Tsylos Park Lodge at Chilko Lake
by Karen McLean of Tsylos Park Lodge at Chilko Lake, www.tsylos.com
September is one of my favourite months. The sockeye salmon signal the autumn season as they come into the Chilko River to spawn and lay millions of eggs. This is the fall feast for fish, wildlife and everything under the Chilko sun.This last fall I wanted to experience the joy of catching a trout on a dry fly, before the trout started to feed on the sockeye salmon eggs.
My niece, Jerica, was visiting for a couple of weeks. We wanted to spend some time together so I grabbed a fly rod and we headed down to the dock, jumped into one of the jet boats and putted up the river. There wasn’t any hurry. I just like watching the eagles, maybe there is a bear about. The sockeye were splashing all over the place, it’s a beautiful sunny day and it is so nice to be out on the river with my niece.We continued to putt up to the beginning of the run and I shut off the motor. I got my fly rod ready and cast out a line. I was using a great big fuzzy, ugly fly with a black body, a white spot on its head and big brown wings. I had high hopes that it would entice a rainbow to come up from all of those tasty salmon eggs.
We floated along, chatting away, deep, rich conversations of life and love, and all the funny things in between. It was so beautiful out, blue skies, golden leaves and the river shifting between shades of blues and greens. I always find the river so soothing, watching the colours change, the thousands of red sockeye lazily swaying in the current, stacked up against the ledges, hearing them splash away and enjoying the warmth of the sun on my back. It is so quiet, but so rich in sounds and life. I love it.
We were slowly drifting down the river and I decided to cast one last time before starting up the motor to avoid drifting into the rocks. I stripped in my line and recast. My fly was floating perfectly, all perky and fat, a nice mouthful for a trout. All of a sudden I saw this big silver belly roll over my fly and it disappeared. The next thing, my line is heading straight up the river. He was moving fast, the reel is zinging and the line is burning my fingers. I said to Jerica "Fricking A! It’s a sockeye and he’s taking all my line."
He was moving and moving fast, and he just kept going and going. The line was to the backing and I was thinking here goes all of my fly line! Just at the point it’s going to snap, the fish stops. I was so surprised. For a second he just kind of sat there. I can feel him on the line, he’s big and he’s heavy. I don’t want to strip the line. He’s too big and I am afraid the leader will snap. So very carefully I started to reel him in. He was weaving towards the other side of the river, but slowly got closer and closer! Then, he decided he had enough of this and ran for it again. He exploded from the river, a silver flash, a perfect arch and a flick of his tail. He disappears, and then jumps, and jumps again.“Oh my gosh this isn’t a sockeye, its one big beautiful trout,” I said with excitement! It was like the world’s best trout movie, just perfect, and then he runs for it again.
I was standing on the bow of the boat and I kept holding on. During this time I hadn’t paid any attention to the boat. It was rapidly approaching a rock. “Jerica, quick you have to row the boat,” Jerica said, ”I can’t oar the boat.”“Jerica you have to! I don’t want to lose this fish, just miss the rock and row us into the bay! You can do it!."Jerica picked up the oars and gets a 30-second rowing lesson as she mumbles under her breath about rowing a boat. She quickly gets the hang of it, misses the rock, and saves the boat.Now we were quickly heading for the dock, but we are going to miss the bay. Calm flowing waters quickly become a fast strong current, especially when you are about to plough into your dock.
At this point I had already decided that I was not losing this fish, even at the cost of my dock and jet! Jerica’s partner Oliver is standing on the dock. Just at the point we were going to crash into the drift boat, he jumped into the drift boat, grabbed the jet boat and saves the day.
We were all yelling and laughing and with the boats and the big fish, it was all pretty exciting. I did not want to lose this fish. I jumped from the jet to the drift boat to the dock and slowly worked the trout into quieter waters where I could let him go. Now we got to fully see the beauty of this trout and he was magnificent. He was what every fly fisher dreams of as the perfect bow — beautiful colours, perfect health and just one super magnificent trout. This fly fishing adventure was the best kind, completely unexpected, exciting, pure joy and so much fun. At the end of it I released the beauty back into the river so hopefully he could produce more beauties just like him. Lucky me and lucky trout. Carpe iridia (Karen’s version of Seize the Rainbow)
PS: if you come to the lodge you can see the video of this beauty!- See more at: http://www.tsylos.com/blog/my-big-trout-story#sthash.lsLQ6vTJ.dpuf