Who could ask for a better birthday present? Congratulations and
a terrific story.
Kent Lufkin
It all started many years ago, when a close friend called me to explain his problem. "Every year, I've gone fishing for my birthday. It's a tradition." That year, he was without a vehicle and dying for some fishing. Always looking for an excuse to go fishing, I called in sick and took him to the South Platte for the day. While the idea is by no means unique, I adopted it and have gone fishing on my birthday every year since. One year I spent four days catching huge rainbows on an obscure lake on the North Island of New Zealand. Another year, a friend took me smallmouth bass fishing in a small creek.
All week I pondered the options of where to go. Since I had gotten recent negative reports on lahontan cutthroats, and I was convinced that steelhead were a myth anyway, I was leaning towards fishing some hidden desert creeks. I called a friend, who happened to be a steelhead bum, and he said the rivers on the Peninsula were in shape and the forecast was good. Well, I thought, I wouldn't mind catching a steelhead for my birthday. I have spent a considerable amount of time trying to figure out why quite a few perfectly normal trout fisherman friends of mine now only fish for steelhead. There must be something to it, I thought.
The night before the trip, I called my friend to confirm our trip. He said he had a bronze casting class that he just couldn't get out of, so I gathered a few spots off him and arranged to meet him at a certain campground on Wednesday night. Hurriedly, I tied 3 dozen flies, packed my gear, and was ready.
At 6:30am I left work, and made it to my destination on the Peninsula absolutely exhausted from not sleeping and the long drive. After an hour cat nap, I downed some caffeine and began scouting a place to fish. This was a very popular river, and even on a Wednesday most of the pullouts were full. Chris had said one of the keys to success was finding fish that hadn't been pressured, and he should know, last season he caught more steelhead than most people catch in they're lives. Aside from that knowledge, I like to get off the beaten path.
After locating a likely spot, I parked my car, suited up, and followed the overgrown road deep into the first growth forest. Soon the forest service road ended, and after a few minutes of searching, I found a rough cut trail disappearing into the dark overgrown bush. The trail slithered and snaked it's way deeper and deeper, and soon I could hear the rushing sound of water. The trail suddenly ended at a huge fallen log, and following it's length, I found myself standing out over a forty foot cliff overlooking the river. Instinctively I reached for my digital camera, and turned it on to capture the beauty of this rugged river valley. Nothing. I stared at it in bewilderment for a moment, before realizing that I had forgotten my battery in the charger at home. Damnit, I thought, hope I don't catch a steelhead.
While the thought of sliding down the cliff to access the river looked more appealing than I'm sure it would have been, I couldn't ponder a way back up to return to my vehicle. Eventually, I backtracked to my car.
I spent the next hour driving up and down, in a state of delirium, trying to figure out where to fish. Eventually, I found another forest road. This one was as overgrown as the first, and I saw no other footprints. It also terminated without warning, and I found myself bushwhacking in the direction that I knew the river lay. Following game trails, drainages, anything I could find, I secretly hoped I would be able to find my way back out again. Soon, I arrived at another cliff. Walking it's length, I found a way down, crossed a small feeder creek, a flood plain, and arrived at a braid of the river.
This braid of the river was small, intimate, with lot's of good structure and holding water. After rigging up, I walked down to the river and saw a shadow slide away. Aaah, I thought. A steelhead. On my side of the river lay a slot about five foot deep, the far side was a shallow fast flowing flat, well oxygenated. As I watched the flat, I noticed two dark shapes in the water, moving occasionally. A spawning pair of steelhead, I thought. Slipping into the river, I crossed the fast current slightly upstream of a fast rapid, and slowly creeped up the flat. The spawning pair spooked off into some nearby structure, and my eyes crisscrossed the flat, searching.
Slowly, the techniques I had learned for spotting trout in New Zealand came back to me, and as still as a hunting heron, I watched. I eventually noticed a shape holding in a foot of water in the lee of a small rock, and took a few steps forward. Is that a fish, I thought? Another two steps. Looks like a fish, I mumbled to myself. Slowly I slid into position, the same as I would stalking a New Zealand South Island brown. The shape lay just within casting range, not close enough to spook in the shallow water, and five feet to the right of it. Make the first cast count, I told myself, as I stripped out line.
It was perfect, I couldn't have asked for a better cast. The indicator went down, and for a second, my fatigued mind just stared at it. I set the hook, and the world exploded. I was hooked into my first steelhead on a fly. Upstream she ran, then down as I palmed the reel and applied side pressure in a feeble attempt to stop his descent. Unaccustomed to a 13 foot spey rod and 8 pound Maxima, I was amazed at just how much pressure I could actually apply. She ran, of course, straight for the nearest log jam, directly below me. I felt the sickening feeling in my stomach when you realise that the weight at the end of the rod is static, not moving. She had wrapped me around a tree limb. I'm done, I thought.
I had one chance, a trick I had learned in trout fishing years ago, and it was only a slight chance. I slid slightly downstream of her, and holding the rod sideways low to the water, I let off the pressure, praying she would swim out. Nothing happened for what seemed like an eternity, and then I felt the head shaking.
It was about this time that I looked downstream to see a large log jam, covering nearly the entire width of the river. I know if she made it to that, I would be finished for sure. For a few tense moments I applied side pressure, and managed somehow to beech her in the shallows. I guestimated her at around 6-7 pounds and 28"(measured against the rod), not particularly large as steelhead go, but I was beaming. She wasn't chrome, but wasn't dark either. As I released her and watched her kick effortlessly upstream, I realised, she would do. I had caught my first steelhead on a fly.
Ryan Davey
worldanglr
Calling Fly Fishing a hobby is like calling Brain Surgery a job.
- Paul Schullery
