The Adirondack's Ausable River

A couple weeks ago I led a trip to the Ausable River in New York's Adirondack Mountains, which is arguably the most scenic river in the East...It is also one of the most diverse with slow, deep pools, riffles, Large waterfalls, fast chutes and heavy treacherous pocket water...Low water and High sun made the conditions challenging. There were no bugs on the water, but we found some fish that were cooperative...Most of the fish were stacked in the deeper pools in the fast pocket water. There were some tricos on the water, and we caught some fish that were sipping early in the morning and at dusk in the slower water...The largest fish landed was a 17inch rainbow and a handful of other bows in the 14-16in range were released, but most of our catch consisted of 9-12in Browns...Only one brook trout was caught...Of course the big one did get away, I was 3 feet from netting a 18-19in brown when he made one last run into some fast water and came off..We lost alot of fish in the faster water and had a few breakoffs and more misses than hook ups (but that can be expected when fishing pocket water)...Besides the fishing, we enjoyed some Lake Placid restaurants and attractions...As always, a great time on an exciting river in a beautiful setting...