Carping Around the Democratic National Convention: Story and photos by Tim Romano

It's not Cheesman Canyon, but downtown Denver has some outstanding fishing right through town on the South Platte River. There are smallmouth, rainbows, brown trout, and even the occasional walleye. Personally, we're out for the bruiser carp.

My friends and I had been eyeing the water flows all summer and they finally stabilized about two weeks ago. One little problem: the Democratic National Convention. It didn't take long to find out that law enforcement isn't too fond of people with backpacks full of "suspicious" fishing gear, rod tubes and cameras poking around sensitive areas. Who would've thought?

But there are truly big carp, a stones throw from the Pepsi Center. You get a lot of weird looks when you tell people you're fly fishing for them downtown. Mostly they ask one question: Why?