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| The skillet is cast iron and about 12" in diameter. Cast iron works best for fish because it evenly distributes the heat. |
In the second week of August, in the year 2010, we did almost that. From Boulder, my friend Henry and I drove to Steamboat, picked up Aaron, and headed to the east side of the wilderness boundary. Parking just below Stillwater reservoir at just about noon, we hiked to the north side of the reservoir and dipped our lines. After about 5 casts, I had caught a fish, a decent 13" brown trout. Henry soon followed with his fish, as I continued to work my way down the shore. As I reeled in another, and Aaron had yet to catch one, he gave up his pole and went to get the stove and cast iron pan out, and begin to gut the three we had already caught. We were all hungry, and had been imaging eating nothing but trout for the next 3 days, which appeared to be a very real possibility. By the time the first two had cooked, we got another two small ones, bringing our total to five fish for lunch. Only about an hour into the trip, and we all had our bellies full of fresh-caught and fresh-cooked (out of the water and into the pan) trout.
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| Looking back down on Stillwater Reservoir from the top of the Flattops |
The three of us bushwhacked right into the thick of it coming across mushrooms (including edible boletus, which we picked), small ponds and cricks and tall grass. We found a small lake to make camp at, and fished with great success for dinner. The forest there, despite it making a comeback from a disease which resulted in a large fire in the 1940's, is very healthy consists mostly of trees of only one age. The dead trees from long ago can make going tough though, as they all blow down in different directions, and were quite large trees. There are no trees above the top, as the basalt that makes up these tops is hard, and the winds must be ferocious at times. We hiked across the flattops to a lake situated on a shelf of basalt, right below the top lip. It was called "Suprise Lake". Right before our descent into the suprise, we saw some sheepherders, whose dogs barked ferociously at us. It made me realize that I had left my ice axe (more for protection and utility than ice) about a mile and a half back. Oops. We continued for camp, and a large white sheephearder's dog kept following us.
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| Our view from the small lake the night before we hiked to "Suprise Lake". It was about 1800 vertical feet, and steep! |
It was really nice, actually, this dog. It wasn't one of those that had been barking at us, and it just kept wandering around, keeping an eye on us. Once we had a fire, it came by and sat with us and allowed us to pet it. Henry decided to call her "Marisol". She left, though, dinnertime we had supposed. We fished the lake after setting up camp, and of caught dinner within the last hour of sunlight. It turned out the dog slept right by where we were camping, and it was a good thing. That night we all woke up when we heard crashing and the breaking of branches. The smell of our dinner had brought in a bear, just like we had expected. Our bear bag was tied between two spruces, about 25 feet up, but our clothes, which smelled like delicious fish and in our tents, that is what scared us. Right after we made sure we were all awake and had in fact heard a bear, Marisol started barking close by. She barked for about an hour, making sure that bear didn't come back.
On the second day, it rained. The morning was cloudy and before noon it was pouring. We napped and tried to keep the fire going, but there wasn't much we could do but stay under the tarp and stay warm. The tarp, by the way, was mine and had my sleeping bag and pad in it, but neither Aaron's or Henry's tents were large enough for all three of us, and so my tarp was the place to be. This whole hanging out under my tarp thing was really a drying off from tending to the fire kind of thing, and my bag and gear all got soaked as a result. But it turned out to be o.k., because right as the sun set, the rain stopped and we were rewarded with and awesome sunset, and a few minutes to dry our clothes in sunlight and by the fire. The fish that night and next morning didn't bite, so the last morning we all took turns swimming in the lake. There's not too much nicer than skinny dipping in a cold fresh lake of mountain water, with the sun shining and a warm fire to return to. We didn't quite pack out all of our food like we had hoped, but we were all tired of eating fish, so I deem it a success.
