Lost on the Big Lost
Sometime life throws us curve balls, and as all fly fisherman learn sooner or later, its simply part of life’s journey to develop a go with the flow mindset. How we stumbled upon the Big Lost river started with one of those curve ball moments and without this particular curve ball we most likely would not have discovered this special river and the adventure that unfolded.
After spending a month in Montana with my sister working tirelessly on our passion Project, (Addicted to the Fly) a women’s wellness program we founded and developed based around the education and community building for women and benefits of fly fishing, we were loading up our cars gearing up to drive south to meet our wild wild pal Terry to fish the wondrous Owyhee River. I will get to why we are called the wild wild west later on that in another adventure itself. Terry was back in Lodi California loading up her show horse Sugar Baby in a anticipation for the Best little derby in the West held in Nampa Idaho each May, which also happen to align with spring fishing on the Owyhee. For those of you not familiar with horses, this is one of the reining horse shows put on the the NRHA. Terry few years back originally discovered the Owyhee river as she took a break from the horse show and wandered into a local fly shop, she was given a hand drawn scribbled map which seemed to lead to nowhere , but trusted the wise old fly guys advise discovered raw beauty of the Owyhee river water as clean as gin filled with beautiful brown and rainbow trout. It had become tradition twice a year to fish this river during the horse show trips. I won’t go into much detail about the Owyhee just yet, I will save that for another Chapter. So back to life curveball, as Terry loads up her horse the vet check discovers some disabling hoof problems making Sugar Baby unable to show. So there is our curveball, the decision is to bail on the horse show and meeting us to fish or say the hell with it and go anyway? My sister and I are already in route a few days early traveling thru Yellowstone National Park to see the baby buffalo which are born in the spring my cell phone pings with a text for Terry, I have a issue I am not showing Sugar Baby! Where are you girls in route? Butte?Bozeman? I am going to fly in and intercept you wherever we can make it happen I need to fish !!! I can hear it in her voice she needed the peace of the river to calm the news about Sugar Baby and the river does that , it stops all time, lets the mind and soul rest and reset, river therapy is the perfect therapy. So after a few minutes looking at a map for a nearby airport along the way we settle one Twin Falls Idaho, within minutes Terry books a flight and hotel. Terry flies into Twin Falls Idaho and the plan was to pick her up and fish our way down to the Owhyee We had watched a short film and read about the many rivers which boast of colorful Browns, Brook Trout and Rainbows along HWY 12 which traveled from the Madison river area of Montana, down into Idaho and Oregon ending at the Owyhee River.
As sister and I travel down from the southwest entrance of Yellowstone park car camping along the way we had hoped to experience some epic fishing on these rivers, instead we experience nothing of the sort, the winter of 2023 continuing with its moody weather with snowfall hitting records highs in most of the Northern States and Tahoe, it was early May and the rivers were running high from the snow melt, the weather was blistering cold with the weather changing on a dime from rain, to snow and winds cut thru all the layers you could put on. That said we were unable to fish many of the rivers along the way that we had originally hoped to. In the previous days we had camped alongside the Yellowstone river, enjoying the peaceful glow of the moon along the riverside, a day filled with sightings of buffalo, black bear and watching the old faithful blow, even growing up in Montana the state is so vast you can never see it all, we had not been there since we were kids, and for us this was a special sister moment. As we head towards Henrys Fork the weather changes from rain to snow to wind, the rivers where muddy like chocolate milk or flowing fast or frozen over, but that’s the thing about fishing, its never solely about fishing or catching a fish it is about the journey and things you discover searching for the fish, and lets face it fish don’t live in ugly places. We discovered nearby hot springs and jetted off dirt side roads that may lead us to some sort of fishing opportunities, we never new we just saw something that looked interesting and turned off the road. People often think we live this glamorous life and by fly fishing standards we do, but lets be honest, we camp along riversides, cook hot dogs and beans on the banks, sometimes a fresh trout is caught and we decide to cook it over the fire, we drink beer and eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on our tail gates , its simple, not everyone gets it, but then again they have not experienced what we have, the epic adventure.
Lets get back to the Big Lost, River, we arrive in Twin Falls Idaho to the hotel early in the morning to pick up Terry , since we were car camping we looked like true wild wild west women, luckily after a few days of car camping, we stumble upon a hot springs and refreshed, its a wonder what a dip the natural hot springs, a few toilette’s a ball cap and hair bands can do. We grab a cup a coffee load up our wild wild west friend and off we got to meander our way down to the Owyhee. We travel a few hours and end up passing thru a town called the Atomic City, The Atomic city was named for the January 3, 1961 incident where a nuclear reactor the size of a small grain silo explode in the Idaho High Dessert, causing one of the only recorded nuclear fatalities on US soil. Atomic city is is in Bingham County Idaho population 41 . As you drive thru its like a ghost town, we stop to fuel up and grab a few breakfast burritos, gas station breakfast burritos are oftentimes the breakfast of champion for the wild wild west girls. As we head out Terry pulls up a map of local rivers and on the map she spots two rivers a few miles away named the Big Lost river and the Little Lost river, so decide to go take a look . As we drive down the next few miles on a unpaved road traveling through farmland and small towns consisting of two or three buildings we end up hitting the Big Lost river. We jump out of the car gear up, layer up and head towards the river as we walk along we see what appears to be Moose droppings. We obviously are in a highly populated moose trail as the dropping nearly covered the path. We all are diligent scanning the trails respecting the Moses habitat and being aware of the danger a Moose hold, especially with this being Spring baby season. We start our journey down the river talking and laughing and bush waking, as we come around a small opening I spot a large pool and decided to throw in my line, despite all the obsticals this hole held, trees overhead making the casting difficult, a huge down tree in the river, a steep bank and drop off making landing a fish level 3 challenge. Never the less I decided to throw in my line and as luck would have it I feel a strike as I start to navigate the fish in to the banks the hit and fight felt light so I yell to Terry I got now but its a small one, as she gets a visual sighting of the fish as it rolls she yells hell it is a small one its a big one, at the same time I see the size of the fish as rolls to the surface and starts to fight ,it jets down stream about 20’ jetting under tree branches and around tree trunks as the fly line get stuck on the tree trunk submersed in the water, I hell shit, I thought for sure the line would break off, as the fish goes quiet burying itself under the logs the three of us contemplate what to do next. The only way to land the fish is to untangle the fly line off the submerged log and give it enough slack to allow the fish to freely swim out without the fly coming out of his mouth, that’s why they always say tight lines, most often as soon as you allow slack the fish will get off. I could tell the fish was bright and beautiful and big, I say to myself I am not loosing this fish, it was a cut throat and the biggest I have ever caught to date so I was determined not to loose this one. So I do what looking back could have been a dangerous decision, I studied the river, the current the debris and obstructions , the depth of the water which were smooth, I quickly formulated and discussed the exit plan with Terry and my sister, If I was to fall in trying to untangle the line, I would swim to the other side of the river, the overall river width was maybe 20 feet. I new to tighten up my wader belt to ensure my waders would not fill up with water. I started pulling of my hat, removed my phone took everything out of my wader pockets, tightened by wader belt, Things were flying off my body as I striped down in preparation for the worst case scenario of falling in, I then I handed my sister the rod who was standing on the upper bank, I jumped down the bank which was approximately 6 feet steep , I position myself against the log in the water that the fly line was wrapped around stepped into the water to reach over and tangle the fly line, Terry was standing in the river close to the edge of water drop off with the net ready. Just as I lean over to untangle the line my sister yells the fish was on the run , it had by some stroke of luck untangled itself from the log, she handed me back the rod, I navigate into the river to the edge of the drop off behind Terry. Stretching my arm and rod as far out and and upstream away from the log and begin to reel the fish in, Terry nets it, we scream like little girls, high five and then all stand there for a moment in amazement of what we just experienced, all our hearts were pumping, we shared the excitement and the reward. As we all stand gazing at the beautiful cutthroat we realize the old saying it takes a village also can relate to bringing it a fish working around many obstacles as a team, it took team work to land this one safely. The rest of the day we walked miles of river banks, experienced many hunger rising fish and beautiful runs , as get back to the car we open the trunk grab the peanut butter and jelly make a few sandwiches grab a beer and lay on the ground laughing and talk ing about the epic. The day we got lost on the Big Lost river. May 2023
Tight Lines until next time
Zina & Sunny
