It's Not Always About The Fishing

[Al Agnew]

My old friend Clyde called me the other day. We've known each other since I was a college student and he owned an outdoor equipment store in Cape, and we've had a lot of adventures over the years, but as time goes by, it seems like we get together less. It had been several years since we'd gone on a float together. He was calling to invite me on a three day trip on Current River with his friend and former business partner Monty, who I knew but had not seen in many years.

Monty lives near the river close to Van Buren, but wanted to go somewhere a lot farther upstream, specifically from Cedargrove to Round Spring. The funny thing was that I'd just been talking with my wife about floating the stretch from Akers to Round Spring, since it had been many years since I'd been on that stretch. It is probably the worst stretch of fishing water on the Current, and is always a zoo in the summer, so I'd avoided it for so long that I'd decided it was time I just floated it and saw it again. Actually, it had also been many years since I'd floated the Cedargrove to Akers stretch.

I jumped at the chance to go, and I met Clyde at his house Thursday morning for the drive over to Round Spring, where we were to meet Monty at noon. Monty's wife would ride up to Cedargrove with us and bring Clyde's truck back down to Round Spring, so it would be waiting for us at the end of the trip.

Clyde and I arrived at Round Spring ten minutes early. No Monty. We waited until 12:30. Still no Monty. And then I happened to look at a map of Round Spring on the bulletin board, and noticed that there were three accesses, two downstream from the bridge and one upstream. We'd come up from the south, and had stopped at the first access we came to. We immediately figured that Monty had gone to the other access. Sure enough, just as we left our access to drive over to the other one to check, Monty was driving over to our access to check.

So after that comedy of errors, we finally were on our way to Cedargrove. We put in the three solo boats, loaded up our gear, said goodbye to Monty's wife, and were on the river.

I had a different mindset than usual for this float. It's 26 miles and the fishing is questionable, so I wasn't really planning on concentrating on trying to catch fish. I threw in a fly rod, a spinning rod, and a casting rod, along with my fly selection and my usual tackle box, but I knew there wouldn't be time enough to stop and fly fish very much, and the bass fishing was probably going to be very tough. Besides, while Clyde does fish--I turned him on to fishing many years ago--I was pretty sure Monty wouldn't evne be bringing a rod. No, this trip was about simply experiencing a gorgeous section of river during the off season when we weren't likely to encounter other people, and to spend time with friends.

I didn't even rig up the fly rod as we started. I figured I'd just use a suspending jerkbait on the casting rod and see if there were any smallmouth, and if the trout would take it. In the first good pool, a swarm of stocker trout flashed around at the lure, but they just didn't have to moxie to take it. That was the way things would go with the trout. There were really a lot of trout in the deeper pools, and they would come out after the lure, but wouldn't take it. I did end up catching one nice rainbow that first afternoon, a largemouth, and a couple of chain pickerel. But all too soon the sun was going down and it was time to stop and set up camp.

That can be a problem with winter overnight floats; there simply isn't enough daylight. It was a little before 4 PM when we stopped, just 2.5 miles below Cedargrove, and by the time we set up the tents and got the cooking gear ready to fix supper, it was nearly dark. We had decided we would each be responsible for our own meals, with no communal kitchens, and Mary had made me a big pot of chicken and dumplings and vacuum bagged it for two meals. All I had to do was dump a bag in the pot, turn on my old Coleman "backpacking" stove (definitely NOT a good backpacking stove, the Peak I is still a great stove for float trips), and in less than five minutes the dumplings were hot. Clyde called it my "Coleman microwave", because he had a smaller stove and a bigger pot and was fixing a meal that required boiling water first and then simmering the freeze-dried meal in the water.

It had been a cool but pleasant afternoon, but after the sun set the temperature began dropping precipitously. The campsite we'd chosen was apparently a popular one, with no firewood evident, so we didn't build a fire. We just sat on the gravel bar, talking and catching up on years of absence with each other. After a long period of conversation while continually adding more layers of clothing as the almost full moon rose and made the gravel bar shine brightly, we finally decided it was time to hit the sack. And then somebody looked at the time on their cell phone, and it was 7:30! That's the flip side of the problem with winter overnighters; the nights are LONG. Oh well, I'd brought along a book to read.

We all had good sleeping bags and pads. Clyde and I had down bags and inflatable down air mattresses. This was the first time I'd used mine; we'd actually bought it for Mary when she went to Peru. It was SWEET! I was toasty warm all night, with only the top of my head exposed, and I was wearing a sock cap to keep it warm.

We arose at daylight, with frost on everything and the moon just setting. The Coleman microwave heated a pot of water in a few minutes, and a steaming mug of hot tea kept my innards warm. The sun rose, the frost began to melt off the tent, and we packed up and were on the river by about 8 AM.

We knew we had a lot of river to cover, so we kept moving, but we certainly didn't paddle hard. The river was low and extremely clear, and we could tell the trout were thinning out as we made our way toward Akers. I saw a few smallmouth, including one of about 18 inches that chased my jerkbait but didn't take it. A few holes farther downstream, I finally caught the best smallmouth of the trip, a 16 incher. When we came to Welch Spring, I caught a 12 incher out of the mouth of the spring. We stopped there and wandered up to the old rock sanitarium building just above the spring outlet. And then it was back on the river, where I finally rigged up the fly rod and stopped at a riffle, and caught one 14 inch trout. Back in the canoe, the jerkbait fooled a couple more pickerel.

In the big pool right above Akers, we encoutered a canoe with a couple in it fishing, who had put in at the Akers access. They would be the only people we would see on the river the whole trip. Eagles kept us company, along with a few herons and one flock of turkeys.

Once we passed Akers, the fishing totally died. There simply aren't many fish between Akers and Pulltite, of any species. I believe I caught one little largemouth and two more pickerel in that stretch as the afternoon quickly passed. We were just drifting in the current, occasionally making a few paddle strokes for course corrections or to maneuver through riffles, lazily floating down the river, sometimes talking, sometimes silently gazing at the scenery. We paddled up into the cave at Cave Spring, where Clyde told of diving with a waterproof flashlight while holding big rocks to take him down as far as he could hold his breath. We stopped at a couple other caves. I desultorily tried fishing at most of the deepest pools.

We'd planned to make it just past Pulltite before camping for the night, but the sun was sinking fast when we came to a beautiful gravel bar campsite a mile or so above Pulltite, so we stopped there.

My second bag of dumplings made another great meal on the Coleman microwave. After supper, we watched the moon rise behind the gravel bar, lighting the bluff across the river, while I gradually finished off the flask of Glenlivet I'd brought along and Clyde and Monty drained their rations of alcohol. Somehow, imbibing spirits fermenti brings out political discussions, which were friendly because we are all of the same general political persuasion anyway. It was a warmer night, and we made it to almost 8 PM before retreating to the tents.

Saturday morning dawned definitely warmer than the morning before, with hazy skies and a bit of wind, which had been entirely lacking on Thursday and Friday. Breakfast and breaking camp was leisurely, but the sun was still barely over the bluff downstream as we swung into the current. We soon passed Pulltite, opting not to hike up to Pulltite Spring. Where Fire Hydrant Spring came into the river just below, I attracted several smallish smallmouth and a very big pickerel, none of which actually got themselves hooked. The fishing was not going to pick up much; in fact, the fishing highlight of the day was in the pool across from the old Alton Club, now a state park area, where I caught a nice 15 inch largemouth and two other largemouth that were considerably smaller. A few more pickerel throughout the day, and one lone smallmouth, was the extent of our catching.

Again, it was a leisurely drift. I commented near the take-out that this was certainly not aerobic exercise. None of us ever made a really hard paddle stroke the whole trip. The riffles were easy, the pools moving even it the low water, and the wind, though significant this day, was not really strong enough to counteract the current. And even with never trying to move fast down the river, we reached Round Spring about 1 PM.

All in all, I can't think of a much better way to spend three fine days at the end of November. Great weather, beautiful water, and good friends. It didn't matter that the fishing, such as it was, was so slow. That wasn't the point.

[LittleRedFisherman]

As always, I enjoyed reading your detailed reports! Sounds like a great time to me. I would love to do that someday, floating a long stretch of river like that.

[Guest]

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[ColdWaterFshr]

Good report, Al. Fishing doesn't always have to be stellar when you have good friends along and great scenery.

[Gavin]

Sounds like a great time and awesome write up! Great stretch to float...but no firewood unless you bring a saw...

[Greasy B]

Your right Al, it's often more about the place and the people. I realized this some time ago when I stopped fishing alone so much.

[Born to Fish]

The beauty of the upper Current always makes it special! Great post;I can see it and smell it!!

[joeD]

Loved reading your report Al. Really. Take a step back and see what you did. Three days on a beautiful stream in your home state, with friends. Doing what you love. We are lucky beyond belief to be able to do these things.

But really. 7:30 or 8:00 pm? Lights out? Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Youth is wasted on the young.