This is that magical time of year when towns all throughout the country fill up with people that are just passing through and seem to just get in the way. They’re the people who you can pick out of a crowd at 200 yards, due to their brand new bright blue cowboy hats, hiking boots with the socks hitched up to their knees, and polo shirts tucked into shorts with a leather belt.
Ah, tourist season.
Tourists are a necessary evil in the Rocky Mountain West. The locals spend countless hours over many beers whining about how crowded things are, about how the rivers, campgrounds and woods are crawling with them. But they are a vital part of the economy.
And when it comes right down to it, most tourists aren’t half bad. Sure, we won’t tell them our secret fishing holes, and it’s always fun to play “Who can scare the tourists most with bear stories”. A couple years ago, I convinced a family from Vegas that if they stepped even one foot off the dirt hiking trail, they would get eaten by bears. Good times.
For fishermen, tourist season can be particularly frustrating. Seems like all of them want to hit the famous water, the ones that have been profiled countless times in the magazines and TV shows. And of course everyone has to stand on that rock in Gallatin Canyon and say “Look honey, I’m Brad Pitt!”
But then there are the places the tourists don’t know about. Hell, most of the locals don’t even know about them. These are the high lakes, the little streams, and the unknown rivers. These are the local’s playground during tourist season.
This week alone, I have hit one particular little creek almost every day. It can be late afternoon on a weekend, and I’ll be the only one there. If you ever happen to see another car at the access, it’s going to be a Bozeman-local. And I’m not talking about one of those posers who claims to be a local but only lives here in the summer at Big Sky or the kind of “local” that just moved here from California, but real, by God locals.
This is Local’s Prerogative in action. Once fall rolls around and the tourists leave, then we will get out on the big water again. Being a local means you know that the rivers are going to be there in a couple months, and you don’t feel that pressure to constantly be out on the Blue Ribbon waters. Besides, it’s always fun to fish new waters.
Most of the fish you’ll pull out of these smaller waters won’t be monsters, but damn, they’ll be wild. Take this creek for example. On average, the fish won’t be much bigger than 12 inches. But last night and the night before that, we managed to catch four fish in the 18 inch range. While it is true that the big waters do have more bigger fish, if you are willing to look around and work for them, you can find them all over the place.
There is a pretty good sense of satisfaction that comes from landing a big fish in a little, unknown creek or lake. The kind of water that you don’t hear talked about in the fly shops or magazines. These are the kind of places you want to keep close, only to be shared with those few good fishing friends you’ve got. If anyone ever asks about them, you just shrug your shoulders and go “eh”, then start talking about some great hatch on the bigger waters.
Is it mean or bad to keep such waters from the hordes of out of staters? Hell no.
That’s Local’s Prerogative.
