"Two bonefish, straight ahead, they're tailing." my guide Charlie says, pointing to a ragged coral outcropping 60 feet away.
Two bonefish I'll never catch, I think, plopping my rabbit-hair fly in front of me, preparing to cast.
"See them?"
Um, no. I do see a lot of blue skies and skin-searing sunshine, though. We take a few more steps, quietly.
"See them now?"
Oh, yes. Yes. Now I do.
Their tails glimmer in the sunlight like tiny transluscent sails, breaking the surface of the water with razor-like precision, in spite of the 20-knot winds howling from our backs. Small breakers slam against the back of my calves in a rhythmic beat. If I weren't wearing pants, it would probably feel good across my sunburned legs, but thankfully I avoided that and merely forgot to put sunscreen on my face. Because, let's be honest, my face is a lot less important than my legs.
"Just relax," Charlie says, echoing the motto I claim the Bahamas should adopt as a national mantra. "You can do it, mon. Just relax."
Bending at the waist, perched on my tiptoes like a green heron eyeing a minnow, I double-haul my line and somehow manage to place a cast inches away from the taling fish.
"That's it!" Charlie whispers. "Good cast, mon. Now, strip."
A V-shaped wake chases my fly with each strip, looking more like a lemon shark than a bonefish. After seeing my rabbit hair monstrosity, for reasons beyond my comprehension, the fish chases after it with reckless abandon. In mere inches of water, the breakers shed off its back in its pursuit, and I strip each time Charlie tells me what to do. I'm like an infant learning to walk: I need guidance to catch this fish, as this is my first bonefish trip in the long, exalted history of John.
Three strips in, Charlie tells me to stop. I stop.
"Strip-set," he says, and I see the fish hovering over the spot where, in a perfect world, I imagine my fly to be. I strip set, and the fish is mine.
With normal, non-mentally deranged bonefish, they take off in an instant, shedding backing from your reel in the time it takes to blink an eye. This fish is different. Instead of running toward deeper water, it does what any fish would do: It catapults itself onto land.
Yes, you read that correctly.
Seconds after I hook this fish, a beautifully silver four-pounder, it rockets toward the coral heads and leaps out of the water toward the shore. Slamming against the sandpaper-tough shards of coral, it flops in an inch of water, thrashing about like a rattlesnake grabbed by the tail.
"Holy shit!" I scream, looking at Charlie.
"That is very, very strange," he says with a huge smile.
"That's wild!" Tom says, his camera snapping away at the scene. "In all my years of bonefishing, I've never seen anything like this."
After beaching itself momentarily, the fish flops back into the flat and makes a run down the coast. Twenty yards later, it launches itself into the coral once more, to the astonishment of the three of us.
"Wow!" Charlie says. "Let up some slack, in case the line is wrapped around the coral."
Winding the reel as fast as I can with my left hand, we splash through the water toward the fish, which is flopping on the coarse blobs in an inch of water, spraying the puddle into the air like a roman candle on New Year's Eve.
I run to the fish, take out the fly, and hold it long enough for Tom to document the entire episode on film before letting it go. The three of us are in a frenzy, because the only other time we've seen anything like the bonefish tossing itself on land was when a seal was being chased by an orca on the Discovery Channel.
"That's the craziest thing I've ever seen on a flat," Charlie says, his wide, dark lips breaking into a huge smile of white canines and bicuspids.
"That was enough to make me want to quit my job, move down here, and do this forever," I say.
"Easier said than done," he says back. "But I wouldn't stop you if you did."
Tags: Bonefish Bahamas Saltwater Wind Coral
When you're battling a biting winter wind, standing waist-deep in 33-degree water, while swinging a bright orange spey fly through the Casino Run on Idaho's Clearwater River, more than likely, you won't be able to feel your toes. Or your knees. Or your hands. You'll mention something under your breath about dodging icebergs and probably curse a time or two when your guides ice shut.
Then, sometime around 5 p.m., when the sun dips over the horizon and paints the river a subdued mix of blue and orange, you'll start to question your own sanity. You'll start to wonder why anyone chases steelhead in the winter, and you'll question why the hell you flew to Montana, hitched a ride with a friend, and drove six hours through snowy, winding, Idaho mountain passes to get there. Existential thoughts, the kind you only get in the most harrowing of situations, start coming to mind:
Why am I here? Is frostbite lethal? How long would it take me to die if I fell in? Is suicide the only option to end the pain?
And then it happens.
In the middle of your self-proclaimed "last swing of the day," the tip of your 14-foot rod wiggles and your fly is yanked with a hearty tug. Three, maybe four, feet of line escapes the reel, and for the first time since you stepped out of the car this morning, you feel something. Your heart races, and the first thing you think is: Jesus, I'd better not screw this up.
The line stops, and you wait for a half a second. You lift the rod toward the bank, slowly. Your eyes open wider than they ever have before, and more than likely, you stop breathing altogether.
Then: SROOOOOOOOOOM!
Your reel screams as a 15-pound Clearwater B-run steelhead takes off upstream--shockingly with your fly still in its mouth. It barrel rolls out of the water, and you stand there, frozen, staring at the river in disbelief, or more accurately, in shock, mixed with what doctors like to call a "mild heart attack."
The next five minutes are a blur as your guide instructs you to keep the rod tip low and pressure the fish. You notice the basalt cliffs across the river that look like loaves of gingerbread dusted with powdered sugar. You think about the celebratory beer you'll have at the Shot Glass in Orofino later that evening. You think about every fish you've ever caught, and wonder why they all couldn't be like this one. Then you'll wander toward the bank (which in this case is a 10-foot sheet of ice) and watch with nervous anticipation as the guide attempts to land the fish without a net.
Then, it's as if everything warms up to 70 degrees. Your knees work. Your fingers are tingling with excitement. Hell, even your toes come back to life. You splash your way toward the ice bank, and without much forethought, plunge your hands into the icy water and grab the fish. You feel its strength and power in your hands, you feel a pulse in your toes, and you're ecstatic. You smile like a maniac, pose for a photo, and slip the fish back into the water as quickly as you can.
And just like that, you forget about the cold, the wind, and the 999 unsuccessful casts you made before that fateful 1,000th. You forget all about your car payment, that wheezing sound you make when you cough, and the first thing you think is:
Okay, maybe just one more cast.
Tags: Steelhead Clearwater Idaho
