As you drive into New Zealand's jewel, Milford Sound, you head up the Eglington River. It's a river of spectaculr beauty as it meanders, brades and dances its way out of Fjordland. For thirty eight years I have longed to fish that beauty but I have heard it is tough to find its fish, only has a couple of fish per mile, and heck, we have always been in a hurry to get to or from Milford so I have never fished it. Until Yesterday.
Sheryl and Meghan were heading into Milford as the weather was finally going to be sunny (it was). That meant Ty and I had time to go fishing. We considered the Oreti again but somehow decided the Eglington would be the target of the day. We stopped a couple of places and tried the water but it didn't have the kind of flow we like to fish so we kept moving. Finally we found a stretch where we had to hike about a km to get to the river and we thought it might be a better choice. We hiked in and were disgusted to find a guide had driven in (illegeally) and was fishing a couple of clients where we wanted to be. Drat! Soon they left and we went to fish The Hole. While I fished Ty went exploring and came running back breathlessly with the news he had spotted a big rainbow up the river. Excitement. Soon we were crawling, commando style, up to the riverbank and sure enough this big redside was cruising around feeding like crazy. We were both intoxicated with excitement as Ty geared up and I lay in the grass as the spotter. Soon he was casting up there to the cruising fish but could not entice it to take a dry. As it was feeding on everthing coming down the river he decided to try his hare and copper nymph which is way too small for me to see from up on the bank. After a few casts where the fish showed no interest Ty shot his cast up the river and it came down toward the fish. As I was watching it closely I was amazed to see this big fish start yawning, or chomping rapidly. It was just so odd. Finally it hit me that the fish had taken his nymph and was trying to shake it loose so I screamed at Ty, he lifted his rod and the battle began. What fun. Father and son chasing this thing around the river handing the net back and forth, leading it into the rocks, then up stream, then down, it was a real circus. It got within reach and we could see it was five pounds plus but finally the hook pulled loose, Ty let out an unearthly groan and it was gone.
That's fishing.
So here we go again as we sneak along the bank doing what is called sight fishing. Ty has become pretty good at recognizing which gray smudges in the river are fish.
Within 100 yards he found another and here we go again. This one is a brown and it is NOT feeding so chances are slim, but ohmygod on about his fifth cast it races over grabs his fly and this time we wrestle the 4 pound beauty into the net. High Fives all around. WE had caught this fish as I had been guiding his casts, being the spotter.
Next it was my turn and sure enough within another 100 yards he spots another big brown and Dad heads to the water while Ty plays the spotter role. I was just about to give up after making a lot of casts when down goes my indicator, up goes my rod and we are both screaming all over the river. The brownie is off with us in hot pursuit. He seemed well hooked so we coaxed him down river to the shallows but I couldn't net him, Ty couldn't net him, he was back and forth, up, down, all over the place when finally Ty lunged into the river and simply grabbed him by the tail. BINGO! Whoopin' hollerin' huggin' smiles all around.
Sight fishing with my son was as good as it gets. it was just SOOOOOOO much fun. I think it was the best fishing trip of my life. The only thing that could have made it better would have been if Andy had been there too. Maybe someday.
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