Ahhh, what a day to be out on the stream.
I spent yesterday up in the San Luis valley, fishing a stream called Culebra Creek in the shadow Culebra Peak, the southernmost of Colorado's fourteen thousand foot mountains. The aspens were pure gold in color, the air crisp and clean.
They call this the "Mysterious Valley" for all the strange happenings that occur in the area. The San Luis valley is the largest alpine valley in the world, flanked by the Sangre de Cristo mountains to the east, and the San Juan mountains to the west. It's known for it's hay, potatoes, cattle mutilations, and UFO sightings.
I was working one stretch of water with a gray wulff dry fly and a gold ribbed hares ear nymph. I was having very little luck, lazily making my way upstream. It was such a beautiful day though, that I didn't much mind the lack of catching.
That's where I first saw him about fifty yards downstream from me.
Now, this is pretty much a hard working, agricultural region. Most of the people you run into on the stream are either using spinning gear, or if they are fly fishing, using rather low end equipment. But this guy was outfitted to the nines. He had the best of everything. Burgundy red goretex waders, an immaculate charcoal colored vest that appeared to be pressed, a rod and reel the likes of which I had never seen.
I stopped fishing, and just watched in awe as this guy made his way upstream towards me. He took five fish in the run I had just covered, all on the surface. The largest looked to be about eighteen inches. You could fish your whole life on this stream and be lucky to take an eighteen inch fish, and this guy nabbed one in broad daylight, right off the surface.
"How's it going?" I asked as he approached.
"Oh, fair I guess" he replied. His voice was really gravelly; like he'd been smoking for many years more than his age would tell.
"Only fair?" I said. "Seems like you're doing pretty darned good to me."
At this point, I finally got a good look at his rod and reel. These were both incredible pieces of work. The reel appeared to be platinum if you can believe that. The rod was a 6 weight. A red hued, bamboo, 6' 6" small stream special. I said that I'd never seen a rod and reel like that before.
"Custom job" he said. "I have a guy that makes them for me. Would you like to try it out?"
"I...I...I'm afraid I might damage it"
"Don't even worry about that," he said. "I've got several more just like it."
He pushed the rod at me, and I took it from his hand. It was as light as a feather. If I didn't have my hand wrapped around the finest cork grip I'd ever seen, I wouldn't even have known it was there. And here is what was really strange. As I admired this piece of fine workmanship, and positioned my hand up and down the grip, the outfit remained balanced. No matter what point on the grip my hand was at, it remained in balance. Very strange.
"Cast it" he said. As if he were commanding me to do it.
Wanting to prove my manhood, I stripped out some more line. I threw my back cast, and due the unusually light weight of the rod, it was a horrible backcast. I knew once I started forward, the line would be puddled at my feet and I would be totally embarrassed. But when I brought that rod forward, it shot every bit of line I had stripped out. I thought to myself that this was physically impossible, but at least I didn't look goofy.
No sooner had the fly hit the water when it was engulfed in a large swirl. I set the hook and could immediately tell I was into a good sized fish. The rod flexed perfectly and played the fish like a dream. As the fish headed for a log jam, the silky smooth drag on that custom reel turned this large fish just in time. Not once, but three times! I hardly had to work at all. Finally the fish succumbed and I brought a gorgeous seventeen inch Rio Grande cutthroat trout to hand. Easily the biggest fish I had ever taken on this little creek. Heck, that was the largest Rio Grande cutthroat I ever caught.
I grabbed my hemostats and dislodged the fly from the corner of his mouth. I held this big buck in the current for few seconds to regain himself, and he calmly swam away. The fly was still in my hemostats, so I carefully looked it over hoping to pick up a new pattern. This was like no fly I'd ever seen before. It was completely iridescent. The body looked like peacock herl, but was smooth as silk. It was like some kind of crystal flash, but there were no seams from any wraps. The wings and hackle were also strikingly iridescent. They looked like they came from a raven maybe. Very strange pattern indeed.
"This is a very unusual fly" I said. "Would you possibly be kind enough to share the pattern with me?"
"Better than that" he replied, "I'll give you one for your own."
He pulled a fly off of his drying patch and dropped it in the palm of my hand. When the fly touched my skin, there was an eerie burning sensation. My hand recoiled and the fly dropped to the water. As the fly started to wash downstream, this kindly stranger turned and bent over to recover it.
That's when I saw it.
When he bent down to nab that fly, a tail - YES a tail, popped out of the rear end of his waders. I'm not talking about a stub here. I mean a full blown two foot long tail.
"AAAHHHHH" I screamed, "IT'S OLD SCRATCH."
Yes indeed. This kindly fisherman was not kindly at all. It was Beelzebub. I was fishing with the Devil himself.
I picked up my rod and ran - ran like the wind. Let me tell you something. I've never run so fast in my life. How I managed to hold on to my fly rod is beyond me. I bet I made the half mile back to my car in under three minutes. We're not talking on a track here, I was running through brush, trees and undergrowth the whole way.
As I approached the car, I pulled my rod apart without even removing the fly or reeling in the line. I opened the door and threw the rod on the back seat. When I peeled out, I burned so much rubber I could still smell it ten miles down the road. I don't think my foot hit the brake even once until I made it to Questa. That's where I finally pulled over to change out of my waders.
Let me tell you one thing. I'm going to stick to fishing the San Juan river for a while. A place with lots of other people around.
Happy Halloween!!!
DISCLAIMER: The above story is fiction. Any references that include me, fishing AND catching are certainly pure fantasy. "Old Scratch" tends to turn up in the taverns of Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado during lent. So, fishing in the Sangre de Cristo mountains during the fall should be pretty safe.
Or is it?.....
