When we first reached the river, the bottom was pure sand. We kept walking. The current picked up as we walked north, but didn’t reach the depths we hoped for. So we walked.
Following the bank of the White River within the Manistee National Forest is not easy. Thickets abound. Grass, thistle and wildflowers grow shoulder high. Fallen trees pushed us out of sight from the river, following a deer path into the woods. When the path looked obstructed, we decided to cross the river.
A fallen cedar stradled the river, its roots buried in the bank on our side, the broken top of the tree resting on the other. McClusky went first, Kenagy followed, the only problem being a three-inch limb pointed straight up to the sky. Kenagy held the limb at chest-height to swing wide. It snapped. He fell. Ten minutes later, we were no closer to good fishing water.
Trout fishing in late July is no easy thing. We did not want to handicap ourselves by fishing bad water. We turned around and walked thirty minutes back to the vehicle. At 9:00 p.m., we found good water.
I had fished the spot two weekends ago by chance. I was driving home after searching Cushman Creek for a good fishing spot and finding none. I decided to do some hiking instead. Twenty minutes into the forest, I heard water. I walked downhill and found a stumbled upon The Spot. I spent half an hour casting dry flies to no particular fish and went home, happy to have found a clear enough place to overhead cast.
When the three of us returned, we pushed further downstream. The sun was setting, but the tree tops devoured any sunlight before it reached the water. We found our hole at 9:30. McClusky dropped his line in while Kenagy and I walked upstream. A minute later, he hit. “I got one.” A minute after, Kenagy followed. “I got one!”For the next half hour, nibbles and stolen bait were almost constant – as were snags in our line from fishing over the same water.
By 10:00 p.m. we couldn’t see our hands. And we still had to walk upstream, cross the river and hike back to the car. We left my house at 6:40 p.m. and returned at 11:00. Our lines were in the water for just over half an hour. Our reward was one 11” Rainbow, one under-sized Rainbow (released), one sucker fish (released) and dozens of bites.
Kenagy and McClusky returned to Holland while I went to bed. I tried to sleep, but had trouble. I kept thinking of my cast, the places to hit when I came back the next day (joined by McClusky and Kenagy). When I did finally sleep, my dreams were filled with Browns, Brooks and Rainbows waiting in the deep for a streamer or nymph to come tumbling over the river bed.