{"id":13823,"date":"2017-09-21T11:00:38","date_gmt":"2017-09-21T18:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/community.nrs.com\/?p=13823"},"modified":"2017-09-12T15:18:06","modified_gmt":"2017-09-12T22:18:06","slug":"big-creek-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/community.nrs.com\/duct-tape\/2017\/09\/21\/big-creek-time\/","title":{"rendered":"On Big Creek Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

10:05 AM –\u00a0<\/span>My raft scrapes into the small landing upstream of the creek. The two guests in the bow of my boat are motionless, bamboo fly rods gripped in hand.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is it. This is Big Creek.\u201d
\n<\/span>\u201cWell, it doesn\u2019t look very big.\u201d
\n<\/span>\u201cMaybe the name is for the trout, not the water.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This gets them moving. As they clamber up the creek-side trail, I eye my own fly rod. I have an hour. The sky is a brilliant, early July Idaho blue. It\u2019s day five of a six-day trip. I could easily lie down on the deck of my boat and sleep. I could do my guide duties and follow the bobbing bamboo rods up the path. I grab a puck of flies left at the put-in by the man I\u2019ve been chasing all summer. \u201cFlyagra these betches\u201d says the label. I grab a foam fly dubbed with red UV, half-hazardly tie it onto my kinked leader and sprint my ass up the trail.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

10:17 –\u00a0<\/span>Idaho can be ugly sometimes. It can be snowy and gray, it can be covered in wildfire smoke, it can be damp or blisteringly hot. This day in Idaho, however, is not ugly. The stream-side alder and willows are fluorescent green, the water is clear and the granite rocks radiate the summer heat. I pick my way down a steep bank to the creek. It looks too fast here, like no self-respecting trout would hold. I cast out my fly anyway, make sure it\u2019ll float right side up.<\/span><\/p>\n

10:17 and 15 seconds –\u00a0<\/span>SLAM. A sixteen inch cutthroat rises to the foam. SLAM, SLAM. It rises again, missing.<\/span><\/p>\n

I nearly fall in the water I\u2019m so surprised.<\/span><\/p>\n

10:21 –\u00a0<\/span>I\u2019ve forgotten the guests. I\u2019ve forgotten the boats, I\u2019ve forgotten the pancakes I made this morning and the steaks I\u2019ll prepare tonight. I let my legs become water and my brain become fins and gills. I don\u2019t think about taking photographs or what I might write later. I let my Idaho body go back to the landscape I was born from. This is the twenty-eight minutes I need to be a good guide for the next 24 hours of this trip. The next cutthroat runs me downstream and I bring it back up the granite cliff, release it back into the creek and cast again.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n