Rock Creek Lake

Rock Creek Lake is a small natural lake, about 55 acres, sitting at 9,682 feet in Rock Creek Canyon about nine miles up a paved road from Tom's Place on US-395. The road keeps climbing past it to Mosquito Flat, the trailhead for Little Lakes Valley, and Rock Creek drops out of that valley into the south end of the lake. Most of the catch is planted rainbows. CDFW put fish in every three to four weeks through the 2026 season, from April into late August, and Mono County and Rock Creek Lakes Resort pay for trophy rainbows on top, some close to 8 pounds. Browns are few, but they are why the old-timers still talk about the place: the lake record is a 15 lb 8 oz brown caught in 1985, and it hangs in the resort.

This is a small, cold lake you can row end to end in a few minutes, and the bank is easy to fish on one side only, so the shore anglers bunch up there. A float tube or one of the resort's rowboats gets you to the rest of it, and the south end, where the creek comes in, is where a fly rod does best. Published fly detail for this lake is thin, so treat what follows as the standard high Sierra stillwater playbook rather than local secrets. Midges come off most days, so a chironomid or small pupa under an indicator off the inlet and along the drop-offs is a sound start. Callibaetis show in summer, and evenings bring fish up for small dries. All season, a size 8 or 10 bugger, Crystal Bugger or Marabou Muddler stripped on a sinking line along the edges covers the planters and gives you a chance at a brown, most of all in fall when they push toward the inlet.

Plan around ice and the road. The season opens the last Saturday in April, but in most years the lake is still frozen then and thaws in mid to late May, later after a big winter. 2026 was a rare year with open water and an open road on the opener. The resort opens Memorial Day weekend, and the lake closes November 15. In winter the road is closed at the Rock Creek Sno-Park near East Fork Campground, so there is no ice fishing. The lake is small and drive-up, so it gets busy after a plant and on summer weekends. Come early or late, and if it is crowded, the creek above and below and the Little Lakes Valley lakes up the trail are all close.