A Quill Gordon fly tied by Hugh Hartsell of Smoky Mountain Flyfishing Guides. Hugh and Carolyn Hartsell image.
NANTAHALA GORGE –– When I was a boy growing up in Bryson City, my father often let me tag along when he would drive out to the lower Nantahala River to fish for a few hours after work. His favorite stretch was the water immediately above the swinging bridge, and even when I was only five or six years old he would let me stand on the bridge and watch him work the water. I still have fond memories of such experiences, most notably the fact that when you stand and stare at the water for a long time, you reach a point where it seems that you and the bridge, as opposed to the water beneath, are moving.
In those days the water was always “off” in late afternoon, and to my knowledge Dad never fished the stream when it was in full flow. In some ways that is understandable, because the stream is a raging torrent under such conditions, although it can be waded in selected spots. Moreover, in those days no one wore waders, and the water in the Nantahala was extremely cold.
Daddy and all the other local fishermen who spent time on the Nantahala referred to the stream in the gorge, the area we are covering in this column, as the “big” Nantahala. Then or now, it is a stream of wonder for the trout fisherman. Years ago Trout Unlimited, in compiling a list of the nation’s top 100 trout streams, included the Nantahala. I wouldn’t argue much, because if you set me the task of catching a mess of trout, there’s nowhere in North Carolina I’d rather go.
Boy and man, I’ve fished the gorge area of the Nantahala for a full 60 years. I’ve sampled and savored its many moods (like all tailwaters, the lower Nantahala is a watery schizophrenic, varying according to whether or not the gates at the dam upstream are open or closed). The biggest fish I ever caught there was landed on Thanksgiving Day, and oddly enough, given the fact that brown trout are the real bruisers here, it was a rainbow.
I caught it in the long pool at the old water gauge, and for those with an interest in history, it might be noted that this is the place where a mountain icon of yesteryear, Jack Coburn, and his wife drowned in an automobile accident. Coburn was a local entrepreneur who befriended Horace Kephart, provided the cemetery plot where he is buried, and at one time owned vast tracts of land in what is now the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Coburn Knob in the Park is named for him.
The same pool also provided me with one of the most interesting experiences of my entire angling career. I had hooked a small rainbow and was skittering it across the surface to release it when a huge brown trout inhaled it. I had sufficient presence of mind to let the brown swallow the little trout, thinking that there was a slight possibility I might hook it. As I tightened up on the line the big brown made three unhurried trips up and down the pool and then, presumably figuring it had suffered enough from indigestion, disgorged the now dead and badly battered rainbow.
This grand stream has given me countless other memorable moments. I once stood in a single pool and hooked and landed perhaps twenty trout without moving a step. Fish were still rising all around me (the Nantahala can produce prodigious insect hatches at times), but suddenly they wanted no part of the fly I was offering.
My companion at the time, the late Frank Young, a wonderful fisherman and fly tier, quietly asked if he could give it a try. I watched, astounded, as he caught a trout with almost every cast. Eventually I asked him what pattern he was using.
“Oh, just a little grey fly,” was his response.
On another occasion I watched a mother mink ferry her three kits, one at a time, from one side of the stream to the other. Then there was an incident with a huge woman who somehow fell out of a raft and washed up on a rock near where I was fishing. I started towards her, changed my mind when I realized how panic-stricken she was, and was rewarded with a string of curses from this beached human whale which would have done the saltiest of sailors proud.
Incidentally, I eventually figured out how to get the raft (I had caught it as it washed by) to her, and told her daughters, who had also fallen out, just what to do. My reward for being a Good Samaritan was to have the woman, once she got to shore, come charging through the streamside vegetation, doing a credible imitation of a rampant hippo, after me. I literally had to leave the area.
Decades ago I was an interested, indeed intrigued, spectator, to what locals at the time sometimes referred to as the “Nantahala War.” This was when the stream’s whitewater appeal was just beginning to attract attention, and local anglers, especially those who liked to bait fish from the bank in big pools, did not appreciate watercraft flowing through their favorite holes. Discord escalated, and eventually reached the point where some irate fishermen took extreme steps such as cutting down trees to block the stream and even stringing wires across the river at a level which would endanger whitewater enthusiasts.
Eventually, matters got so bad the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission had to do something. Their solution was a true rarity, and an example of bureaucratic brilliance. They allowed night fishing on the Nantahala, the only trout stream in the state where this is permissible.
That episode points out one of the down sides of fishing the lower Nantahala with the water “on.” You face, especially in warm weather, a non-stop “hatch” of canoes, kayaks, and rafts.
Aesthetically it is a nightmare, but from the standpoint of affecting the fishing it means nothing. The trout here have long since acclimated to this situation. In fact, my personal preference, and it is a distinct one, is to fish when the stream is in full flow. It is important to pick your spots, be very cautious in your wading, and stay close to the shoreline out of the way of floaters and the strongest currents.
No matter when one fishes this stream though, water “on” or “off,” in the height of the summer, with a mist hanging over the stream thanks to the water temperatures being so much colder than those of the air, or in the depths of winter, it is a fisherman’s paradise. While the stream is stocked, and quite heavily, virtually all of the trout I catch here are wild ones.
That consideration, along with knowing there’s always a chance to make a meaningful connection with a really big fish, heavy hatches, and the many fifty-plus fish days I’ve had here, draw me to the land of the mid-day sun (that’s what the word Nantahala, which comes from the Cherokee language, means) as surely as a trout is attracted to a Quill Gordon hatch this time of year.
Jim-great writing. I know nothing about fishing-but your writing makes me wish I did : ) I also wish I could go back and stand on that bridge with you and watch Commodore.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
Like