My mind wanders back the meandering wake to that glassy water where the fish lay. And the bugs that hover there, long enough to hold off the mouths and the end of it all. I spent many hours there on my bum, my legs crossed, scanning the water for Mayfly regattas and spent wings collapsing.
Often the road there, would take me over Teton Pass and into that fertile country that lay to the west of the spires. Falling and twisting down into the green valley… Even through cracked glass, I could often make out the distant bulges of the Centennial and the Lemhi Ranges whose collisions rise over seventy miles distant. Windows down, there is bluegrass picking and wind throughout the cab of the truck. And best to stay alert on this twisted trail that winds though fields of potatoes and barley.
There are scattered heaps of rusted machinery by the side of the road. A too-ripe shack with no glass has the words “Cold Beer” peeling from its side. Little white houses and red barns with white trim are swallowed by the swaying prairie as the road continues on to the ancient caldera that is Island Park, Idaho. It is still my most favorite path to travel.
Passing over the bridge out of Ashton, Idaho, I get my first whiff of her – that unmistakable cool, buggy scent of wet earth and moving water. And there she be, still moving – rippling and smoothing her way towards the Snake’s other half and then onward; further until she fills with Steelhead and Salmon that come home from the sea.
To speak of origins: A rain drop meets Yellowstone and slithers down into the earth. It finds another and grows and finds more and strength becomes her and the water it flows clean and cold through a labyrinth of volcanic rock that came stone a million years before. And at the end of her underground path, out of the side of a modest hill on the western flank of the park, she is unveiled: streaming from the earth she is uncovered; she is beautiful, distinguished, banded, and witnesses tell it so.
The Henry’s Fork of the Snake River begins where Buffalo roam. Could a drop be more fortunate? How about me, could I be more fortunate to wade into her arms or sit on her banks and watch the clouds pass over? This is where my mind flows. When the present loses character, I drift upstream between the crests of a widening wake that may start with a nose.
A friend took me here long ago. We drank beer while watching the river and he told me that if I can catch fish here, then I could catch fish anywhere. I remember being anxious at the possibility of casting line as we continued to sit and watch. I grew restless that day, waiting. More sips of beer and salami slices down our hatches among chatter of bugs and rise forms and how best to approach a ripple that would hopefully ripple once more.
