Turquoise Lake

Turquoise Lake sits at about 9,900 feet just west of Leadville, a natural lake raised by Reclamation's Sugar Loaf Dam into a reservoir of about 1,800 acres for the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project. It holds lake trout, rainbows and some browns and cutthroat, ringed by Forest Service campgrounds and the peaks of the Sawatch.

Ice-off comes late, usually in June, and the weeks after are the best fly fishing, with chironomids and small streamers along the shore and the inlets. Summer fish drop deep, and the lake trout limit is 2. Fall brings lake trout shallow again before the lake freezes.