After crossing the stream below my chosen spot- a deep pool with a very short run in a bend, overhung with willows pool, I lamented the fact that there were no fish moving. "Bl*%&^y river has been stripped bare" I thought as I unzipped my fly for an early morning leak.
Just as I hit mid-stream (yet still standing on the bank), I noticed movement up in the head of the pool right on the edge....a light brown shape slipping slowly sideways, and then a snout eagerly broke the surface. Fate is a funny thing, if I hadn't been busting for a spritz, I would have once again walked straight past a decent fish, simply for a lack of patience.
I quickly got sorted out, tied on a size 16 'Dads Favourite' and backed off a little, before entering the river directly down stream. As I got into position, and began to strip out some line, the rainbow swirled and whirled downstream surfacing every couple of seconds. these were not small gentle dimpled rises, but she was fair poking her head right out of the water and slopping back under again.
The hardest thing about this trout was that she was absolutely all over the pool, at one stage a couple of meters to my left and only a metre or so upstream. Luckily she seemed so utterly preoccupied with the beetles that were constantly drifting her way, that she didn't notice the 6'4" tree standing in the middle of the river wearing a fishing vest. After she worked her way back into the middle of the pool, I chucked a couple of horrific casts, before she swung downstream after my fly, and gulped it just as the line started to drag through the water. A solid hook up was achieved as I lifted my rod, and we were on.
The Twizel river is only a few meters wide as it exits this pool, and there are probably 70 metres of rapids downstream, interspersed with overhanging willow and plenty of other snags to lose a fish in, so I was keen to keep the fish in the pool. Keen that is, until two more fish swung out of the depths and started feeding as soon as the hooked fish left it's prime spot. Still aiming to keep her upstream, but out of the pool, I let her come back into the rapids. The plan went horribly wrong, and she shot off downstream. Reel screaming, I lunged for the bank and charged off downstream after her, narrowly avoiding snagging the line in one of the willows on the true right bank.
The lively rainbow stabilised in the rapid in a slightly quieter spot, and I managed to get control of the amount of line she'd stripped in the one furious run. Five minutes of negotiation to get her into the shallow slower water without anymore downstream sorties, saw her finally netted. Time for a couple of quick photos before letting her go, sneaking home for a shower and trudging off to work.
