[legally] wadeable smallmouth spot within 90 mins of Arlington?

[Ashley Frohwein]

Some friends and I are looking to fish for bass around July 11. We're trying to keep things low-budget and local - so no boat or guides. One of the guys is a moderately experienced fly fisher, and the other is a casual spin fisher, so going after carp may be a bit too much of a challenge for the latter.

Any ideas on somewhere relatively close to NoVa where we could wade (legally and at least somewhat safely) for bass? Ideally, I'm looking for somewhere nice looking (so no 4MR, for example), relatively easy to figure out/fish, and that is off the beaten path/not full of people.

If there aren't any great options, I guess we could fish a lake. But that's not the most exciting prospect. If we go the lake route, I think we'll probably head to Burke.

[Danny Barrett]

The confluence of the Rapidan and Rappahannock is right at 90 minutes from Arlington.  Its right outside of Fredericksburg.  There is about a mile or so hike involved, I forget the exact distance.  Switchfisher has an article on his website that was real helpful.  Its been 2 years since I've been down there but it use to have some good small mouth and never saw many people.  Wading was easy.

Thanks,

Dan Barrett

dannyt...@gmail.com

(540)-222-8064

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[Rob Snowhite]

Sent from my iPhone

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[Ashley Frohwein]

Thanks, Rob! How do you think it compares to the Rapidan-Rappahanock confluence (on the pro and con sides)?

On Friday, June 26, 2015 at 11:03:54 AM UTC-4, Rob Snowhite wrote:

Sent from my iPhone

On Jun 26, 2015, at 10:01 AM, Ashley Frohwein <ashleyf...@gmail.com> wrote:

Some friends and I are looking to fish for bass around July 11. We're trying to keep things low-budget and local - so no boat or guides. One of the guys is a moderately experienced fly fisher, and the other is a casual spin fisher, so going after carp may be a bit too much of a challenge for the latter.

Any ideas on somewhere relatively close to NoVa where we could wade (legally and at least somewhat safely) for bass? Ideally, I'm looking for somewhere nice looking (so no 4MR, for example), relatively easy to figure out/fish, and that is off the beaten path/not full of people.

If there aren't any great options, I guess we could fish a lake. But that's not the most exciting prospect. If we go the lake route, I think we'll probably head to Burke.

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[Rob Snowhite]

It's closer and you'll have the place to yourself. Rap is cleaner and clears up faster from storms. You could get into Stripers up on the rapp too. 

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[Ashley Frohwein]

Thanks!

[Andrew LaVigne]

Have yet to try out the confluence, but I've fished the Rapidan at the Elys Ford Crossing, a couple miles upstream from the confluence (there's a parking lot at the bridge), and had success. Some very interesting holding water there, downstream especially from the put-in. 

For those who fish the confluence: Where do you park?

[Steve J]

Hi all!  Long time lurker-first time poster here....

I drove to Woodstock, VA last weekend which was a 90 minute drive and fished the Shenandoah North Fork at the Burnshire Dam.  I was the only one out there for a long time.  You can wade up and down the river.  There's one point of public access which was really easy to get to.  The river is really nice, surrounded by nice woods and the sounds of the water going over the dam and water going over the rocks.

If you want to kill a few more minutes you can drive a little south and go to Murray's Fly Shop.  Really nice and knowledgeable people there.

Danny,

Where's a good spot to park to hike into the confluence?  I've heard about fishing there but haven't made it yet.  Thank you in advance!

Thanks,
Steve

On Friday, June 26, 2015 at 10:01:29 AM UTC-4, Ashley Frohwein wrote:

[Danny Barrett]

I believe it was at the end of 619 (Richards Ferry Road).  It's a gravel road that just sort of ends by a trail head.  The trail ends right where the rivers merge and is a very easy hike. I hope someone has a more concrete answer you for. 

Thanks,

Dan Barrett

dannyt...@gmail.com

(540)-222-8064

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[Misha Gill]

Richard's Ferry Road does indeed take you there. From  Steve Moore's book Wade Fishing the Rapidan River of Virginia, "About 1000 feet before you get to the end, the road will split. Take the right hand fork. Park on the right hand side of the road at the end. At the end of the cul de sac, go past the gate on the City of Fredericksburg trail that leads to their campsite on the river. Immediately prior to the campsite, the trail lurches right to move downstream. Take that fork and walk another .5 mile to get to the confluence."

I've been meaning to fish the confluence of the two Raps. Let us all know how you do!

[Ashley Frohwein]

Will do! Thanks.

[Steve J]

Wow! Thank you Misha for the great detail!

-Steve

On Friday, June 26, 2015 at 4:17:37 PM UTC-4, Misha Gill wrote:

[Aden]

I love the confluence. Done a few solo camping trips there which is easy because the city of Fredericksberg owns both river banks for about 30 miles and they treat it as public property. Camp anywhere ad the fish are at your feet. And the fishing is good too. The deep pools hold some truly large fish.

[Rob Snowhite]

Speaking of camping, watch out for the streaker mentioned by Howell Raines. Virginias version of Naked Ned.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jun 27, 2015, at 11:14 AM, Aden <aden...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I love the confluence. Done a few solo camping trips there which is easy because the city of Fredericksberg owns both river banks for about 30 miles and they treat it as public property. Camp anywhere ad the fish are at your feet. And the fishing is good too. The deep pools hold some truly large fish.
>

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[TurbineBlade]

There were balls of blue damselfly adults on the Shenandoah Friday -- and the bigger fish are coming up to hit big poppers dead-drifted!  I finally dug out the (enormous) poppers I thought were too ridiculous to use in FW, and some decent smallmouth (and one redbreast!) came up and crushed it.  I was impressed with the increase in fish size with those darn things versus what I usually catch.  

If you are willing to catch far fewer, but much bigger fish -- it's a good way to go.  

Gene

On Saturday, June 27, 2015 at 11:18:39 AM UTC-4, Rob Snowhite wrote:

Speaking of camping, watch out for the streaker mentioned by Howell Raines. Virginias version of Naked Ned.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jun 27, 2015, at 11:14 AM, Aden <aden...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I love the confluence. Done a few solo camping trips there which is easy because the city of Fredericksberg owns both river banks for about 30 miles and they treat it as public property. Camp anywhere ad the fish are at your feet. And the fishing is good too. The deep pools hold some truly large fish.
>
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[Scott Stankus]

Sent from my iPhone

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[alexjmc...@gmail.com]

Is Seneca too high to fish now?   Little Falls gauge at 5.5 feet today.   

On Friday, June 26, 2015 at 11:03:54 AM UTC-4, Rob Snowhite wrote:

Sent from my iPhone

On Jun 26, 2015, at 10:01 AM, Ashley Frohwein <ashleyf...@gmail.com> wrote:

Some friends and I are looking to fish for bass around July 11. We're trying to keep things low-budget and local - so no boat or guides. One of the guys is a moderately experienced fly fisher, and the other is a casual spin fisher, so going after carp may be a bit too much of a challenge for the latter.

Any ideas on somewhere relatively close to NoVa where we could wade (legally and at least somewhat safely) for bass? Ideally, I'm looking for somewhere nice looking (so no 4MR, for example), relatively easy to figure out/fish, and that is off the beaten path/not full of people.

If there aren't any great options, I guess we could fish a lake. But that's not the most exciting prospect. If we go the lake route, I think we'll probably head to Burke.

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[TurbineBlade]

I wouldn't try it -- but the smaller streams should be decent.  They sort of go up and then down right as the big river is getting crappy.  

Gene

[Rob Snowhite]

Everything is heinous. Four Mile was raging mud this morning, the river in the city is nasty though I got a nice largemouth from the Tidal Basin on a black and orange Reaper.  Difficult Run was blown out too. 

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[Ashley Frohwein]

Any idea whether a trip to locks 7/8 today would be worth it? Or would the visibility likely be nada?

[Richard Farino]

The beauty about fishing the Canal is even if you show up and the fishing isn’t fantastic, it wasn’t difficult to get to, and you can still probably catch a few fish.

Part of becoming a better fly fisherman is the "discovery stage”.

R

Richard Farino

Urban Angler VA | 108 N. Washington Street  2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 

(703) 527-2524 | fax: (703) 527-3313 | ric...@urbanangler.com    

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[Jeffrey Silvan]

Between Lock 7 and 8 has been extremely high - 2 feet or more above normal levels - so it makes for difficult conditions even in the more "clear" canal scenarios. Between 7 and 6 was a bit more normal from a water height perspective. On Sunday, the canal was chocolate milk. There were still plenty of obviously feeding fish, but very few that you'd be able to hit without a strike indicator since visibility was <6".

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[Ashley Frohwein]

Thanks, Jeff!

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[Bob Smith]

"2:37 PMRichard Farino

The beauty about fishing the Canal is even if you show up and the fishing isn’t fantastic, it wasn’t difficult to get to, and you can still probably catch a few fish.

Part of becoming a better fly fisherman is the "discovery stage”.


R


Richard Farino

Urban Angler VA | 108 N. Washington Street 2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 Google_Maps_Marker
(703) 527-2524 | fax: (703) 527-3313 | ric...@urbanangler.com urban-signature-facebook urban-signature-twitter


"discovery STAGE"? When the hell do you move out of the discovery stage???😄

[Bob R]

Hemlock Overlook on the Fairfax, Prince William county line is close and has a fairly good bass population, both small mouth and large mouth.   

Today I fished the North Fork of the Shenandoah at the Gooney Run public boat landing and did O.K. (2 small mouth and 1 huge bluegill).  All the other access points in the area were too high and muddy to wade safely with a 10yr old kid.  However, Gooney was running gin clear and cold, and there's a couple small islands right at the confluence with the Shenandoah that shields the main current.  Between the lee from the islands and clear water from the creek, we found good fishable water behind and just down stream of the islands.  Takes right at 90 minutes to get there but it might be worth checking out, plus Shenandoah River State Park is just 2 miles away.  Couple negatives are that it's a drop off point for at least one outfitter, so there's constantly shuttle buses dropping off kayakers.  And some of the locals bring their kids there to swim, but neither bothered me at all.

 
On Friday, June 26, 2015 at 10:01:29 AM UTC-4, Ashley Frohwein wrote:

[Steven Butler]

Has anyone been out on South Fork of Shenandoah this week? Floating it on kayaks either way, but heard the SM bass are tearing up buggers in the riffles in the past month or so. I figure it has to be up a lot with recent rains.

[namfos]

What a philosopher! 

;-)

Mark

[Richard Farino]

The discovery stage of fly fishing is the early stage when everything you do and “discover” seems to awaken knowledge and learning in the sport.  It’s one of the most fun and important parts of fly fishing in my opinion.  When everything starts to come together.. you feel the fly rod loading and you understand what had to happen to make the line rocket out of the rod tip…  matching your first hatch, figuring out a current seam, watching a fish eat a fly you tied for the first time, planning a route on a map where to fish and actually showing up and putting the time in to figure out how to catch those fish – those are the primers of making you a better angler.

R

Richard Farino

Urban Angler VA | 108 N. Washington Street  2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 

(703) 527-2524 | fax: (703) 527-3313 | ric...@urbanangler.com    

From: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>
Reply-To: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>
Date: Wednesday, July 1, 2015 at 9:01 PM
To: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: {Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} [legally] wadeable smallmouth spot within 90 mins of Arlington?

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[Richard Farino]

Oh Bob – to make another comment – I learn something every single time I go out fishing.  If I didn’t learn something new each time I probably would get bored of it.

The discovery part is sort of the same part in the stage of human development when children discover their toes  ;)

R

Richard Farino

Urban Angler VA | 108 N. Washington Street  2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 

(703) 527-2524 | fax: (703) 527-3313 | ric...@urbanangler.com    

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[Bob Smith]

Richie, I know what you meant.....and I'm still discovering my toes!

[Marek Rich]

Amen! Couldn't agree more!!!

Sent from my iPhone

On Jul 2, 2015, at 11:14 AM, "Richard Farino" <ric...@urbanangler.com<mailto:ric...@urbanangler.com>> wrote:

The discovery stage of fly fishing is the early stage when everything you do and “discover” seems to awaken knowledge and learning in the sport. It’s one of the most fun and important parts of fly fishing in my opinion. When everything starts to come together.. you feel the fly rod loading and you understand what had to happen to make the line rocket out of the rod tip… matching your first hatch, figuring out a current seam, watching a fish eat a fly you tied for the first time, planning a route on a map where to fish and actually showing up and putting the time in to figure out how to catch those fish – those are the primers of making you a better angler.

R


Richard Farino

Urban Angler VA<http://www.urbanangler.com/> | 108 N. Washington Street 2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 <4E148038-E81B-4BEE-B11A-3BDA4F477DB0[16].png><http://g.co/maps/7rjwx>
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From: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com<mailto:tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>> on behalf of Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com<mailto:tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>>
Reply-To: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com<mailto:tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>>
Date: Wednesday, July 1, 2015 at 9:01 PM
To: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders <tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com<mailto:tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com>>
Subject: Re: {Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} [legally] wadeable smallmouth spot within 90 mins of Arlington?

"2:37 PMRichard Farino
The beauty about fishing the Canal is even if you show up and the fishing isn’t fantastic, it wasn’t difficult to get to, and you can still probably catch a few fish.

Part of becoming a better fly fisherman is the "discovery stage”.


R


Richard Farino
Urban Angler VA | 108 N. Washington Street 2nd Floor | Alexandria, VA 22314 Google_Maps_Marker

(703) 527-2524 | fax: (703) 527-3313 | ric...@urbanangler.com<mailto:ric...@urbanangler.com> urban-signature-facebook urban-signature-twitter

"discovery STAGE"? When the hell do you move out of the discovery stage???😄

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[Andrew LaVigne]

I was on the S. Fork Friday and Saturday. The water was still kicking at around 1200 CFS to start the day Thursday; it was cloudy in a lot of spots, but not terrible for the most part. I fished from a float tube from the Bentonville low water bridge to Andy Guest park both days - it was slow the first day, only picked up a few fish on the float, all on either a Kreelex streamer or a chartreuse clouser minnow. 

The 2nd day, the water had dropped another 200 CFS, clarity was improving, and the sun was out - fishing improved markedly. Still no topwater action, but caught plenty of little smallies through the day. Most were in the 7-inch range, couple 10-12, nothing bigger. Very few sunfish as well compared to years past, although that may have been a function of the size of fly I was throwing. 

There was almost no topwater bite, despite scads of damselflies on the water. I think another few sunny warm days, and things will start to kick off on that front. 

[TurbineBlade]

Good to know -- I appreciate the report!  I'm sure about 20 other people do too, but they'd rather read it and pretend they heard it whistling through the pines ;). We'll probably be back out there this weekend.  

Note -- I'm a small fly guy, with the recent exception of poppers.  Of course, it may be different if I were fishing for musky or something.  

Gene

[Steven Butler]

Hit SF as well from Bixler's Bridge (near Luray) to Bealer's Ferry on Saturday. A surprisingly good day out and decent water conditions. Caught several SM bass in the range you described on olive wooly buggers. Definitely saw a bit of top water activity, but didn't bother with throwing any dries.

On Monday, July 6, 2015 at 9:37:20 AM UTC-4, Andrew LaVigne wrote:

[Charlie Church]

Ran into a couple guys heading out at low water bridge friday morning. Andrew, were you one of them?

We were in a drift boat. The fish cooperated with us in the afternoon. White was the color of choice....and on crease flies/ck baitfish. 

[Andrew LaVigne]

Unfortunately not - the group I was with was not entirely functional in the morning, didn't start our floats until 2-ish...more of a beer weekend than fishing for my crew, I just managed to shoehorn a bunch fishing into it. If we were organized enough to get a sponsorship, it would have been from Miller Lite or New Belgium as opposed to Sage or Orvis.  

This was my first time fishing while reclining on an inner tube strapped to 5 other people and a beer barge - could be that our noise level was scaring off some fish, but it actually worked out fairly well given the circumstances. 

I did see a couple guys with legit fishing-specific float tubes working down the river - that seems like an interesting option, although it was nice to just glide right over uneven ledges on the inner tube. Plus I kept my flies/vest on the beer float, which made it easy to go in for refills when I needed to change flies. 

[Jeremy Dusina]

sounds like a perfect setup!!