The West’s Best Fly Fishing Isn’t in Montana Anymore

Colorado holds a special place in my heart – it’s where I learned to fly fish and really caught the bug, so I try to get back whenever I can.

Recently, the opportunity came up to spend a few days exploring trout water in a part of the state that was new to me, and I jumped.

The Gunnison Valley, tucked between the San Juan and West Elk Mountains on Colorado’s Western Slope, is best known for two destination mountain towns – Gunnison and Crested Butte. 

Both towns are great in their own right, but there’s a whole lot more to the valley worth experiencing.

My home base was Almont, a small town located between Gunnison and Crested Butte, where the East and Taylor Rivers meet to form the Gunnison. I stayed in a cabin on the banks of the Taylor, and it was the ideal jumping-off point to explore the whole valley.

The best known trout fishery in the Gunnison Valley is – you guessed it – the Gunnison River. It can be thought of in two main stretches: the upper river, winding through ranchland from Almont to Blue Mesa Reservoir, and the lower river below the dam, cutting through the rugged Gunnison Gorge and Black Canyon.

I spent a day fishing each, and the two stretches couldn’t look more different. On the Upper Gunnison, I fished long, slow-moving runs in wide open meadows filled with gold-leafed aspen trees. In the Black Canyon, the walls close in, the flows pick up, and everything feels much smaller. Two very different environments –  both with excellent trout fishing.

I split another day between the Taylor River and one of its tributaries. Fed by releases from Taylor Park Dam, the Taylor runs cold and clear year-round – making it a great option for winter fishing.

That said, it’s technical fishing – and after a morning of dredging small nymphs, I decided to go up higher to find less sophisticated fish. 

That afternoon, I was fishing a single dry fly on Spring Creek above Almont. The fish weren’t big – but after a few hours of constantly switching flies, depth, and weight, a handful of six- inch trout willing to come up and crush a hopper was a welcome change.

The Gunnison Valley is full of open space and public water, but it’s got a lively cultural side too. On my last day – after a few post-fishing beers at the Eldo – I caught a movie premiere at the Center for the Arts in Crested Butte.

It was the world premiere of Matchstick Productions’ new ski film. My mental shift from fishing to ski season usually starts in November, but this definitely jump-started it.

I was relieved to see that I wasn’t the only viewer who clearly had just come off the water. As you might expect, there’s a good deal of overlap between skiers and fly anglers in Crested Butte, and in the Gunnison Valley as a whole.

It’s a special community fueled by a passion for the outdoors, and I’ve a;ready started planning a return trip.