After just two days of Western Montana’s “Get Your Guide On” Flyfishing Guide School, seasoned two-year vets Maddox and Karter say they can totally separate the future guides from the wannabees. Here’s a partial list of giveaway blunders they have witnessed:
THE DONNER PARTY MEMORIAL in Truckee, Calif., stands 22 feet tall, indicating the depth of the snow during the fateful winter of 1846-47. The snowstorms began in early November, trapping the Donners and other families near a frozen lake, deep in the high Sierra Nevada, until rescuers were able to reach them in March. Of…
Starting today, Veterans Day, Simms is offering a special edition G3 Guide™ Stockingfoot to benefit the Bozeman-based Warriors and Quiet Waters Foundation (WQW).
When Winston added a third “I” to its BIIx rods several years back, the classic all-around sedan received an engine upgrade in the form of boosted horsepower. Thanks to a slightly stiffer mid-section and tip, the speedier BIIIx performed great in the wind and was more accurate at longer distances than its predecessor.
Sagebrush and brown rolling mounds. Ripping wind and an Arctic shoulder-season. One righteous truck stop bar, where dollar bills wallpaper smoky internals. And iffy gas station burritos at 6 a.m. There you have Alcova, Wyoming… at first glance.
IN THE SHOWTIME SERIES HOMELAND, Carrie Mathison, played by actress Claire Danes, leads drone strikes against terrorists from the comfort of her CIA station. But the same technology that makes drones—also known as unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs—convenient military weapons, has also helped advance the careers of real-world civilians, including a growing list of flyfishing…
“THIS IS A SWEET CAR,” said the friendly sheriff of Hardin, Montana (population 3,500-ish), who’d just pulled us over for a burnt-out headlight. After promising to replace the light (Fat chance!), he let us roll on with no questions asked. (Which was damn lucky on our part, because if we’d have had to find any…
Wolf Creek, Montana, is just ambitious enough to justify a post office and a couple of bars. Its proximity to cold, clear tailwater stretches of the Missouri River, below Holter dam, also make it ripe for a fly shop, and that’s where Wolf Creek Angler steps in. Shop co-owner Jason Orzechowski purchased the retail space…
EVERY TIME A GIRLFRIEND COMPLAINS about her husband or boyfriend going fishing again (insert big sigh), I bite off a small chunk of my tongue. I’d love for my husband to go fishing. A week in Montana? Hmmm- That doesn’t seem far away enough-or long enough. I hear there are big fish in Kamchatka. And…
THERE WAS A TIME when skateboarder-turnedgraphics- creator Dave Hartman excelled at the art of being aimless. Bucking the law and generally lacking purpose, Hartman bounced from home to home in suburban Arizona and California, rural Alabama, and southern New Hampshire. Until fishing intervened. He found a fly rod and carried it to Montana. And there…
CLYDE HAS A FLAT. I can see it from the boat ramp of Montana’s Bitterroot River. The front of the old Merc is sloping toward the passenger side, and while I’m happy to discover that there’s a spare in the trunk, I’m unhappy to discover that the jack is missing its handle. I’m unhappy again…
The browns had started to rise just as Sam Bush was taking center stage. Twenty yards of dimpled St. Vrain trout water was all that separated me from Planet Bluegrass amphitheater and a full night of music in Lyons, Colorado. The urge to tube my rod prematurely and forgo my well-designed plan was tempting, but…
THE FIRST BONEFISH TO EAT MY DRY was tailing in ankle-deep water. I threw it two feet ahead of him and left it to dead drift. When he got near, I stripped it and he saw the wake, followed with his head up, hesitated, then turned away. I twitched the fly and he circled it…
I thought I was just sharing a lark—fine: I was bragging—when I posted a Facebook update a month after moving from Missoula, Montana, to Oberlin, Ohio: “Just caught a dozen bluegill on a fly rod in a light rain standing on the shore of Oberlin Reservoir. I think I’d forgot how much fun fishing could…
At 37 feet long, 9,000 pounds, and three miles to the gallon, Clyde didn’t fit well in Berkeley, literally or figuratively. I passed an electric car with a bumper sticker that said, “Animals are just little people in fur coats,” and eased on toward the Sac.
Located in a rugged side-pocket of eastern Montana, little Fort Smith is a big flyfishing destination. There are few roads and plenty of river; more browns and rainbows per river mile than humans per square mile; and limited amenities exist other than fly shops, outfitters, and a few fishing resorts. Life is good, if you…
WHITEFISH, MT—Scott Fenwick says Northwoods Angler “isn’t your regular fly shop.” It only takes a few seconds inside to understand what he’s talking about. There are rare books, collectible paintings, antique signs and surfboards scattered among the requisite flies, rods and other fishing gear. In one room, underneath a television displaying a flyfishing adventure documentary,…
There are two types of fly shops out there, destination and local. Oak Orchard Fly Shop defiantly falls into the latter category. Of course this was not always the case.
Saloons tucked away in the small Rocky Mountain communities that survive on the ebb and flow of anglers are where fishing stories either start or end. The more dilapidated, the better. If flakes of hide splinter off a 60-year old mule deer mount, or pornographic cartoons denote the men’s and women’s restrooms, then grab a…
Hwy 101, from Northern California to Port Angeles, Washington. No stretch of highway in the country crosses more prime steelhead water than this one. Start on California’s Klamath or Smith, then head up to Oregon’s Rogue or the great Tillamook Bay rivers like the Trask and Wilson, and then finish up on the drippy Washington…
[Last Friday we posted a short piece on Last Chance, Idaho, flyshop, The TroutHunter. Co-owner Jon “The Animal” Stiehl joins us today, filling you in on the dirt: High times, low times, drunken A-Bar debates, scraps with reps and the establishment, Idaho gun love, and Rene Harrop’s penchant for Natty Lite. Enjoy. —GM]
Next time you’re driving around fishing the rivers of southwest Montana and you’re in the mood for a little adventure, try driving the High Road. This rough-and-tumble 20-mile county road connects Twin Bridges to Melrose and the Big Hole River to its confluence with the Jefferson. But before you start out, learn from the mistakes…
Sunshine and Salmonflies on the radar Of the laundry list of flyfishing variables we cannot predict, weather—good or bad—ranks near the top. So far spring 2010 has been a strange, extended winter for many living in the West: Rain, snow… more snow. Nowhere is that more prevalent than in southwest Montana, where late-season snowpack continues…
What would motivate a person to open a fly shop in the midst of the Great Recession? I asked this question to David D’Beaupre, who opened The Sierra Trout Magnet and Guide Service in Bishop, California, in August 2009. With small, independent fly shops closing left and right in recent years, I figured he had…
About a month ago we received a letter signed by a dude named Matt. He claimed he’d stumbled upon a flyshop so amazing, so gritty, so real, in a state so blessed—or cursed, choose your poison—with outfitters, that we must share it with you. Sensing the big scoop, we dug deeper. Matt told…
I pour a little rum in my cider and get typing. At present, I am coupled with winter, 400 square feet of cabin, a half-empty bottle of rum, and memories of my rookie year of guiding in Yellowstone Park. The only sound breaking the tap-tap of the ‘writer is the occasional gust of wind dusting…
In Montana there are two kinds of winter days-those that are warm enough for fishing and those that aren’t. Here, cold is a relative term. A week of high-sky, 40-degree weather in early November can send the Baetis hatch into submission and seem downright arctic after a month of Indian Summer. Yet a windless February…