The wife and I hiked into McDowell on Sat. Great, well maintained hiking path to the lake (it took 15 minutes with two pontoon boats). I have to admit, this is one of the nicest trails I have ever hiked. The path is elevated and packed. Without a hydrographic map or a fish finder, we both trolled a leach for two hours. I landed three beautiful rainbow trout (18,16, 14), lost one fly and had several other strikes (all fish were C&R). The missus missed a few but had a great time. This tea stained lake would be fun to explore with a fish finder and chironomid fish the shoals? I did try dragons (gomphus and darner), scuds, and minnow patterns without any interest. I did take some photos of the lake which I will post later. There wasnt much surface action or "hatches". There was a lot ot "jewel winged dragon-fly" adults about. These adults have white stripes on their wings..... kinda cool. The sun was high in the sky but the wind was consistant from the south. TTFN

---