Last fall, Field & Stream Online Editor Nate Matthews and his father, Bruce, spent 15 days fishing the Rio Grande River from its headwaters in Colorado to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico. These excerpts from their journals tell the story of the 9th day of their trip. You can read reports from previous days here.

NM: 10/1, 6:30 AM
Woke up this morning in another beautiful campsite, just 100 yards from Mexico and 30 miles or so from the western edge of Big Bend National Park. Everyone’s dragging a bit, so we fire up our stoves and brew some java. Tim’s sitting at a picnic table and nursing a cup. “God, coffee. Work!” he says.

Our goal over the next two days is to reach and then paddle a stretch of the Rio Grande that flows through 1800-foot deep Mariscal Canyon, which is supposedly the most beautiful canyon in Big Bend. The float is not very long, only 11 miles, and we’ll be splitting it up over two days, but there’s only one place to camp in the canyon, about halfway through the float. Dropping in at the put-in with enough light left to reach... [ Read Full Post ]

By Tim Romano

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Last fall, Field & Stream Online Editor Nate Matthews and his father, Bruce, spent 15 days fishing the Rio Grande River from its headwaters in Colorado to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico. These excerpts from their journals tell the story of their 2500-mile motorcycle ride along the historic river. Photographer Tim Romano documented the excursion. You can see more photos from Day Five of this expedition (and find new journal updates as they are posted) by clicking here.

BM: 9/28, 6:30 AM
Today we broke camp and re-organized our gear for the first half of the float Nate’s got planned for us (that's a map of the day's float in the photo above). Up early and moving fast so we can get to the put-in in time to do some fishing. It's apparently a pretty long ride to get reach it. Tried to get all the stuff in the truck within five minutes -- Tim filmed the loading.

But … the Toyota won’t start. Battery’s fully discharged. Somehow in all the data dumping, camera charging, etc., we must have run out of juice.

So, Nate’s off on the bike looking for help. Tim’s... [ Read Full Post ]

Last fall, Field & Stream Online Editor Nate Matthews and his father, Bruce, spent 15 days fishing the Rio Grande River from its headwaters in Colorado to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico. These excerpts from their journals tell the story of their 2500-mile motorcycle ride along the historic river. Photographer Tim Romano documented the excursion. You can see more photos from Day Four of this expedition (and find new journal updates as they are posted) by clicking here.

NM: 9/27, 7:00 AM
Yesterday was a riding day; we spent roughly 10 hours on the bikes leaving the headwaters and then passing through the desert of the San Luis Valley. When we finally arrived at our campsite on the east side of the Upper Rio Grande Canyon it was nearing full dark. I pitched my tent on the edge of a cliff, then crawled into my sleeping bag and passed out, exhausted. Woke up this morning to an incredible view, but it's a good thing I don’t walk in my sleep … I hadn’t quite realized how far down it was to the bottom.

Today is a fishing day. Right now we’re... [ Read Full Post ]

Last fall, Field & Stream Online Editor Nate Matthews and his father, Bruce, spent 15 days fishing the Rio Grande River from its headwaters in Colorado to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico. These excerpts from their journals tell the story of their 2500-mile motorcycle ride along the historic river. Photographer Tim Romano documented the excursion. You can see more photos from Day Two of this expedition (and find new journal updates as they are posted) by clicking here.

NM: 9/25, 6:30 AM
Just woke up. Last night was a haul. As I wrote in my journal yesterday, we spent more time than we should have picking up the bikes from the dealership they'd been shipped to in Colorado Springs, and so we didn’t leave for the headwaters until four in the afternoon. The sun was setting right into our eyes as we headed out of town. I woke up this morning with a sore back, a sore butt, and a crick in my neck from riding with my helmet tipped sideways so that the corner of my visor blocked the worst of it.

Dad’s up now, too, and moving pretty... [ Read Full Post ]