Thursday, November 3, 2011

Crowds

Sooner or later I knew it was inevitable.  I cut my teeth on a small river near home (not that it's that great of fishing, however it will remain nameless for nostalgic purposes).  It was truly a rare day indeed to see another vehicle at any of my usual haunts, an even rarer occurrence to actually see someone else on the water.  My home water even weathered the storm that was "The Movie" (for those of you that are not aware I"m referring to A River Runs Through It) without so much as a slight bump in pressure.  Everyone wanted to come to Montana, luckily for me and my home waters, everyone wanted to fish the "Big Blackfoot" like the McLean's and live their own part of the movie (little did they know the movie wasn't even filmed on the Blackfoot).  And so my little slice of Montana flyfishing heaven has remained relatively unknown.  Until very recently the locals that did fish it knew each other's rigs and would gladly move on if they spotted someone else's rig at an access.  One day this summer I was to meet my buddy for an evening of fishing, when I arrived at the predetermined spot, I saw my buddy's subaru (that's another story entirely), what I didn't expect was to walk to the river's edge and see this...
Admittedly the closest guy in the water was my buddy, but to see three people in view on the same stretch of my home waters was enough to bring me to the brink of tears.
Fast forward to yesterday.  I took yesterday off of work, knowing although it may not be the best day for fall fishing (sunny and mild) I was planning on hitting the home waters in hopes of enjoying what was sure to be one of the last nice days this year and perhaps to catch a couple of more fish on dries.  As I arrived at my first choice, there was a pickup parked there, albeit with local plates.  No problem, I didn't recognize the truck but figured one of the locals had the same idea as I did.  My backup plan quickly fizzled as I drove by and could see two vehicles parked at the access.  Again no problem, I know a stretch nearly as good and not as well known as the first two choices.  As I drove over the bridge I got a knot in my gut.  In my third choice, standing out like a dick in a women's locker room, was a Porsche Cayenne.  No shit a Porsche Cayenne.  It just gets better, upon closer inspection the douche dude was still at the vehicle, stringing up a rod.  I couldn't help myself.  I pulled up next to his rig and asked him (knowing full well the answer, as his brand-new Orvis waders weren't wet) if he was just getting done or just heading out.  "Just getting ready to go" he said, in his best Western Montana accent (whatever that is).  At this point I see a rod all strung up and ready to go leaning against his rig, one put together but not strung up inside his crossover SUV or whatever the hell they're referred to as and he's is in the process of stringing a third rod up.  I'm completely befuddled at this point (I don't think i've ever had to cast more than 30' on this river) and ask the guy how many rods he plans on taking with him.  "Probably just two" he says, kind of like he would prefer all three but, whether he wanted to appear like he could get the job done with just two rods, or not wanting to look like a total , douche, noob, rookie, I honestly couldn't tell which.  He proceeds to tell me that he may want to throw a streamer or two (I didn't look, maybe the other rod was a two-hander!)  Perhaps the humor is lost on me but the thought of a guy carrying two and perhaps even three rods to fish this particular river (which is perhaps 30' at its widest) just really got to me.  I bid the guy good luck and decided to go deer hunting.
This brings me to my last thought.  George Carlin once said something to the effect of any driver who drives faster than you are is crazy, and anyone driving slower than you are is a fucking idiot.  I've noticed that this kind of parallels fly fishing.  Anybody with nicer stuff than you or someone with all the goodies (especially on smaller home waters) new Orvis waders, wading staff, lanyard, vest, fancy wooden net etc. (you get the hint) is obviously either a noob or a snob or both.  Conversely anybody in tennis shoes, cut-off jeans carrying an eagle claw rod from K-mart is either a redneck or a dumbass or both.  Perhaps those were just my feelings, although I have a sneaking suspicion that many more of you (and you five people reading this know who you are) have had he same type of feelings at one point in time.  I have recently decided (perhaps maturity had something to do with it?) that regardless we all share the same passion.
But I'm sorry, the douche in the Porsche Cayenne was too much........I'm just sorry I didn't have my camera

2 comments:

  1. Ja Tach auch.

    Man I miss Montana. You should try fishing here in Oregon - it's insane. Way to many people.
    Altough one stretch of the south yamhill River is on my property here and fairly safe of other anglers. we have salmon swimming up right now.

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  2. Montana misses Mell too! I would love to come visit, and now you throw in the fact that you have a river out your back door, sweet! Any summer run steelhead by chance? If not I would love to come over and try for Coho on the fly. Hope everything is going well for you, take care Volker.

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