San Juan River

The San Juan below Navajo Dam is a tailwater running through high-desert sandstone and sage in the far northwest corner of New Mexico, and it's one of the most productive cold-water fisheries in the Southwest. Deep, frigid releases out of the bottom of Navajo Reservoir hold the water in the high 30s to low 40s year-round, which means the rainbow trout and brown trout here grow heavy on a 365-day buffet of midges, baetis, aquatic annelids, and scuds. The first 3.75 miles below the dam are the Quality Waters — special-regulation water where the fish are big, numerous, and have seen every fly in the box. The named runs — the Texas Hole, the Braids, the Kiddie Pool, Baetis Bend, the Lower Flats — are famous for a reason, and on a busy weekend you'll be sharing them.

This is technical fishing, and there's no way around it. The water is gin-clear, the bugs are tiny, and the trout feed in slow, even currents where they can inspect a fly all day. Standard rigging is 6X to 7X fluorocarbon under an indicator with two or three flies in the size 22-26 range — a midge larva, a baetis nymph, a small annelid or a Ray Charles. Sight-nymphing to individual fish is the most effective and most satisfying way to fish it. The Quality Waters are wade-and-float; the upper braids above the Texas Hole are wade-only, while drift boats put in at the dam and at the Texas Hole ramp. Below the special-regs line the river opens to standard tackle and a bigger limit, and the trout fishing stays strong for several more miles before the water warms.

The river fishes twelve months a year, which is part of what draws anglers from across the country to a corner of New Mexico that has little else going on. Winter is cold but uncrowded, with midges hatching every day and the occasional dry-fly window on overcast afternoons; spring and fall bring the best baetis emergences. Flows are entirely a function of dam releases — typically 250-650 CFS, with occasional spring bumps — so check the gauge below the dam before you drive in, since a release change shifts where and how the fish feed. The hub is the tiny community of Navajo Dam, a cluster of lodges and a fly shop on Highway 173; Farmington, about 40 minutes southwest, is the nearest real town with an airport and full services.