Meandering Angler: Steve ‘Kyled’ himself

Note: Steve Kyle, my friend and sometimes fishing partner, returned this week from a five-day adventure fly-fishing for king salmon on the Kitmat River in British Columbia. He sent me his typical lengthy report, which I’ve done my best to squeeze into the space of this column. Here, in Steve’s words (with some editing), is that report.

Years ago, I talked my fishing buddy, Les Vadasz, into joining me on a steelhead trip to the Sustat River, a legendary, but remote, piece of pristine water carving its way through the middle of British Columbia. We flew Air Canada from San Francisco to Vancouver, BC, caught a smaller plane to Smithers, and an even smaller bush plane to the lodge, which sits just a few yards from the river. We looked out and instead of a clear, blue mountain stream, we saw a highway-sized ribbon as dark as chocolate milk. A landslide up river from the lodge the day before we arrived dumped a mountainside of dirt, trees, rocks and stumps into the water.

After three days of swinging flies through this muddy mess, we went home.

Les was a good sport about it, but that was not the only fishing trip that went south with the two of us.

A few years later in mid February Les and I (and Bill Lynch) drove north to fish some famous Oregon steelhead streams that run off Mount Hood. As we waited in front of the hotel to be picked up by our guide, snow was falling. A huge winter storm was dumping prodigious amounts of snow where we stood and further up the mountain. A few hundred feet down, where we started fishing, it turned into icy, slush coming down in torrents. It was like being in the middle of a freezing-cold car wash.

I won’t go into in much detail, except that we nearly froze to death with nothing to show for our suffering. That was when I first heard Les declare, “I’ve been Kyled again!”

My name became an adjective used by my fishing friends whenever a fishing trip didn’t go as planned, which brings me to my recent trip to the Kitmat River in Northern BC.

It was a hard five days. While I tried to convince myself that being a few months shy of my 80th birthday still qualified me, I soon found I needed all the pluck I could muster to keep up with my younger fellow anglers.

It never gets dark in summer that far north. We virtually lived in our waders. The guides had us up at 4 a.m. We’d fish until 11 a.m., have lunch, take a nap and then wade into the 48-degree water once more, staggering, slipping and sliding over the rocky bottom, casting as we went.

Steve took several more paragraphs to get to the end of his tale, which can be summarized in a few words after the following questions: How many fish grabbed your fly? How many did you hook? How many did you land?

Steve’s answer to all three questions was ,“Zero. Nada. Zilch.”

He added, “I was Kyled.” But, my irrepressible friend still claims he had a good time.

“In the end, it’s the people with whom you choose to surround yourself who make a trip, and this trip was exceptional because my companions and guides were first class,” Kyle said.

For those who enjoy eating salmon without working that hard, go online and purchase tickets to the annual Golden State Salmon Association fundraising dinner at William Tell House in Tomales July 23. The menu includes fresh barbecued salmon and proceeds will go to support GGSA’s work restoring salmon habitat. Seatings are at noon to 3 p.m. and 4 to 7 p.m. Tickets are $100 per seat ($50 for kids under 12) and are available by calling 855-251-4472 or go to goldenstatesalmon.org.