Chasing fish downriver was usually a losing gambit on the T. Between the very slippery rocks and the relentless current the fish damn near always won. Lytton was the exception as there was lots room to chase them provided you didn't fall.
Sometimes you won the chase if you had someone there to help you.
I had a secret little pocket that always kicked out huge bucks. It was just a scoop in a large chunk of bedrock with some boulders in the scoop and at the right water level, it was a fasten your seat belt type of hole the minute you made your first cast. Because it was so consistent I guarded that place like it was my private Fort Knox. If there was anyone around, I wouldn't fish it.
So one day the conditions were right. I step in and boom, instant hook up. Usually it was a knock-down drag out fight in this spot. There was a huge back eddy and that part of the river dynamic seemed to keep the fish from going off downstream --- you didn't have to chase. But this fish was different. It instantly went across the river to the opposite bank and then took off for Lytton.
This spot is just below what they call the Island....I'm guessing it's maybe 3 km upstream of Big Horn?
So I'm on a bonafide Nantucket Sleigh ride with this fish. Part of the thrill of getting Thompson fish on a fly was the high-pitched scream your fly reel made once they took off. I'd never heard my fly reel scream like it did with this fish. By then it had gotten huge amounts of line out on me. But I could run. I could chase. Reason? I never wore cleats when I fished the THompson like alot of the other guys did, precisely so I could chase fish without breaking my neck. I was a wading stick kind of guy.
So I'm running downstream across the rocks as fast as I can trying to keep slack out of the line. I'm stripping off clothes. First the vest. Then the Cowichan sweater. Then the wind breaker. I'm sweating like a pig, and I've already covered an easy kilometer of river chasing this fish but by this time, the fish had so much line out on me that when he disappeared down below a bend which by then, was the top end of the Orchard Run, my dacron running line was thwacking across big boulders and driftwood because of the angle that fish had on me. No way was I going to get this fish. It would destroy my fly line and probably break me off just from line abrasion.
All of a sudden I see a car pull off the highway. A guy comes running down the embankment. He's a friend of Rick Olmstead, a guy named Steve who I think worked in a tackle shop in the L.M. He says he's been watching me and together we're going to get that fish. By then I'm exhausted, whimpering a bit, a defeatist attitude coming on because I knew what that fish was doing to my line....dragging it across the rocks like that. And I didn't have a back-up line for this trip. I could get other fish if I got my line back in one piece.
But this guy would have none of it. He was like a drill sergeant. He ran off below me, untangled my running line from the rocks and logs, then barked orders at me. Reel! OK, run! OK, reel! OK, give him line. OK, run! This went on for another kilometer.
So by then we were at Big Horn. I knew if that fish got into the rapids below Big Horn it was game over. So did Steve. And by then I was completely out of gas.
So the fish is out in the middle of the river in the dancing waves just before the river narrows and disappears down into the canyon. And it was getting dark. But by then I could see the fly line. I never thought I'd see that fly line again so it was a bit of a triumph For me.
The guy is screaming at me again----put the screws in! Freeze that reel! So I do it and I'll be blowed, the fish starts heading towards the shore we both stood on. I knew that just above the rapids was a small bay of soft water. I knew that because I'd fished it before. So against all odds, I put the screws in and was able to swim the fish into that bay. If he made one more run I knew he'd be a goner but he didn't---It's clear the fish was as done as I was. I grab the leader and hand my rod to Steve and pull the fish towards beach using the leader. It was one of those gorgeous high teen bucks that we both knew would make for a stunning meal if slow-cooked over coals. Yes, this was back in the day when you could keep those glorious specimens.
Steve sees that I'm not exactly going through the motions of beaching the fish like I'm going to keep it and says:
"No way. After what we just went through? How can you even think of turning loose such a gorgeous fish?"
And as I held the wrist of its tail so it could regain its composure I responded ...
"Yes, way. Although I appreciate all the help you gave me how could anyone even think of keeping such a gorgeous fish?"
And together we watched it push back out into the middle of the river and then it was gone, like it had never been there, had never graced our lives with its presence.
But it had and we mulled that over quietly to ourselves during the long walk back to our trucks.