Very rarely do I get the opportunity to fish TOTALLY new water with a client, water that I had never even seen. The type that you carry a map in the river and keep track of mileage and bridges so not to pass the GET OUT. It is definitely not something I would ever do with a paying client had they not totally understood that I had no idea of what was around the next bend.
Earlier this week I spent three days on the Missouri river by Craig Montana when all the good water in SW was a raging torrent. Of course we could of went to the Beav and jammed our boat between thirty others and fifty bankies but I would rather T-BAG a chainsaw than do that. Chuck Keenan, Harry Lee and his son Chris where up for the adventure of traveling north to the big rainbows of the Mo. Now, I have spent a few weeks above Mid Canon in the last two years and had a good handle on that water but below that was just the Atlantic Ocean as far as I knew. Of course as soon as we arrive the same snow melt issue was traveling there and the Mo was rising a couple thousand cfs a day, NOT what you want for the blind mission I was on.
With the best advice we could find from Headhunters fly shop, we headed into the great beyond with some crazy ass new RAINBOW CHEK NYMPH and the GAFF a SW pro guide special. It really felt like fifteen years earlier when we would road trip it to far away rivers in hope of finding what we had recently read in some shiny dream laced publication. Loaded with enthusiasm of a pointing dog on opening day of pheasant season we hit everything hard and found fish on most corners and drops, probably the best scud fishing in a river I have ever seen. Soon we were out of the CHEK nymph and scratching out a few on felt penned ray Charles.
Every year I add to the list of clients that will do anything that it takes and Chuck Keenan was on the top of that list, a very educated and seriously calm hearted man with a lust for gods natural beauty that makes us all proud to just be a human. We had a stroke of genus the next day along with some in-tel from fellow guide Scott Wison a few days earlier and headed for the never seen stretches down from Mid Cannon. Armed with ten different worm patterns and more Chek nymphs we hit the insides at four to seven feet deep and semi slow to slow. Pumped a few fish that were full of 18 PT’s and nothing else, and no they did not eat PT’s. It was worms or nothing, and the bite was ridiculously soft to the point of NOT hooking the bite, none of them. Harry Lee was totally on point and ripping them at a twitch of the bob he landed 7 or 8 before lunch and Chuck and I were shooting blanks. Just when diving head first into the next rock pile seemed like the best thing to do, I go desperate and pull out another new fly (if you can call it that) the gummy I had ONE,, mostly as a novelty. Oh yea you know what happens, drift thirty feet and two foot of Rainbow trout is skipping all over the river. The trout where hanging onto that THING like it was gold on wall street. After the initial shock hitting the EASY button I remember that we only have one, out comes the 1X and all knew knots. 10 fish later and a few reties we loose the gummy to a giant Brown that left us holding on a little too tight. With that action came the overwhelming confidence and a certain speedy reaction that gave us another good chunk of fish on the Gaff.
The float down from Mid Cannon is breathtakingly beautiful, the rock formations, evergreens and big trout are certain to see Chuck and myself again and we may just have to go farther to repeat Winging it!
