first time for everything

Soon the gas tank was full and we backed out, pulling over to the dock and tying off before I went and pulled the jet boat out of the slough and over to the dock as well. 

The clients exited the lodge with anticipation of an exciting day and one by one, four of them got into the boat as Liam and I prepared the ropes to haul the jet boat. 

We began pulling away from the lodge as I slowly let the rope slide through my hands, making sure it didn’t get caught in the motors props as I waited on it to come tight to the jet boat behind us as it finally picked up in our wake and hauled nicely behind us. 

We headed for the river and some bears were spotted on a nearby beach before they took off running for cover startled by the boat. Rounding the point I admire the mountains all around and at the same time felt a slight nervousness about the day.

Finally, we found ourselves at the Gibraltar river and watched our pilot Mark land and anchor his plane before we unloaded the jet boat and also anchored up.

Mark took a couple of clients and Liam upriver in the jet boat while I rigged up the rods for the day. With the knots completed I passed off the rods to the clients: June and her husband Dan, and within just a few casts I could see June had a fish, but soon after it jumped and came loose, escaping her fly. She casted more and more, but no more fish could be hooked and the buzz of a jet boat was nearing. 

Mark pulled in and we all grabbed our gear, loading into the jet boat and preparing to go upriver as well. 

We got to a spot and stopped, walking through waist deep grass and up into some braids in the river. Dan and Mark began fishing, and June and I made our way upriver trying to find a good place to begin. 

A submerged bush created good cover, and we both decided that it seemed like a good spot to start. I handed her one of the rods and watched as she casted it and swung the fly downstream in the current as the line went tight and soon after another fish had been lost. 

We persisted drift after drift, missing a few fish but then finally connecting, and soon after she had another fish. We talked about how her fish size went from 10” to 15” and hopefully soon to 20” and then 25” and made jokes about the 30” fish she was going to catch, but with her next fish being around 8 inches, we realized that our trend was no longer going to be followed. 

Two eagles flew overtop as we switched rods back and forth throwing streamers and nymphs in every hole, hoping to catch as many fish as we could as we moved upstream. 

We switched rigs and began fishing yet again, and she caught a few fish as we talked about her fishing trip to Mongolia for Taimen. It was at that time when we had a few fish in the net and I felt confident enough to tell her she was my first ever client I had guided. She seemed to be shocked, and to my surprise, she began telling me how well she thought I was doing. This conversation didn’t stop her, however, as she continued to cast and mend the line whenever I told her to, and as soon as she saw the fly drop she would set the hook like clockwork. 

Very soon after I could see Mark and Dan walking upriver toward us with lunch, and we talked to them about how the fishing was before we found a nice gravel bar to sit on and have lunch as we talked. 

Finishing lunch, we prepared to begin fishing with a new goal in mind. Dan told us he had caught an 18 inch rainbow and June seemed more than eager to catch a fish bigger than his when I had mentioned it. Just a couple casts after lunch, Dan could be seen reeling in a fish above us. So we slowly worked our way up the run fishing behind Dan and Mark who were doing fairly well. 

We got to a bend where they had stopped and Dan invited June to take his hole because he felt there were many fish in it and wanted to see his wife catch a few. I instructed her to cast toward a limb submerged in the water, knowing one of the two big trout we could see would have a perfect chance at her flies. She casted, mended the line, then watched as her flies drifted downstream, and just as it went past the fish, it ducked under the surface and I told her to set the hook. The fish rolled out of its hiding place as the other big trout chased it in aggression. 

I listened as Mark began giving her tips on fighting the fish while I focused on netting it. Her drag would scream and she would reel it back in, but just as it got within reach of the net, the drag would scream again. 

Finally one good scoop of the net left all of us with smiles as I gave June a fist bump before taking a picture and measuring it on the net quickly. We were both very content with that fish, and with it we had the biggest fish of the day, surpassing Dans by a mere half inch. 

After releasing it, we went back to fishing and I began thinking back to when she was fighting the fish and the aggression the other fish had shown so with no doubt in my mind I looked at her and told her we would catch the second large trout. 

I grabbed the rod I had previously laid in the grass behind me and took off some weight while I looked at the streamer that was around 4” long dreaming that it would soon be crushed by that trout. I could see the trout laying on the far bottom corner of the pool and upon telling June to cast around the center of the pool and let the fly swing in front of him she carried out the action. 

The fly smacked the water and began swinging as the trout came darting for it and took a swipe at it then, just as I told her to strip the line, he crushed it, but spit the fly out too fast for her to get a good hookset in. 

The trout moved back to its spot and we threw many more casts at it with the streamer watching it chase it and swing at it multiple times but never fully committing. 

I decided our chance of getting it with a streamer had probably long passed, and we switched back to the rod with a dry-dropper rig on hoping we could get him with the nymph. 

She casted and casted, putting mends in the line at just the right time but we couldn’t get him to eat. She casted a multitude of places trying to get the drift right and finally casted downstream toward it. The dry fly gracefully landed on the water and the trout lifted and I could see the white in its mouth as it grabbed the nymph and I told her to set the hook. 

The same process had ensued, only this time Mark was farther upstream and I was telling her when to let the fish run, when to reel, and also making sure she was keeping her rod tip up so we didn’t lose what could be the largest and most colorful fish of the day. 

Soon the fish was tired and I scooped it up, admiring the bright red cheeks and stripe. Once again, we fist bumped and both smiled before, during, and after the picture we took together. 

After unhooking, measuring, and releasing the fish we realized we had caught another big fish of the day passing up the most recent by half an inch. 

Mark decided it was a good time to switch locations and we rode downriver to check on his plane and realized the wind was progressively getting worse and we needed to get out while we could. 

He dropped us off and took off upriver getting Liam and his other clients. We packed into the plane and made our way out of the river into the lake with growing waves and very soon into the air. 

I watched as we flew over the village of Kakhonak and the point where we had cut firewood a few days prior, and soon a lodge came into view and we slowly dropped in and drifted onto the lake pulling around to the dock and unloading the plane ending what was my first ever day of guiding.