Amelia & I had been spending the day in bright sunshine spotting and taking fish. It was the break through day after a couple of tough weeks of rain and cloud, which really hamper the sighting. Through that tough stretch, we still caught many fish each day, it's just that the going is slower and the eyes have to really be zoned in. Not this day, however. The river glowed a west coast gold, crystal clear and of perfect flow. On the first bank we came to, 800m above the highway bridge, there were 6 trout, spaced 10m from each other, lined up along shore. It was a happy time. The only disappointment came as Amelia stepped into the casting zone to hook the last one. It was as much a gimmie as the others had been. As she stripped her line from the reel, literally out of nowhere came a dust devil about 80 feet high right up the shoreline seam. This mini-tornado went right over the trout, sending it for cover mid river. Like I've said to others about out last 6 weeks to NZ this year, we hooked everything we cast to. She never had a chance. It was a really neat interruption to our day. Neat that it happened. I still giggle when thinking of it, and that my only comment to her was "That was your fish. My turn!"
That day will certainly go down as the first really solid break through. It was hot, sunny, and we walked a good distance. The fish glowed in the water. Things were quite obvious. The fish were all nice trout, in the 4.5 to 8 pound range... about 22 to 28". Nice fish. I was still hoping for something more, however. I was still at the stage of hoping to crack 10 pounds in NZ. AJ had already done it a few times earlier in the trip in a couple of intimate streams. For me, I simply watched and enjoyed her shaking and squealing on the first one, then just enjoy the others. Seeing trout that size was fun. I just wanted one.
As it unfolded, we were walking along this river. It had been given rip rap armoring on the out turns of this reach to protect the saw mill on the north shore. This, the only development on the river, which spends much of its time racing through beech forests and virgin hills. We were just touching on the lowest reach. The rip rap looked similar to rip rap on the Red Deer about 2 km below the dam. Like many rip rapped corners, it created a few deep pools. And it was in one such pool that we came to that a large, dark shadow was holding. It fed a couple of times to its right (the deeper side), but would not come left. AJ was setting up the video camera, but I just wanted to flip my fly, catch it, move on. I knew it was large but wasn't really too concerned about it. It was just another fish in a series of just another series of good fish 5 to 8 pounds. I was excited to have a go and decided to cast before she was ready. My first cast was left (inside) of the fish. No dice. My next cast was about right and lo and behold it took. It didn't look too long but I simply couldn't budge it. It literally owned me for the next 10 minutes as I waded back and forth to try to turn the fish. It wasn't until it finally came to net that we realized that I'd cracked 10 pounds.
It wasn't a mind blowing experience. It was just big. I was no more nervous about casting to it than any other trout on the trip - less, if so honest. I was not impressed by its fight nor its wariness as compared to other trout - each was about right. I was impressed that it was so fat because it had been feeding on mice up in the hills. That was neat. But, my desire to chase after big, fat trout waned right there and then. I'd done it, but so what? Honestly, size matters so little as related to the other matters of where, how, when, why, and a couple dozen other "what" factors that create intensity for moments. To flip a fly at a fish sitting in cutthroat water, knowing it will feed, it doesn't matter if it's a 10" cutthroat or a 10.25 pound brown. It's going to happen. It's fun, but it's essentially the same. I sure had my 10 pound brown. We just spent most of the rest of the trip trying to find places to make it a little harder on ourselves. It's just the way we are.
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