Friday, June 19
Tolstoy has famously said that every happy familiy is happy in the same way, but every unhappy family is unhappy in different ways.
Tolstoy wrote about unhappy families because they were more interesting. Besides, he knew no one wanted to read books about boring, happy people.
It's the same with fishing stories. The best tales are the ones about adversity. The big storm. The day you forgot your rod and the guide showed up drunk. The trip where you went over the waterfall trying to get away from the bear that ate all your food for the week.
Those are the trips people like to hear about. They're funny, gripping, and entertaining. The trips when where everything went right? Booorrrring.
So today was beautiful--sharp and clear with hardly a cloud in the sky and the lightest little breeze. We flew to a placid lake of surpassing beauty surrounded by rugged mountains. Then we hiked just over a mile on a forested trail that bordered an intimate stream flowing gently with water clearer than the air itself. Wildflowers were in bloom: bluebells, wild rose, cow parsnip, and many more.
Then we fished for grayling, whose irridescent turquoise flashes betrayed their presense and their preference for sockeye fry. And then we caught a bunch of them. It was a perfect day in every way, and a great end to this part of our Alaska trip.
You really want to hear more? I didn't think so.
Chad Hewitt takes off in the Beaver after dropping us and our gear at the headwaters lake.
Grayling.
Mrs. Fuzzy, under the watchful eye of guide Jon Streeter, presents a fry pattern to the grayling.
Wildflowers were in bloom along the river.
Guide Jon Streeter holds a grayling caught by Uncle Fuzzy on the Kijik.
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