Maiden Ride @ Ute - The Game Changer 29Nov13

Gorgeous day with just a bit of ice and snow on the trails. Rode Ute Pk on the normal loop in about my normal time - which is freakin' huge given I haven't ridden in 2 months and it's the day after TGiving dinner. Woohoo; the SB95C is a game changer for me... when I mash on the pedals headed uphill, it goes there now. It flies super smooth on the downhills. I am so out of shape. From snow to trail.

Break In The Cold on the PT 27Nov13

With the passing of the cold front I fished the PT today. Bright sunny day was nice on the back at 60 degrees but it did limit the BWO hatch. I parked at the nature center as the only car early and there was still plenty of action despite the sun. Turbidity increased some over my last trip actually - viz probably 18" only. You know what that means - bring on the silver surfer... and he did not let me down. Took most and the 3 largest (dropped the biggest before pic) on the surfer during the BWO hatch @ ~11:30am but stayed productive before and after too. Landed fish on the black ice, olive mojo midge and rainbow warrior. I saw sipping but didn't feel like shifting rigs so stayed sub-surface. Colorado is so cool.

Clear-Low-Steady-Nice Arkansas River Tailwater on Warm-Cloudy-Windy Day -19Nov13

The BWO hatch was "on" with cloudy skies and great river conditions. Flows ~100cfs for 5 days now, temp of 64 degrees, visibility about three feet, water cool but not cold. I arrived late AM and noticed the cool water and cloudy skies but air temp was ok even in the AM. The best bugs were BWOs: tung BH black ice and tung BH olive vinyl #18 , mercury glass head RS2s #20-22 and both parachute and Barr's dry BWOs in #20. I haven't fished dry for a while so that was fun during the hatch... biggest fish were caught beneath though. Cheeseman emerger also worked as very well as did small black red glass head mojo midge emerger and small rainbow warrior. I started with some losses and even rig steals but calmed to catch many fish today floating the rig from riffle into the runs. Wind messed up the PM a bit for 2 hrs but I hung in there and was productive throughout. Quite a few folks out there today but I sense I was doin' more catching. Caught a 20" and 18" as well as a gob of 16-17" rainbows... shown are a sample.

The Final Blow, Err 'Bow, Today on Gr8 Fall Fishing on PT 10Nov13

Greg Lehmann, Jim Yohanan and I fished a gorgeous fall day on the Pueblo Tailwater. There were plenty of fisherman parked at Valco Ponds but it wasn't combat fishing. Jim had a number on and Greg and I did well. I likely led the team with a passel of fish this day. Most were taken on a red glass beadhead black midge wire-wrapped emerger (mojo midge) but plenty took the silver surfer too. Flows were down a smidge to 240 cfs and clarity was improving at ~16". Coolest moments were at the end of day when I landed a nice 19.5" silvery rainbow and feelin' like I was all that I returned to the hole (the 1st one above the fishery put in - I wasn't sure there'd be big fish) and within a cast or two landed a 22" football rainbow after a 15 min fight. I knew he was big and was careful but 10 min in he went and sat between two rocks right at the bottom of the weir and I thought I'd lost him as it felt snagged - I got very close and even tweaked the leader with my hand to test the snag and moments later he went for another run. The big pig here was the eventual reward - sweet.

Dave Is Audezed & Wooed 03Nov13

Others may be skiin' but I returned from PA and installed some new audio gear. I got the HD USB 2 ASIO driver working on the Win 8.1 MS Surface Pro II after some work. The Surface runs JRiver Media Center in "theater view" and pull songs from the music drive array on a server and spits the stream out the USB to the integrated DAC and tube amp from Woo Audio called WA7 Fireflies. The new Audeze LCD-2 cans are game changers, especially when paired with the tube amp. The JRMC has a crossfade adjustment and dynamically pulls images of the band playing and displays a changing montage... cool, plus no fatigue listening to this setup... sweet.