Top 15 Canadian Moments 2012 - # 6 - Forgiveness

There are days where I know that my guest thinks that I'm disappointed how things turned out.

Nothing is ever further from the truth.

Pierre joined me on the Bow R in September hoping to do some head hunting and sight-fishing. As we left McKinnon's little did we know what we were in for. The day was sunny. Not much wind. Not much cloud. The water was low and crystal clear. Amazing. Right off the hop we decided to stop and slowly walk a bank in search of active fish, sub-surface. There were 3 holding together under a gentle, subtle seam in slow water. It took some time to show him what I was looking at but he did see them. In dark water I looked for the glow of a lighter colored, flagging tail on top of the dark rock. The dark head of one brown sat on a lighter rock, the light bodies of the two rainbows atop darker rock. When he moved into position to fish, he was somewhat blind, but knowing the general area, he put a few casts in. "Here it comes... set!" I called straight away. Swing, miss. Bugga. That fish took hard and bolted to the river. The others remained. A few casts later, another took his nymph on a downstream take. I again called. Miss. And the third missed as well. We had some work to do, both in the setting of the hook, but also in our giving/receiving of communication to ensure the timing was a work-together event and not an opposing one. It was quite good discussion for sight-fishing.
Alas, that was the end of our sight-fishing for the day.
We spent an hour and a half on that bank, spotting a dozen trout, hooking 2/3 but missing them all for various reasons. It was painful for him, I was simply loving the opportunity of engaging him into the fish that were lined up.
We opted to have a go in the drift boat. As we hopped in one of us commented at the numbers of midges on the water. The wind remained dead-calm, the water a flat, oily slick. A fuzzy one, mind you. The midges were coming... in droves.

We made it 20 yards in the boat before the fish started popping. One rose, we'd move over to work it. Then another would pop. And another. We'd slide from one to the other, the the next, slide down to the others, on to the next. We worked 30 fish as we moved downstream. The water was low, at the lower end of the flat I simply pulled out, rowed upstream to the top of the flat and worked down again. At times, we'd move off one fish that stalled to another, then row back up to work the former. And we hooked some amazing fish. We spooked some fish - a few I got too close to with the boat, others simply stopped at the cast or line landing, or line drag.
Nothing landed, but an amazing experience for sure. We spent another 2 1/2 hrs on that 200m of water and had some lunch.
The day continued just like that. Fish popped everywhere. Over and over we lined up on fish, some spooking, some bolting, some returning to feed, some taking straight away. Honestly, we saw so many fish that it was a complete blur. The entire day was incredible. We had to have lined up on 100 fish, getting takes from many. And I can't honestly recall if we landed anything - all I know is that he was frustrated at times while mixed in with awestruck disbelief that this day was happening. Me too!

Hours passed and that special moment fish never happened, despite the literal dozens of opportunity. It was a pleasure to be on the water with someone who so appreciated it all, mind you. I think a few small fish were landed - but I can't recall - the day was simply too enjoyable to think about that. Yes, frustration in some misses, but let's keep that in perspective. It's fishing frustration. We're on the water, after all.

The rises began to dwindle and became sporadic spacing. Evening set in. Things were quiet, still, warm. As we drift the second last great bank, we were sure a nice fish would show. Not much happened. We switched up to a hopper-dropper for luck. It had slowed. But he missed a couple of random takers. To the tailout. Hope faded.

Then, as so often happens, his hopper was sucked in by a good brown in one of those methodical, slow water brown trout takes! Yessss....

It's funny how an enjoyable day fades to an enjoyable evening, and on those special days that special moment just rounds the day into a perfect blend.

And it's funny, just as you think you are at your wit's end at times, how if we just let the river and day unfold, and settle into accepting what comes our way, that the world can actually be quite a forgiving place. That nice brown at the end of the day... what a forgiving turn for someone who not only hoped for exactly that, but for someone who kept at it and persisted... and enjoyed the ride.

The hardest part of that day came 2 days later. I floated the exact section of water with another long time guest. The wind was west 50, gusting 60mph. We caught fish but it was a completely different experience, as you can imagine. I was sore after that one!