Boeing IAM votes to strike.

AM, GK & AB after a continental breakfast, are off to the Elk River Fly Shop to pick up another one-day $21. 00 Conservation license joined shortly after by JR & MS. Another round of replenishing our fly boxes with Beetles, Blue Wing Olives, Comparaduns & Hoppers, then a quick stop at Subway for lunchtime sandwiches. Were off to Stream X. Along the way, JR says he met the couple from Pasadena, their trip to the Wigwam was spectacular! Lots of huge Cutthroat and Bull Trout to 15 lbs!

Reaching Stream X in an area lower than we’d fished before, AM, AB & GK park at a pullout. JR & MS drive upstream. The plan is JR & MS will fish down to the AM van. AM, AB & GK will fish downstream. We’ll all stay in radio contact and when it’s time to leave JR will pick up the AM group a mile or so downstream and return to the van. Good plan….until the JR / MS team was no longer in radio range??

AB suspected the team returned to the spot upstream where JR had lost the huge fish two days earlier. Later we were to find out that’s exactly what they’d done. JR approached the same rock, with the same Royal Stimulator fly, except this time with an 8-pound tippet. He made a cast above the rock, the fly swung alongside the rock and drifted down the seam. SMACK!! A tremendous strike and the battle was on. MS netted the huge Westslope Cutthroat, estimated at 4 lbs! As JR shaking, gazed at the fish in the net he thought he was seeing double. The fish had two flies in his lip, two Royal Stimulators! JR had caught the same fish that had broken off two days earlier!! A few great pictures and the monster was slipped back into his pool. An awesome fish of a lifetime!

JR with Fish of a Lifetime!

Monster Fish!!

and it came from this little stretch of stream!!

Then it was MS’s turn. Mike caught several nice fish then ran into a 3 pounder!! Another awesome catch.

and the good fishing continues!

and continues more!

Meanwhile the downstream team is having fair luck until both AM & AB spot a Blue Wing Olive hatch coming off the river. AM and AB change flies to size 14 –16 Blue Wing Olive. The fish start feeding, you can see 3 and 4 fish in the air at any one time. The BWO imitations are just the ticket, AM & AB start catching fish on nearly every cast. AM has caught several large fish including one of the 3+ pound lunkers.  AB casts to the midpoint of a long pool, the fly is making a perfect dead-drift down the seam when a very large trout raises his head and slurps the fly. AB set the hook and the trout raced upstream right into the branches of a fallen pine. I swear the fish knew exactly where to go to break off the line. Oh no! He’s a gonner. AB put tension on the line to no avail, then gave the fish it’s head, that didn’t work either. Then I laid the fly line in the water using the current to put a bow in the line to try to pull him out of the tree. It worked, I was amazed, I’d actually gotten the fish out of four feet of heavily branched pine tree without breaking my 4# IGFA tippet. The fish turned and ran downstream, over a shallow rapids into the pool below. A few more attempts using the fly line bowing downstream method moved the large fish out of the current and into netting range. MS had heard my radio appeals and was manning the net. I was glad, I needed help with this fish. I made five attempts to bring the fish to the net, each time he would have nothing to do with it. On the sixth attempt, the large 3-1/2+ pound brightly colored, hooked-nosed buck Westslope Cutthroat slid across the rim of my net, he barely fit in the large Orvis Catch & Release net. Wow! What a fish!! GK took a couple quick photos and the fish slipped back into the hole. This stream is incredible….I can not believe the number and size of these fish!

AM drops down the river, we’re almost giddy with the size and number of fish we’ve caught. We decide to quit fishing and concentrate on coaching GK into a few of these fish. AM spends an hour with GK, while AB scouts downstream opportunities for GK. After a few misses GK gets the fly presentation, the dead-drift & strike down pat and starts catching fish.

GK continues to catch fish as AB & AM head downstream to new water where they catch several more above average Cutty’s.

We’re no more than a ¼ mile from where we started fishing. JR & MS call on the radio. "How’s fishing you guys?" What can you say after a day like this?

We told JR/MS to fish at the holes at the end of the trail from the van. Meanwhile three anglers came upstream to the hole being fished by AM/AB. We decided to start heading back to the van. We asked the three angler how the day’s fishing had been. They said that they’d had a good period earlier in the morning, but not much since. They’d quit fishing and were headed back to the road. We share the fly patterns we’d been using with them and encouraged them to try a few holes on the way back to the road. One fellow fished a hole that we’d caught several large fish in an hour earlier, he was having no luck when AM asked if he could make a cast. Sure, give it a try. AM’s first cast produced a nice 2+ pound Cutt. AM brought the fish thru the hole, AB landed it & took a picture. The other angler was just standing there staring. We left and wished him good luck.

A couple pools ahead we ran into the other two in their party. We suggested they try another pool where we’d caught fish earlier in the day. AM & AB moved to the pool above them. Within a couple casts AM & AB had a double-header, both beautiful fish. We moved on.

GK was still catching fish in the pool where we’d left him.

We all headed back to the van, exhausted from a great day of fishing Stream X. This was a magical place this day – it had to be experienced to be believed – hell, I experienced and didn’t believe it – it was that good. To give an idea how good it was, we started talking about this secret stream (which had every spot taken by a car or truck?) and how we were concerned about abusing the resource – fishing was too good – would the YG be the destruction of this world class fishery? Not likely but it felt good to be able to talk that way due to our prodigious fishing capabilities!

We left the stream at 5:30PM after eating our Subway sandwiches. Back at the hotel we all went to the Elk River behind the hotel. All caught fish with AB / AM staying until dark and picking up a couple 16"+ Cutts, AM on an green/tan emerger and AB on a single tungsten Prince Nymph sunk into a deep hole and fished without an indicator. As AM & AB emerged from the stream, we found ourselves under a sign that said "Welcome to Fernie" with an arrow pointing toward the river, almost like our fishing hole had a huge billboard advertising it.