Chapter1c

Before I knew it, I could see the hole. The water is so clear every boulder; every fold in the strata of rock formation, and every pebble are visible as if you were looking into an unopened bottle of Beefeater. It’s deceptively deep and with the water clarity the depth is hard to decipher. The left bank is comprised of a sandstone cliff, smoothed over by time, wind and water, cold grey in color and standing strong like an old woodsman guarding the hole, protecting it from the elements and worse, the few fishing souls who might venture up this far.
Above the hole is a run that shoots through a low point in the sandstone bottom. It meanders over the rocks creating a riffle of hard water dumping over a ledge and into a bubbling pool as the water deflects off the bottom and churns over and over until it spills out of the tail end of the seam.

It’s at the upstream side of the hole in the turbulent water where the bigger fish will lay. They wait for nymphs and fry that have lost their hold in the rocks above the run to tumble down. The seam becomes a feeding trough and as the shadows get longer, the fish start looking up for surface food.

On the right side of the hole there lies a somewhat steep gravel bank. The pebbles act like marbles when stepped on and any uncalculated move might send one sliding right into the river. It’s the only vantage point to cast from however as standing in the hole is impossible because of the depth and to the left, the old man stands.

The one saving grace is that fish don't hear noise above the water very well. I can call out commands to Chase. I can even kick a rock or two and unless those rocks fall into the water, the fish won’t hear, which allows me to make a good sneak on the hole. If I’m standing in the water and grind two rocks together, the vibrations carry with lightening speed sending fish either deep into the hole, disappearing in the rocks or under the cut banks and snags. However, that’s not to say they can’t feel vibrations from the bank so the best practice is being very, very careful.

It took me a good hour and a half to work my way up to this spot. The wind had lain down. The temperature was dropping. The cliffs were supplying the shadows I needed. Everything was perfect. I checked my tippet for nicks or abrasions. If I hooked him I wouldn’t want anything to ruin my chances of landing him. I took a moment and a breath and acknowledged the old man watching over the river and I assured him I meant no harm.

Working my way up the right side I felt my Chacos slipping in the pebbles. I moved up the bank a little higher to make sure I wouldn’t disturb the water. The problem is the higher on the bank, the more visible I became so I had to crouch as I snuck. The closer I got the slower I moved and the last couple yards seemed to take an eternity. I positioned myself to have the best shot at putting a 45 degree cast into the riffle without casting a shadow over the fish.

I start by taking false casts behind the hole. I want to get just enough line out to be able to set the fly down right at the end of the run so to not cover any more water than needed. A big mistake most beginners make is having too much line out, which creates slack making it impossible to get a good hook-set when the fly is taken. Another problem is they cast too far throwing line over the top of the water they want to be fishing and contaminating the water upstream by already drifting line and fly through it. I rarely fish more than 30 feet ahead of myself, especially in small water when I’m fishing upstream. It’s a lesson I learned years ago while fishing the Madison.

It was the Mother’s Day Caddis hatch and I had recently moved out to Montana from Milwaukee, WI. I drove about 2 hours to get to Ennis on my way to Bear Trap Canyon. I stopped into the Ennis fly shop to get the local flavor. I had spent a ton of time on the lakes and rivers in the Mid-west, which does little I realized for these waters. The guy in the shop spent about 30 minutes explaining the hatch that was going on, what sized of bugs to use and how to rig a caddis with a dropper. As I walked out the door he said, “Oh yah, and one more thing. If you don’t catch anything don’t worry about it. It took me 3 months to catch my first trout.”

Wow. I was feeling a little intimidated to say the least. But I headed out anyway with my new ammo and a little more knowledge. I hiked into the canyon about 2 miles before throwing a line. I fished for at least 3 hours without getting a single take. Feeling a little defeated I headed to the bank and sat down. I looked back to see a fisherman a hundred yards behind me fishing the exact same water hooking fish after fish. “Man!” I screamed to myself.

Feeling defeated and a little beaten down I had two options at this point. I could collect my things and humbly head back down the trail to the truck or I could try learning something. I chose the latter and spent the next 30 minutes watching this guy catch fish.

What I noticed right off the bat was the amount of line he was throwing. Thirty feet was all it took and after letting the fly drift only about 15 feet through the seam or past the boulder he was fishing, he would immediately pick it up and put it right back in the zone. There was no time wasted. There were no unnecessary false casts. He didn’t have any more line out than he needed to get the job done, which allowed him to manage the slack in his line and make the necessary mends and set the hook before the fish could spit the fly out.

After watching my new mentor for a while, I regained some ambition and confidence and decided to have another go at it. I waded back into the current and emulated my teacher. In the next hour I caught eight fish and missed a couple others. I was stoked to say the least and like sinking that last par putt on 18th hole, I left feeling victorious and knew I would be back on the water in the coming days.

So now on the Dearborn after taking a few false casts well behind my target, I turn my body slightly making a single cast, setting the fly perfectly on the inside edge of the seam. The fly is a foam hopper imitation that is easy to see and virtually unsinkable. Even in the hard water it bounces down the riffle rolling into the pool only getting lost for a second before emerging on the surface.

On the first cast my hopper floats through the zone without drag, passing directly over where the monster rainbow should be—nothing. Careful not to pop the fly off the water I pick it up and again take a couple false casts downstream of the riffle and then once again set the fly down on the water; this time a few inches further into the seam and again—nothing. My third cast I put right on the outside edge of the seam and as it drifts into the pool on the bottom of the run the dark shadow of the rainbow reveals itself as it rises up and turns to chase the hopper downstream. I see the white mouth of the rainbow open as it chases the hopper gaining ground. With a burst of speed and an attempt by the trout to crush the bug it makes its last run at it and with a gulp, smacks at the hopper.

About the only thing I can liken to what happened next is a premature ejaculation. It took everything I had to wait as long as I did to set the hook but as soon as the mouth came up out of the water I snapped the rod-tip up and pulled the hopper right out of the trout’s mouth.

I spent nearly two hours getting to that position, making that cast coaxing that particular fish into taking my fly. It was almost painful how carefully I worked the pool. I had made the right choice of fly and when the perfect cast was made and the drift was accomplished I pulled the fly right out of the fish’s mouth. Pathetic.

I’m not too proud to admit this but I have been known to chuck a putter or two getting three full rotations after missing a two-and-a-half foot putt. The urge was there but I held onto my rod without sending it airborne. Beside the fact that its roughly six feet longer than a putter and would take much more effort to get the same result, the rod is also about $300 dollars more expensive to replace. As I’ve gotten older I’ve developed the propensity to think of these things before acting.

The feeling only lasted a couple seconds and I thought maybe, just maybe I could get the trout to come up again. Starting over, I took my false casts and put the fly right back where he was lying at the bottom of the riffle. To my surprise, he showed himself again but this time only came up to about six inches from the surface of the water, turned tail, and rolled back to the bottom out of sight. One more cast and I was confident I had blown my chance.

There is a paradox here however. As I finished kicking myself I noticed something. For the past half an hour or so, all I thought about was the objective at hand. I was in one of the most beautiful places I know of, participating in something I am truly passionate about and for the first time in a long time, I was at peace. Nothing else mattered and even though I hadn’t actually caught the trout, my stomach wasn’t turning, my brow was no longer furrowed and you know, I was actually happy.

Wanting to document this special place I turned to grab my camera and remembered I had left my bag about a hundred yards downstream. Deciding to retrieve the bag and the camera and come back to the run, I made the short hike back and then returned to the hole to take a few pictures. I remembered a conversation I had with an ex-game warden who suggested fish have a memory of about seven seconds. Seven seconds? That would mean this particular fish should have forgotten me by now right? Not fully buying it, I decided to at least change flies before trying it again.

Going a totally different direction I pulled out my box of ammo. In there I had an assortment of hoppers, beetles and other terrestrials. I also had the one go-to fly that everyone on every stream should have—a parachute Adams.

A little larger than the Adams I would normally use on the Missouri but much smaller than the hoppers I was throwing, I added some tippet to my leader and tied on the number 12 fly. I coated the fly with Gink and then added some to the butt section of the leader. I dropped the fly and watched the excess coating leach into the water. Standing in the exact same spot as just a few minutes before, I began the ritual of taking false casts downstream from the run and again, worked this special hole.

The Adams is not nearly as buoyant as the foam hopper and as I set the fly on the inside edge of the seam it only drifted about two feet before tumbling down, submerging under the surface of the water disappearing deep into the hole. My initial thought was to jerk the fly up out of the water, take a couple false casts to dry it off and then return it back to the run. I snapped the rod-tip up and as the line straightened and became tight my forearm stopped dead half-way through the motion.

You know you’ve hooked a monster when the weight of the fish stops your arm motion dead in its tracks and instead of you leading him, his head-shakes and his rolls dictate your next move. He ran through the pool and headed downstream and all I could do was chase him. I knew he was in control seconds after accidentally setting the hook when he ran out all the access line getting to the reel before I knew what had happened. He took a jump disrupting the calm water of the pool landing with a “plat” on the surface, which only seemed to piss him off as he changed direction and charged back upstream.

Sometimes things don’t work out the way they’re supposed to. Sometimes we do everything right and we fail and then sometimes we fall into success, happiness and even peace. And sometime the Gods, fishing or otherwise, wait for those moments when we are ready for peace, love, or catching fish. In graduate school I studied a social change philosopher by the name of Hanna Arendt. She described peace as something that can no more be forced on someone than sleep, or love. In her writings she often spoke on the fallacy of thinking we can go to war in order to coerce people into living in peace.

I gave thanks to the trout while releasing him back to his hole and as it disappeared I reflected on the profound lessons a day like this brings. Snipping off the fly I buried it in the rocks returning it to the earth, retiring it from its life as a fly and onto its new one, degrading back to the elements it was derived from. I broke my rod down and placed the reel in my pack. With the sun now fully hidden behind the mountains I began my hike back to the jeep.

There’s a reason I made a complete one-eighty as a 36 year old and got into guiding. I chose this lifestyle because of the lessons and rewards and because of what fly fishing has done for me. Looking back on what the first summer has brought I can’t say I don’t wish some things could have been different. However, I am proud of things I’ve accomplished and what I’ve been able to offer to those around me.

Please share these lessons with me in the following chapters.