Today’s blog is brought to you by Don LaChance, currently our 1st Vice President. Enjoy!
-FVTU Editorial Board
It was July of 1999; I was in the process of planning and organizing a 2 week backpacking trip to Yosemite for 8 of my scouts and 3 other adult leaders. The plan was for the twelve of us to break into 2 smaller 6 man patrols and cover the 54 mile High Sierra Loop through Yosemite’s backcountry. We had planned this trek to be completed in 7 days, 6 nights including a one day, one night layover at the end of the third day in a backcountry established campsite right on the Merced River.
Two weeks before the trip, my buddy called me up and said, “You know, with all this time out there at Yosemite, we are going to need to find something to do on our down day, what do you think about taking up fly fishing, it can’t be that hard?” We agreed, so that Saturday, Dennis and I took a ride to Upcountry and met Grady for the first time. He set us up with 4 piece 4/5 weight Cortland rods, a couple of used reels and cheap fly lines. What followed next was a walk behind the shop where we learned to cast. In a matter of minutes, Grady had us casting like pros, at least in our opinion. After our 15 minute’s instruction and for about $125 per man we were set, or so we thought.
The 2 of us headed back inside and found out about those must have extras. We picked up vests, waders, boots, nets, leaders, tippet, forceps, nippers, zingers, flies, floatant, fly boxes…… I can’t even tell you how much more that came to.
The next day, Sunday, outfitted with all my new gear, I headed to the Farmington on my own to bring the river to its knees by catching an obscene number of fish. In reality what happened was I became an expert in wind knots. They weren’t the kind that you can undue in 5 minutes with a little patience, no I am talking about going through a full 3 pack of leaders and a roll of tippet in about 2 hours. Well, no fish that day, I didn’t even know where I should be putting a line in on the river, nothing about drag free drifts or even the first thing about which fly to use (matching the hatch).
Fast forward, 2 weeks later, we had just spent 3 days on the trail and both patrols met for our down day at a campsite on the Merced River. The boys along with 2 of the adults were spending the day swimming and lounging on the banks of the Merced. The troop had found a small waterfall with polished rock that they were using as a slide dumping them into a large pool about 5’ below.
Dennis and I headed upstream. We each staked out a claim to our own private section of the river and were going to meet up every hour or so to compare notes. Our plan was to enjoy the solitude, out in the wild, communing with nature while catching enough fish to feed the troop for dinner.
The section I had picked was about 20 feet wide heavily canopied pocket water. At that moment, all heard was the wind in those low hanging trees and all I saw was water passing through the maze of rocks right in front of me. I had read an article on the plane in a fly fishing magazine which I bought at the airport and learned that fish are not fond of direct sunlight, instead they preferred the shade. Well, with the canopy of trees and bushes, on the section I had chosen, I had that covered. The article also went on to say, trout like to use rocks and other types of structure as a place to hold so they wouldn’t burn too much energy when feeding. Hey, with all the boulders in the stream, I was sure this was the place.
Now I started to get ready. Match the hatch, piece of cake, the bugs looked brown, and so did one of the flies I bought from Grady. I tied on tippet and a fly and was good to go. At that moment, all I could see was the water holding fish with my name on them, I no longer saw the bushes or branches. To this day, I will not understand how but I was able to throw a good single first cast about 20 feet upstream right behind a rock on the edge of the seam without getting tied up in the bramble around the water’s edge. I could tell you I was watching my backcast and aimed for it but, that would be a lie. A fish exploded out of the water taking the fly. My memory says it was a 10 minute fight, but in actuality it probably took about 30 seconds to land this monster, an 8” Brookie. I had caught my first fish, on my first cast and a keeper at that. The rest of the day I caught more branches and rocks then anything else. I did manage to eek out a couple of smaller 4 to 5” fish, mostly by accident, but turned them back to the river to be caught again when they got larger.
Dennis landed 3 that day as well with his largest running a whopping 6”. Being true backwoodsmen we each kept the largest for dinner. After each of the scouts tried a small taste, I think Dennis and I had 2 bites each; thank goodness for the freeze dried food we had packed in.
So began my fly-fishing odyssey, 20+ years later, I have built an arsenal of rods and reels and have accumulated more accessories then I will ever use in a lifetime, but still continue to tell my wife I need just one more fly rod. The trips continue, every year to a different location. Our group has evolved with some changes every trip, no more scouts, this year there will be 6 of us are headed to Oregon for a multi-day float/camping trip on the lower Deschutes. There will be more to come on that trip this fall.