Weather: Calm
with slight breeze at times, mostly sunny, T-60s to 70s
Moon Phase: 19%
Moon
Water Level: 3,569 ft amsl
Mudline: First
mudline (green stained) started in Piute Bay near our camp, Second Mudline (mud
stain) was not found this year. Run off
hadn’t started yet.
Water Temp:
Ranged from 53 degrees in the morning up to 60 degrees in the afternoon.
Best Baits (in order):
Curly tailed grubs, Texas rigged plastics, spinnerbaits, jig and trailer.
Who Went: Rick, Bobber John, Dunc
Spring is here and it’s time for my favorite fishing trip of
the year, Lake Powell. My buddies and I
have a camping list that we revise after each Lake Powell trip, and this being our
decade anniversary of going, you might say we have it dialed in.
A quick stop by the grocery store and we were on our
way. We left this year on a Friday
evening and arrived at the Ticaboo Lodge at midnight. Lucky for me, I brought a nasty cold with me that
made sleeping miserable, but luckily it got better as the trip went on.
Saturday morning we enjoyed a hot breakfast and made our way
to the boat ramp only to be surprised at how low the water was. In fact, we couldn’t even launch at the main
Bullfrog Marina. It was bone dry. Instead we were redirected north to a service
ramp to launch.
Saturday:
We only had the afternoon to fish, so we stayed close and
fished the waters near camp. It was a
smallmouth afternoon and the fishing wasn’t fast. We worked areas hard and caught fish, but it
wasn’t as hot as we had hoped.
Rick was
throwing texas rigged plastics, John was throwing curly tailed grubs, and I was
throwing a jig and trailer and spinnerbaits.
All produced, but the grub and texas rigged plastics were the main
producers. Most fish were caught off
points and rocky shorelines in 10 to 15 feet of water.
Sunday:
A much better day with a mixed bag of smallmouth,
largemouth, walleye, and crappie. I woke
up early and the weather was gorgeous. I
snapped a few photos showing our view from camp, including a panorama of the glassy water and red bluffs in the San Juan Arm.
We fished all our usual haunts in the San Juan arm and
fishing was good, especially for Rick.
He was close to the Lake Powell Grand Slam, minus the catfish and
bluegill.
He also busted a pretty good
largemouth.
Then just before evening we were fishing a stretch of rocky
shoreline and it went nuts with smallmouth bites. We must have landed 50 of them within a
couple hours, and John added one crappie.
It was a good way to end
the day. Most fish were caught off the
shoreline between 5 and 15 feet of water, however the afternoon smallmouth bite
was shallow near rocky and gravel shorelines. At times we were trying to manage two rods with fish biting each of them.
We headed back to camp a bit early and filleted a bunch of fish. We had enough fish for dinner each night we
were there. While Rick went to work filleting fish, I threw some topwater around camp and landed a very nice Crappie. I walked over and added it to the filet pile. Yummy!
We started the morning drifting baits in 15 to 20 feet of
water. This produced a few smallmouth,
but wasn’t fast fishing. We moved to some
different areas of the San Juan arm, and caught some smallmouth and largemouth,
mainly off of points and deeper water from 15 to 25 feet.
The wind was a bit annoying forcing us to
troll and hide in the back of a few select canyons. Trolling produced a few stripers and
smallmouth, but this was by far our toughest day of fishing. Still a good day, but we had to work for them
in the shifting winds. Almost all fish
were caught off points and underwater ridges. Casting into deeper water across a known point
or ridge usually produced a few fish.
That evening we fished topwater from the shoreline near camp. It’s a bit early in the year for topwater,
but we managed a couple. Just before
dark I tried to jump to a large rock to cast from shore and ended up landing on moss
that put me right on my butt and onto a slippery slide that launched me into the lake! Crazy part was I couldn’t
reach the bottom and had water up to my neck!
I quickly launched my rod onto shore and got out. My new job had just given me a new cell phone
the day before I left on this trip and it was in my pocket. Luckily I was able to get out of the water
quick enough to keep it mostly dry and the phone was fine. Whew!
Tuesday:
Another nice day and we decided to run up lake to explore Escalante
Canyon.
It's a gorgeous canyon and I have heard good things in the
past, but never fished it, so we gave it a chance. The low water didn’t help, but we didn’t find
much that looked fishy. It may be
better with higher water, but for now it wasn’t too impressive. We did find one decent cove that had some sunken
trees and rock rubble. We caught a
few smallies, and I lucked into a good largemouth on a spinnerbait.
We also found some skinny stripers hanging
out in the back of one canyon that played with us for a while as we harassed them
with deep diving crankbaits. The bite
was fun while it lasted.
That evening we headed back to the San Juan arm and fished
some new shoreline. One spot in
particular was on fire for largemouth and Rick put on a clinic with the
spinnerbait.
A storm was blowing in and
it makes me wonder if this was a pre-storm bite.
Those are the best! John and I
also got into some largemouth and I had one break off that I think could have
been the fish of the trip. It was fun
while it lasted, but soon it was getting dark.
Topwater didn’t produce, so we turned on my newly installed boat lights and began drifting jigs in 20 to 30 feet of water. Bobber John and Rick picked up a couple
walleye, and rick landed one catfish. I
managed one striper before calling it a night.
With no moonlight it was a scary boat ride back to camp. I literally followed our trail on the gps all
the way back. We passed through boulder islands
and underwater hazards going 30 mph in pitch black. Totally freaky!
Wednesday:
We slept in late and by the time we had camp loaded it was
time to make the 2 hour trek back to Bullfrog.
When we arrived Rick backed the trailer down the ramp and I noticed I
was missing a runner board. I couldn’t
trailer the boat without it, so Rick and John headed into Bullfrog and scored a
2x4 from some construction workers.
Price was a 12 pack of beer. A
few zip ties later and a 2x4 and we were ready to trailer the boat and head back to
SLC.
Conclusion:
The trip was a bit early this year, but we were lucky to
have good weather. The bite wasn’t the
best we’ve experienced, but some good moments and shorelines that produced a lot of fish. We caught a bunch of smallmouth, a good
number of largemouth, and a few crappie, walleye, and stripers. Rick picked up one catfish while drifting, so
the only fish we didn’t catch was a bluegill.
We had the entire San Juan arm to ourselves for 4 days and that was one
of the bonuses of doing the trip earlier in the year.
It was one of my favorite camp sites we’ve had, and the fish dinners
each night were amazing.
We had a couple evenings where the bite was shallow, but
most of the trip fish were found between 5 to 20 feet of water and off of rocky points
seemed to produce the best. We caught a
handful of fish on topwater, but the cold evenings seemed to keep the fish
deep. Trolling was awful and barely
produced a bite. Typically we can’t keep
fish off when we troll at Lake Powell.
The spinnerbait produced some nice largemouth, but plastics were king as
usual with the curly tailed grub and texas rigged creature baits producing the
most fish. The jig and trailer also had its
moments. The only fish caught on
crankbaits were stripers, and I don’t recall a fish being caught on a senko or
worm, although we didn’t give them much of a chance.
The only mishaps of the trip was me taking a swim and the
2x4 runner board replacement on the boat trailer. It was another successful trip with good
memories and many fish caught. Can’t
wait to go back!
