Fork of the Elk above Webster
Springs in the early morning and
fished until noon, and then we moved
on to the main stem Elk near
Monterville after lunch and for the
rest of the day.
I'm probably wrong, but it seems to
me that experts forget to mention the
Back Fork when they talk about the
best trout water in West Virginia. But
I've caught some of my biggest trout
there, and I always try to work in a
few hours of Back Fork when I'm
lucky enough to get up to the Elk.
This day was no disappointment,
either, as Matt and I both hooked
several nice rainbows. We worked
our way upstream through a portion
of the catch-and-release section, Matt
fishing primarily a prince nymph, and
me fishing a woolly bugger. The
recent dry conditions left the stream
running pretty low, so trout were
easy to find in the larger pools. To
keep from spooking the fish, Matt and
I divided up the pools and fished
separately, and we approached each
pool as quietly as we were able. The
fish cooperated all morning. If they
knew I was there, they didn't seem to
care. And frankly, I don't know how
they could miss me.
I simply tossed my woolly bugger
across the current and slightly
upstream, let it settle into the pool,
and then stripped it back toward me
with little short jerks of my line as it
also drifted downstream. With each
cast, I got a little farther away from
me, until I had covered all of the water
within a reasonable casting distance
in front of me. Not the kind of fly
fishing you read about in Gray's
Sporting Journal, but it is effective
nonetheless. By noon the day was
turning hot and humid and we were
ready for a break, so we walked,
stumbled, and waded our way back
downstream to the vehicle, and we
headed into town.
After lunch at the Subway restaurant
in Webster Springs, we drove
upstream, following the main stem of
the Elk, through Bergoo, past
Whittacker Falls, to Monterville. We
stopped in the fly shop at the Elk
Springs Resort where we ended up
buying some #16 Light Cahill
emergers on the advice of John, the
guy manning the store. He told us
about the previous evening's Light
Cahill hatch, and how he had caught
a number of trout on the emerger.
So, we bought a few, and I ended up
buying some new wading boots on
sale, too, and then we headed out in
the afternoon heat to try to catch a
fish.
By 5:30 in the afternoon,
thunderclouds reached over the
surrounding mountaintops and sent
gusts of fresh air into the humid
valley.

About the same time, fish started to rise and boil under
the surface, and I figured it might be time to tie on one of
those Light Cahill emergers.
With rumbles of thunder echoing down the valley of the
Elk, and the evening sun slipping behind approaching
storm clouds, I laid my Cahill gently onto the current and
watched it glide under a wad of sycamore roots at the
head of a long pool. Suddenly a big rainbow trout
swirled out from under the overhang, slurped up my fly,
and headed back to the deep. The last thing I saw of
that trout was the fly popping loose from the outside
skin of its lower jaw.
I continued to fish that hole, and Matt came along and
fished it with me, but we were not able to get that fish to
strike again. We caught some smaller trout from the
same place, but not the big one. We trudged our way
out of the river as a heavy rain began to fall.
The lesson I learned from my day on the Elk is that you
don't have to get fancy to catch fish on a fly rod. You
can fish nymphs and woolly buggers, and you can catch
trout consistently. But if you are lucky enough to be
present for a hatch and have the right fly, it can be
thrilling. And I was also reminded of another thing...you
don't actually have to land a fish to remember it for the
rest of your life.