Jon B's blindfolded dart hit Colorado from across the room. He'd switched up the throw - off the bow of his Lund instead of eye-level with the map - hoping to break a Midwest streak that had cost him two consecutive failed challenges. Denver was not what he asked for. It was, he said, what he was going to make work.
"24-hour dart challenge number seven starts now," he said.
The brief was the same as the other six episodes. Catch five different species or 10 fish total inside 24 hours of touching down in the state. The math was about to get a lot harder.
Inside the rideshare from Denver International, Jon checked the weather and found a temperature shift that read more like science fiction than a forecast.
"Today is going to be a high of 78. Beautiful. When we get there, it should be like in the 50s, maybe 60s. It's going to be nice. It's going to be a little windy, but that'll be very fishable weather. However, tomorrow, our all day fishing mission. So, it's going to go from 70 to 27° F. It's going to snow. It's going to blow 20 mph and it might even sleep. Freezing rain. So, in other words, we're screwed," he said.
Day one tested whether shore fishing could lock down the species count before the front hit. Jon picked up an early bycatch fish, then chased a tip from a local who suggested a higher-elevation reservoir an hour and a half out of Denver. The drive was on a narrow mountain road with what he described as "a straight drop off of pure death" to one side. The reservoir, when they arrived, was closed.
"The lake's closed. Wow. Why is that the case?"
"This is why you don't take risks. We drove an hour and a half on just up a mountain. Looks so good, too. Dude, this happens to us so much."
A roadside cutthroat trout pool below the locked reservoir produced a few drift presentations and zero bites. The trout, Jon noted, had seen everything that had ever floated past them.
"These trout are going to be cunning, especially on a roadside spot like this. Like these fish are smart. They've seen a million flies in their lifetime."
The rescue came at the last spot of day one - a small reservoir near Denver where the front of the lake had drained out and what looked like water on the satellite map was, on the ground, mostly mud. Jon worked a finesse jig along the still-watered edge and got the day's species two on a Colorado largemouth.
"My first ever Colorado/Denver largemouth bass," he said. "Just had to slow things down with the old longer log. This is fish number three, species number two. Not a big one by any means, but a fish that felt much needed after the day we've had."
A second small bass came shortly after, then a third. The smallmouth he wanted - species number three - did not show before dark.
Day two was the day the forecast had warned about. The temperature dropped, the wind came in, and the snow that arrived "like cats and dogs" forced the camera crew to put the larger camera away. Jon left his videographer Asher with the car and walked down to a small dam alone.
"I'd rather one of us just suffer than the whole lot."
A finesse setup - a 6'6 light rod, an 8-pound leader and a tiny football-head jig dressed with a Googan prototype bug - went out into icy water just warm enough to support active fish. The first cast onto deeper water produced a smallmouth bass, the species he had been chasing for 24 hours.
"This might be my smallmouth. Yes, it is. It's my smallie. Species number three. Oh my gosh. We did it. Ah, we did it."
The challenge needed 10 fish total, and Jon had eight at that point. The next bite was another smallmouth on the same finesse jig, then number 10 hit on the very next cast.
"This is it. This is number 10. Next cast after. Next cast after. Oh my gosh. We freaking did it, folks. 10 fish done and dusted."
The challenge had 55 minutes left on the clock. Three species, 10 fish, in a state that had thrown a closed reservoir, freezing rain and 4.5 hours of driving at him in two days. Jon's takeaway was the line he closes every video on, but in Denver it carried more weight than it usually does.
"Keep fishing. Never stop.
