Ever have one of those days on the river where just nothing goes right? The fishing is slow, the weather is wrong, and then it starts blowing a gale (upstream of course). So it was a few weeks ago for us on the Upper Madison.
This particular float actually ended up being the last time I fished with Shane before he moved. We didn’t know it at the time, you always think there is time for one more trip, but time ran out on us pretty quickly. If we had recognized this as the actual “final” trip, we would have gone to our traditional going away spot – Between the Lakes on the Upper. But this time we stuck with Varney to Burnt Tree.
The day started with reports, from trusted and reliable sources, that the river was on fire and fishing great. I was slightly handicapped by a pair of wading boots that had blown out the previous week. And when I say blown out, I mean shot to hell. Not just soles but the entire bottom of the boot coming off kind of blown out. The Upper Madison in late season is not a place you want to not have broken wading boots. Still, you can reach a lot of water from the boat.
Getting to a river with reports of how great it is is kind of like catching a fish on your first cast. You know it should be really good, but it rarely turns out that way. When the wind started blowing, we knew we were in for it. Milkshake Mike picked up one nice rainbow that gave the rest of us hope for the day. But sadly, it was not to be.
After several more grueling hours of battling the breeze we stopped for lunch and built a fire. Fishing in the fall and winter almost always requires a fire during lunch. Even if it only burns for a few minutes, you have to stand around and poke it a few times. That’s just how the world works. By that point in the day we had tried it all. Every fly, every technique. Nothing was working. So what do you do then? Sacrifice a fly to the fish gods.
We very ceremoniously chose one, stuck it on a stick, and offered it to the flames. We then put the burnt hook back on the fly patch on the boat, feeling convinced that now we had tried it all.
It didn’t help.
Didn’t do anything but make the wind blow harder in fact. Damn. The float finally drew to a close, and we found our tired asses sitting around a table at The Gravel Bar in Ennis. The fishing may have sucked, but the homemade huckleberry pie sure helped make up for it.
It wasn’t the best farewell fishing trip. So that just means that Shane will have to come back and we’ll do it right this time.
Photos by Shane Rickert.
