Madison River Outfitters — Local services in West Yellowstone

Waited a few days after the trip to post to be as factual as possible. Went fishing on Wednesday June 14th. Outfitters shop and check-in: great, helpful, friendly. Lunch: good and as selected. Scenery: it’s Yellowstone, it’s breathtakingly beautiful. Guide: nice and friendly. Fishing: this is where the 2 stars come in. You save up and pay that kind of money to be taken to the hot spots, know what kind of flies to use, and to be put on the fish. With 3 adults fishing all day, one small fish was caught and very little action beyond that. Everything you read talks about going to the Firehole this time of year. After several hours of not much action, when I asked about that location the guide said he wasn’t a fan and didn’t have much luck there a few days ago. I can’t imagine it was any less than what we were having. There was also an unnecessary unpleasant experience near the end of the trip. So, if you want a friendly person to accompany you on an amazing scenic view while fishing and don’t care about catching fish, this may be for you. If you are actually interested in catching fish, as we were, and you have access to the equipment and know how to tie a fly, you could do just as well without paying for a guide and have our same experience. You could fish all day to catch one little fish and not pay over $800 for that...

Our guide was Tyler and he was a great host for the day. He made sure everything was setup for fishing and was quick to help, including net our many fish's. He also pointed out the area for each to fish. And change our flies as things changed.The lunch provide in the deal by the Outfitters was okay, nothing to brag about. In the package deal, waiters and rods were supplied. The waiters were old and wore out, my son right side leaked water bad. The rod were mixed match old and tired. Should have used our own gear, but for some reason I thought we would be using High quality gear since we were taking the trip from a "pro shop". Recommend you bring your own gear if you have it. Even Cabela's $150 rod combo is better than what was supplied. The store did have great selection of clothes and fishing flies. Even had a couple of rods for sale. Staff was helpful, and Neila was very...

If I could give more stars, I would! My husband and I traveled to Montana last week to celebrate his birthday in Yellowstone, and booked an all day float trip with Madison River Outfitters. Start to finish, it was an ::awesome:: time. John booked our trip for us, and was awesome with getting us our non-resident fishing license. My husband asked about hiking trails, and John took the time to email us some hikes around the park.

Our guide was Mike, and he was excellent - highly recommend him. We fish a lot, but we don't have the chance to fly fish in a river since we don't live near one with easy access. Mike was incredibly patient with us both while teaching us the proper technique and fixing some bad habits we'd both developed. Mike is super personable, and it felt like we were just fishing with a friend - the whole day was the highlight...