Idaho

Idaho has more fishable trout water than almost any state, and it changes character completely as you move across it. Eastern Idaho — the Henry's Fork, the South Fork of the Snake, the Teton — is technical, hatch-driven dry-fly water fed by springs and Palisades releases that hold flows steady through the season. Drop southwest and the Wood River valley near Sun Valley gives you Silver Creek, the spring creek that humbles everyone, alongside the freestone Big Wood. The Boise drainage adds urban tailwaters you can fish after work.

Central Idaho is the wild end: the main and Middle Fork Salmon run through the largest wilderness in the lower 48, freestone and remote, with runs of steelhead in the shoulder seasons on top of resident cutthroat. Farther north, the Clearwater country — the Lochsa, Selway, and North Fork Clearwater — is native westslope cutthroat water and, in fall, some of the best B-run steelhead swinging in the West. The Panhandle's St. Joe and North Fork Coeur d'Alene are catch-and-release cutthroat rivers that see a fraction of the pressure of the marquee names.

The short version: if you want technical dry-fly, go east; if you want wild cutthroat and solitude, go north or into the central wilderness; if you want steelhead and trout in the same trip, the Salmon and Clearwater drainages are where to do it.

For stillwater, Henry's Lake at the head of the Henry's Fork is the one people plan around, with big cutthroat, hybrids and brook trout from the Memorial Day opener into the fall. Island Park Reservoir just downstream is the quieter option and the dam that sets the Box Canyon's flows.