Sierra Adventure: Conway Ranch - The Last Episode

A giant rainbow

Here it is, the last episode of the season. In just a few days I will be heading back to school, where I will be busy with homework. Over the summer, I have documented my many adventures in the form of a blog. Although I will continue to make entries, the posts will be far and few between. Still, I have one last adventure from my time in the Sierras for you.

The family posing with my sister's fish

The entire time my family has been in the Sierras there was one place that was always in the back of our minds. That place was Conway Ranch. Conway is the home of the legendary Alpers Trout, a modified version of the rainbow trout that fights harder and grows bigger than the average rainbow. The Ranch grows the trout to be shipped over the Eastern Sierra, but they also have a couple ponds which they stock with the trout they raise. We were about to go to one of those ponds.

Me fighting a fish

My family arrived at Conway Ranch at 11:00 A.M. There we signed the necessary paperwork, and began to set up our rods. I would be using an olive wooly bugger tied onto two pound tippet. My father would be helping my younger sister catch fish with a bobber and bait. As soon I threw my fly into the water, a fish jumped up and snapped my two pound tippet. That was how big the fish were. Switching to four-pound tippet, I cast in again, and hooked up with another Alpers Trout. Meanwhile,  my sister also had a fish on her line. We both landed our fish, and took photos. Over the next hour and-a-half I proceeded to catch six Alpers Trout, my dad caught one, and my sister caught five for a total of eleven Alpers Trout. By the end we all had broken our fair share of lines, and were fatigued. We fed the trout as a chore for the managers, piled into the car, and drove back to the Bay Area. My family ended the Sierra Adventure with a combined total of sixty-one trout, a mix of brook, brown, rainbow, and Alpers trout.

The biggest rainbow of the trip

This trip was a truly remarkable experience for me. It will stay in my mind as the best trout fishing excursion I have taken so far. The amount of fish we caught, the unique places we visited, and the people we met made the entire trip appealing and captivating. Whether it was fishing in a high mountain lake, or pulling a giant brown trout in from a float tube the fishing was special because of the memories that I will take with me from this trip.




However, this trip brings me back to one of the reasons why I started this blog. Many of the places that I have gone to in the past weeks may not stay open for more than ten years. Although the people of today try hard to preserve the lakes for future generations, the future generation may not preserve it for themselves. It's hard to compete for attention with the flashy game console or iPod. Many kids will not get outdoors as much as they need to. They will not make the connections with nature as previous generations have, that leads to the conservation of special places. Fishing was my solution to this problem.  There is something  about fishing that most children instinctually like. Therefore, it is one of the easiest tools a parent can use to get a child familiar with the outdoors. And when a child gets familiar with nature they will want to protect it, like they would an iPod or Xbox. So push yourself to get outside and see what it does for your child.

Preserve Nature!