Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/433799
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 1 7 4 nowhere, trying to figure out if the little river we were scouting was worth the effort or if it made more sense to turn around and head back to the Kispiox. Our biggest problem was that our maps were poor. This was back before smartphones, and a year or two before Google Earth set the sporting world afire. Scouting actually involved looking at an atlas, picking a likely spot to fish, then hiking to the river with the hope of finding decent water. Our luck, though, had been pretty minimal. While the old logging road paralleled the river, it wasn't an exact match, and a combination of elevation change, distance, and tree cover conspired to keep us guessing as to what we might find. When we did hoof it in to see what the river had to offer, the water invariably proved too fast and skinny, with ankle-deep riffles stretching upstream and down as far as the eye could see. We'd just about given up hope when we ran into a local angler who told us about his favorite spot. In fact, he was kind enough to tell us where to park and which direction to head. We were only a mile or two away, and by the time we hiked to the honey hole, it was obvious that our new-found friend knew what he was talking about. The river ran down out of a canyon, curled through a lush cedar bottom—those cedars were magnificent, almost the size of redwoods—then pooled in front of a huge cliff face, after which it turned and raced downstream into another endless riffle. It was exactly the kind of spot we were looking for, and the only issue was that the pool wasn't big enough for both of us. Sure, we could have crowded each other or taken turns, but that would have been a little too crass. I do a lot of my angling based on feel, and that spot was too perfect. It just didn't feel right to divvy it up like a boy—and doubly so for Kian. He's incredibly competitive, with almost every aspect of his life revolving around sports and stats and scores and who won or lost the big game. So the fact that he's beginning to look at fishing through a less- competitive lens was a huge shift— one I didn't see it coming. In fact, it took me a few seconds before I could wrap my head around his comment, wipe the smile off my face, and begin to respond. If you've been fly fishing for a while, you know that one of the wonderful things about our sport, right on par with the beauty and excitement it fosters, is its never- ending capacity to surprise us—to reach out, take us by the hand, and lead us toward a moment of pure, unadulterated amazement. Sometimes it's the fishing. Maybe an unproductive pool decides to make up for its past stinginess by blessing you with a 23-inch brown. Or an unseasonal cold snap shuts down the angling on your favorite farm pond— except for the year's biggest bass, which decides to inhale a little panfish popper. Or perhaps every trout in the river decides to slam a size 10 Elk-Hair Caddis when the only insects on the water are size 22 blue-winged olives. Other times it's that perfect, unexpected moment. A gorgeous sunset paints the western sky as the trout rise and the elk bugle. Or the biggest whitetail buck you've seen in years wades across the riffle below you and pauses midstream, where he's illuminated by the early-morning sun. Or, if you're really lucky, you show up at the river and the only other angler in sight is a bald eagle, who flies low overhead and drops a single dusky feather that lands at your feet. A number of years ago I was up in British Columbia fishing for steelhead with Billy McConnell. Toward the end of our trip, we were driving down a dirt road in the middle of Kian Tanner, the author´s son, fights a big fish in a Montana trout stream.