When you think of the Grand Canyon you think of the Arizona desert and vast views of breath taking views as far as the eye can see. Now take that and add in trout fishing and you have an adventure worth taking. You might be able to even pay for some gas for the trip as well. Right outside the town of Page, AZ lies the famous Lake Powell with its fabulous slot canyons and massive house boats. Well the Glen Canyon Dam creates such a wonderful lake from the mighty Colorado River. Below this dam runs cold water that holds big trout and breath taking views one can’t miss
If your journey starts in Page, AZ then youll head south on US-89 until you hit a basic Y in the road and youll head north on US89A. Right after you cross the Colorado River there is Lees Ferry Road on your right. You’ll take that road till it dead ends but our journey wasnt over yet. You have fishing access there but we decided to go up stream. We booked a pair of Kayaks from ” Kayak the Colorado” for $35 per boat and we also booked a back haul was $80 per person to take us to the base of the dam. With taxes and fees for two of us it cost $245.88 for an amazing adventure. Make sure youre on time because we thought it wasnt going to take us long to get there and maps told us almost an hour so we had to speed becuase we got caught behind semitrucks on a two lane road. The back haul was about 11 miles. This trip was worth every penny we spent
After getting dropped at the base of the dam it was time to rig up the old 5wt’s and do some drifting down the river. The hard part about this river is how clear it is your depth perception is thrown off and you can see the bottom and its 20ft deep. You’ll see trout swimming ant think its waist deep water and youll be over your head licky split. So while your on your kayak make sure not to tip over because its cold and deep and running at a flow of about 3mph which doesnt sound fast but can sweep you away
We tried floating down stream to see if we could get some takes just drifting on the kayaks but from the depth of the water and the depth of the trout with our 9ft leader we seemed to still be a bit shallow and not getting down to where the trout are. Tried to adjust but we only got two takes on the drift and both were small brown trout. Here is the cool part though, there is a bounty on Brown Trout. This is how you can pay for your trip. The AZ DGF is trying to save a minnow that inhabits these waters and it seems the more carnivorous and aggressive browns are doing a number on thier population. So they implanted chip in the noses of some that could be worth several 100 dollars. So you’d have to kill the fish and drop the head into box at Lees Ferry with all your information. Each Brown is worth something but some may be worth more than others.
After taking a couple pictures we found a sand bank on one side of the river that looked shallow and a riffle into a deep run and decided to pull off and try to fish that section hard. That decision paid off big time. We brought waders but were too excited to get out there and fish especially with the day getting closer to ending. Yes the water was cold, yes my body got used to it but i would advise using waders to keep you warmer. Lots of times there were boats driving up the river and thier wake would send waves your way and get you cold in places we all like to keep warm. We pulled a decent amount of fish out of this run and didnt want to leave but we still had almost 8 miles more to float down and not a lot of time to do it.
After drifting down river and drifting through iconic places like Horse Shoe Bend and hooking into a couple more fish we were running late on time and sun light. There were several more sand bars were we picked up fish and even lots of people camping and fishing in Horse Shoe Bend and you could see fish as you were floating by. So we decided to pick up the pace and get back to the car as we didnt have any camping gear. At one point we were the only two people on the river and could see another soul and the silence of nature was something indescribable We pulled into the parking lot just as the sun went down and put the kayaks back for pick up and loaded up for the hour long drive back to the hotel in Page. So I would highly recommend this trip even just for the views and solidarity. If you want to watch a video of our trip click on the YouTube link below and if you want to see more please subscribe. Also visit our shop for our amazing apparel that make you look good and we think helps you fish good as well
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