There’s a First Time for Everything

It’s been said that guides have a shelf life…

By Jonathan Lee Wright

There’s been a lot written about the craft of guiding fly anglers, mostly by guides explaining technical nuances with an inferred authority that translates into bookings, or later in life, book sales. This isn’t inappropriate, really, as guiding is a business and that needs tending to. But if you’ve done any amount of it, you begin to realize your motivations for staying involved in the profession change, and often a bigger picture begins to emerge.

I’ve had the privilege of spending a dozen years guiding in and around a major national park in Colorado, usually running between 100 and 125 days a season. This translates into thousands of clients, the large majority of which were Never Evers who hadn’t even touched a fly rod, though some had experience with spin fishing or hunting. None were acclimated to the altitude, not their fault, but it’s something you needed to take into consideration. There were several other guide services in town as well, and during peak season things could get hectic.

You don’t remember the details of every day at any job (certainly sitting in a cube, which I’ve also done), but even when working with the public, flying on autopilot is sometimes necessary. Having a concise, rote orientation talk for newbies will save you from headaches you later realize are completely your fault, because you didn’t explain something fundamental, like: “When wading in fast current, jam your boots between the rocks, and don’t try to balance on top of them.” It’s actually hard to efficiently cover all the basics in this sport when people are champing at the bit to get on the water.

We get into this gig for a lot of reasons. Mostly, it’s because we’ve had a serious jones to go fly fishing our whole lives, and developed an equal distaste for most other employment. Some come out of teaching backgrounds, and this serves them and the sport well. Quite a few have hit the eject button on sales and customer service careers, which brings another whole skillset. Some, like me, are science geeks and like to talk about that in the context of the outdoors. And some guides, I’m convinced, just like talking. A few even own fly shops.

For the most part, it’s glorious work, and while I’m partial to the experience and environments involved in fishing for trout in the American West, it’s all pretty good, really. Years go by, and you find that maybe you’re not only disinclined to do something else, you’re not even equipped. It’s been said that guides have a shelf life, and you definitely start to feel it. Medical issues creep in–blown knees, scorched retinas, melanomas and organ mutinies take their toll. With enough time on the water, you will witness Acts of God as well. I’ve seen boulders the size of automobiles shot a hundred feet out of a hanging side canyon by an unseen cloudburst miles away. Thirty foot logs sweeping downstream out of nowhere towards clients under a clear blue sky. Rearview mirrors missing faces by inches from drivers crossing the white line by feet, or surprising a cow moose with calves bedded down in open sagebrush. It can give you the willies.

Then, just when you start to question yourself, someone (a client) walks in the door that sets you straight again…

The Andersen twins were home schooled on a farm in the Midwest, and had never fished for trout. Their dad had bought the brothers a trip for their tenth birthdays, and they advised me that not only could they already drive a tractor, they could work on one, so I didn’t need to “baby” them. While I gave streamside instruction, they politely apologized for interrupting me to ask startlingly intelligent questions about the stream bugs I found, and the nymphs in my box that we were to imitate them with. After working with one brother for a first fishless hour, I found the other taking a break and looking at the underside of a stone he had pulled out of the water. He then asked to see my box, requested a fly change and proceeded to catch a healthy rainbow trout. I never neglected to show my boxes to a client after that.

Philip and his grown daughter had booked a morning trip. In his late 60s, I was told he had been in a bad car accident, and they were wanting to celebrate the recovery from his injuries. He was pleasant, if strangely distracted, and I helped him with his gear for the day. After getting them both set up on a run, his daughter seemed pretty capable, so I shifted my attention to Philip. He was a little unfocused, and I stood by closely until he got his feet under himself. To my surprise, the daughter connected on her own, and I disengaged to bring over the net. On returning to work with Philip, I discovered him wandering streamside, looking at clouds overhead, seemingly content. I eventually got him onto a couple fish too, but it was work keeping him on task. Back at the shop, I asked the daughter how the recuperation from his head injury was going, and she replied, “Head injury? What? Oh, no–he broke his legs in the accident. He’s an astrophysicist, he’s just like that…”

Chris was every bit of four hundred pounds. He had come in the shop with a group of twenty other anglers, and the party was being divvied up with the guide crew. Some of the clients were already gravitating in conversation to the other guides when Chris asked the group, dejectedly, “Who gets me?” There was an uncomfortable pause. This wasn’t float fishing, and our area was blessed to have steep cold water with uneven footing. I stepped up and introduced myself, and blowing off rental waders, since it was a warm day, we just laced up some felt-soled boots and headed out the door before everybody else. Chris brightened considerably when he saw I was driving a ratty diesel Suburban with a barn door and front seat like a sofa. After arriving at the river, we carefully navigated what banks and cobbles I thought he could handle, leaning on each other before getting positioned on an easy drift with shallow wading. As it turned out, Chris was a professional chef, and wanted to learn how to catch the trout he served to his customers, closing a circle for himself. We talked about fillets, poaching in herb butters and what parts of the Mediterranean produced the best capers. He caught one fish in the only place we got to that morning. Chris hooked it fair and square, and gently let it go. He was happy.

Tom showed up in a converted Astrovan, with a simple bunk in the back and a dozen rods underneath. Having taken an early retirement after they had scooped out a significant portion of his brain, due to cancer, he was now on an extended road trip to try and catch the state fish of every member of the union, in our case, a very pretty subspecies of cutthroat. He was still quite capable as an angler, having fished his whole life, but moving current was throwing off his balance. He really just needed someone to point him at the fish, and steady him wading. After arriving at a trailhead in the national park, we made our way up a mile-and-a-half of moderate hiking, with Tom in the lead using trekking poles and me humping the waders and lunch in a big dry bag. I knew the stream held cutts up near the end of the canyon, along with three other species as well, so a catch-and-release Grand Slam was always a possibility. On the water, he was a hot stick and had taken more than a dozen ‘bows, brookies and browns on his barbless dries, but still no cutthroat. I was getting a little worried. So far, he had asked me to just lay a hand on his left shoulder when we were standing midcurrent, and this was enough for him to center his balance. At the very end of the canyon, there was a section of large boulders before the stream wound into tighter cover, with harder going. Tom tucked in behind the first large rock, and leaned forward over it with his left hand propping him up. I backed off. The soft water behind the next boulder up was an easy shot, Tom executed perfectly, and a cutthroat obliged. A nice one, too. After some photos in wet hands, I congratulated him on his fish and his Slam, and I said we would probably really get into them now. Tom looked at the forest ahead, looked back at me, and said, “Mission accomplished.” We took our time walking out.

There’s a first time for everything. We owe it to you, the committed clients, to make that mean something, and in the process, take us beyond our habituated routines and outside of ourselves.

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Jonathan Lee Wright has been a mountain guide, photographer and journalist for most of his professional life. Growing up fighting the wind in southern Wyoming, he learned to fish and hunt by cultural default.” Read more of his work at Muck Rack.