This creek and I’m going approach again. After I first moved to Idaho 25 years in the past, it was one of many first blue traces on the map that I searched out. I discovered its delicate course via a lodgepole forest in what was then a crisp new copy of DeLorme’s Atlas and Gazetteer for the Gem State. That very same assortment of maps is now a dog-eared, light compilation of 1 / 4 century’s price of journey. The journey began right here. On this modest little willow-shrouded, beaver-dammed trickle via the Targhee Nationwide Forest, simply outdoors of Yellowstone Nationwide Park.
In lean waters years, I’ve fished the creek as early as mid-Could. When winter snows pile up, I’ve needed to wait till virtually July earlier than I deemed it fishable. Within the grand scheme of issues, it’s not a really particular creek, however I find it irresistible. And I’ve my causes.
First, it’s dwelling to a number of the prettiest brook trout I’ve ever seen — little non-native treasures that shade up in early summer season. They’re not huge. They do what brook trout do everywhere in the West – they eat themselves out of home and residential after which they stunt. So, the typical brookie from the creek is perhaps six inches lengthy. A giant brookie is perhaps 10.
Second, it’s the final creek I ever fished with my grandfather and due to that it’s at all times there, behind my thoughts. Similar to he’s. He’s the writer of my fishing – with out him, I could by no means have picked up a fly rod.
Years in the past, not lengthy after I moved to Idaho, and never lengthy after I found the little creek, my grandfather drove to Idaho from Colorado. He’d misplaced his spouse, my grandmother, a few years earlier than, and he was getting alongside about in addition to might be anticipated. He’d bought the household home, purchased a pleasant new pickup and moved into my uncle’s basement. One early September morning, he determined to take a highway journey. At 80, he grabbed his previous fishing creel and an previous bamboo fly rod and drove 10 hours to return see me.
Nonetheless fairly new to japanese Idaho, I steered his just-off-the-lot Dodge up the freeway towards the little city of Ashton. We crossed over the South Fork of the Snake on the drive up, and we caught glimpses of the Henry’s Fork at St. Anthony. However we have been creek fishermen — we at all times eschewed the large water and the overall lack of elbow room for smaller, extra delicate waters. We sought out the creeks and brooks and hidden trickles deemed inferior by different anglers.
And this creek is one such inferior place. It’s actually choked by willows alongside most of its course, making for a hell of a bushwhack if you happen to don’t know the little grottos and hidden moose tunnels via the thicket. Its water is darkish, only a bit stained from its course over the forest loam, and its backside is slick-as-snot granite. On the perfect day, it’s a beast to attempt to fish.
However we did it that day in September, because the willows, turning gold as the times shortened, rustled within the late-summer breeze. We walked the slippery backside intentionally, and I watched because the previous man picked off brookies that, on that day, have been precisely the place they have been alleged to be.
A World Struggle II veteran who fought with the Marines within the South Pacific, my grandfather, I feel, discovered peace in locations like this. Quiet, unassuming locations the place, with the intention to discover the magic, you first should scrape off the crusty outer shell which may preserve others away. There are locations like this everywhere in the Rockies, truthfully, and my grandfather and I definitely fished our share of them.
However this place was the final place. And due to that, I come again every time I can.
Now, virtually 1 / 4 of a century later, the younger muscle tissue and the impervious bones are gone. And, in fact, so is my grandfather. At the moment, I stroll the creek with cautious goal. One step at a time. I’m considerate as I fish its small runs, taking care to not lose my backcast within the willows. And I exploit fistfuls of the streamside willows to examine my steadiness, lengthy since diminished due to a reconstructed decrease again. However I preserve at it. I preserve coming again to this creek. Its brookies are nonetheless there. They’re nonetheless small. They’re nonetheless lovely.
Typically, I don’t fish in any respect, an unthinkable proposition all these years in the past. Typically, when it’s miserably sizzling, I simply drag my trusty previous camp chair down the hidden path to the creek and set it within the water. The creek’s chilly flows cool the air close to its floor, and it’s a terrific place to contemplative. I’ll watch the little char rise just a few ft above me — it normally takes them about 10 minutes to get used to me sitting there, hovering over them. However as soon as they’re comfy, life goes on within the creek.
I consider my grandfather usually, and I particularly consider him once I’m right here, on this creek. He forged a mighty shadow over my youth, and I realized loads from him. However I treasure his best present to me greater than the rest. Fishing, in fact.
And, on this creek, it seems like he nonetheless fishes with me. This creek. This place. There’s magic right here on this darkish water. My grandfather and I discovered all of it these years in the past.
