Deep Creek’s middle reaches are quite open, making for easy casting and featuring a mixture of pocket water and bigger pools, while the farther you venture up the Right Fork (the stream divides upstream from where Pole Road Creek enters from the left), the tighter the canopy becomes. If you love really “close” fishing, with bow-and-arrow casts and overhanging brush, try one of the many feeder streams. Interestingly, the Left Fork, while not that large, is wide open and affords easy casting.

FORNEY CREEK

Forney Creek is one of several streams in the park emptying into Fontana Lake. In the present context it enjoys several advantages. Forney is not as well known as Hazel Creek or even Eagle Creek. It is the most remote of all the streams entering the lake. Add to that the fact that it is too far from the nearest trailhead for “hike-in, hike-out” day fishing, and you have the components of a stream the loner can love.

The backpacking fisherman’s access to Forney Creek begins at the end of what the locals call “The Road to Nowhere” (Lakeview Drive). This hard-surfaced road out of Bryson City winds past Swain County High School, enters the park, crosses Noland Creek, and then ends abruptly after passing through a tunnel. From the parking area at the tunnel, take the Lakeshore Trail and then, depending on whether you intend to overnight at campsites 73 and 74 or farther upstream (my personal favorite is Campsite 71), stay on that trail or (for Campsite 71) take the Whiteoak Branch Trail. Either way, you’ve got a hike of better than four miles ahead of you.

Forney Creek is a medium to medium-large stream, by high country standards, and in all but its uppermost reaches it offers plenty of casting room and the typical mix of plunge pools, riffles, small pockets and long runs found in such waters. It contains both browns and rainbows, with the latter tending to become more numerous as one progresses upstream.

Pick a midweek time period in the early spring, and chances are pretty good you can make a three- or four-day trip without encountering more than a handful of other anglers. To me, at least, that’s reason aplenty to venture into the heart of the park.

TWENTYMILE CREEK

Unlike Forney Creek and the more remote reaches of Deep Creek, some of Twentymile Creek’s finest fishing doesn’t require hikes of such distance that they are really suitable solely for backpackers. Its appeal lies in the fact that it can be reached by road (North Carolina 28) with just a few miles travel from Fontana Village. However, the stream is so far from any major population center that it gets little pressure. To reach it, just take the turnoff onto a gravel road at the point where Highway 28 crosses the stream at its mouth, follow the road to a parking site just above the ranger station, and prepare to hike or start fishing.

Twentymile Creek gets its name from the distance by an old road (much of it now under the waters of Fontana Lake) from its mouth to that of Hazel Creek. The actual stream, a medium to medium-small one, is much shorter in length.

There is one designated campsite (93) here. It lies 1.8 miles upstream from the trailhead and has to be, aesthetically speaking, one of the least appealing sites in the park. On the other hand, the stream is a great one for a day of walk-in fishing, with access all along the Twentymile Creek Trail being quite simple (there are a number of bridge crossings).

This is a stream predominately populated by rainbows, although you may catch the occasional brown in the lower reaches. It can be quite rough going, thanks to a rapid rate of descent and lots of cascades. Even though it is small, some real wading skills are required during the high waters of spring.