Strung Magazine - Uphill, Into the Rhododendron

Uphill, Into the Rhododendron

Words by Adam White

Photos by Sammy Chang

Lukewarm dregs of coffee sloshed in my mug as we made a hard right turn onto the highway just north of Peachtree. Clouds hung overhead shrouding the mountaintops, their exposed bases standing like sentinels and ensuring our course remained straight through the valley. The plan was to meet at the trailhead just after noon with our good friend Dan and his dad Jeff. Jeff had flown in from Idaho the previous morning, leaving the grandeur of legendary western streams to make an arduous five-mile hike to a remote stretch of Western North Carolina, battle nearimpenetrable walls of rhododendron, and scramble over massive boulders in search of pocket water holding small, colorful mountain char. For the masses, there is no frame of reference for such behavior, but to us these little fish exude a near-mythic quality: Their splashy rise to a drifting bundle of thread-wrapped elk hair has consumed the bulk of my daydreams since I learned to cast. My friend Sammy’s infatuation is no less passionate; we had been talking about the prospect of visiting this stream since we met several years earlier.

The logistics of the trip materialized over several months with hours spent poring over maps, reading books, and scouring the internet for clues that made reference to potential barrier falls, hiking distances, and campsites. Though I had never ventured up the creek this far, I was already somewhat familiar with the area having spent my childhood camping and wandering the mountains of Nantahala with my grandparents. It was under their tutelage that I developed a deep respect for the land, tramping the mountainside on their heels and learning as they identified native flora— from wild ramps to ginseng, lady slippers to trillium. I also took great interest in the streams that my granddad said contained “specs.” As part of the storytelling mountain culture, usually the general whereabouts of these streams were disclosed in an animated discourse recounting harrowing encounters with black bears, canebrake “rattlers,” and black panthers—the Appalachian version of a cougar that could “scream like a woman,” according to my granddad. Much like the fish in these streams, my grandmother was tough as nails. She also possessed an uncanny ability to cultivate life from the loamy Appalachian soil. I swear: With sufficient amounts of dirt, water, and sunshine, she could make a dead twig sprout a new leaf.

My family’s heritage is inseparable from this forest. Having immigrated to the area in the 1800s, most of the poor Scotch-Irish settlers quickly married and blended their culture with the few remaining Cherokee families who managed to avoid forced relocation. The forests and valleys are rich and ancient; the culture is simple and inviting, but with a flare of mystery. Many of the rivers, creeks, lakes, and towns still carry their original Cherokee names. Venturing deeper into the Land of the Noonday Sun, the road signs still bear Cherokee syllabary. While the Appalachians may have lost some of their former grandeur to eons of erosion and weather, there is a unique sense to these mountains that is unlike any other place on earth. Their roots dig deeper still, into a time before the foot of man first tramped their laureled slopes and gentle valleys.

Brook trout are the perfect representation of this bygone era, remaining largely forgotten as our country industrialized and urbanized at breakneck speed. Brookies have paid a dear price, suffering precipitous declines due to habitat loss from deforestation, the introduction of nonnative competitors, and the ever-present threat of warming waters due to climate change. Since the glaciers first began their slow recession northward and global temperatures steadily began to climb, brookies in the South have been forced further and further into remote stretches of wilderness, exiled to headwater streams isolated by waterfalls that prevent the upstream migration of competing nonnative salmonids. It’s the degree of remoteness of this particular drainage that has kept its natives protected and genetically unique from

other brook trout in the region. They are fighters: resilient yet fragile, beautiful and increasingly rare. Finding them requires a lot of planning and effort and a little luck.

Sammy’s pickup bounced onto the forest service road about a quarter till noon. Windows down, cool mountain air spilled into the cab, and the rhythmic and metallic drive of clawhammer banjo twanged on the stereo. As we pulled up to the trailhead Dan and Jeff were already cinching down their packs; both wore huge grins. We hopped out of the truck and quickly exchanged highfives, fist bumps, and hugs. Finding the right fishing buddies can be a cumbersome and difficult task, but once the bond is forged, the friendship is for life.

I leaned against the truck and briefly closed my eyes, taking in the rich smell of the woods. Nearby I could hear the rush of the creek. It was already mid spring, but the early afternoon air was still cool, and the trees were cloaked with the soft green hue of new growth. Opening my eyes, I surveyed the scene and noticed a family-sized Coleman tent pitched within a stone’s throw of the road. Next to the tent was piled a season’s worth of firewood. Over the fire hung a cast-iron Dutch oven, suspended by a steel tripod at a height where the flames just barely licked the bottom. No one spoke a word, but we were all thinking the same thing: Someone is already ahead of us. Just then a slender, bearded man in his mid 60s wearing denim pants, an old barn coat, and a felt hat lumbered up from the creek.

“Heading up to the brookie water, are you?”he asked with a gleam in his eye. As it turnsout, our secret stream wasn’t so secret.

Having now made this annual pilgrimage another half dozen times, we eventually came to refer to this benevolent, everpresent figure as “Appalachian Gierach,”— affectionately shortened over time to “Appy G.” Appy G is a character, no doubt, but I’ve seen him make a tight roll cast under low-hanging rhododendron and catch two fish at once on a tandem nymph rig. Beyond his fishing skills, his advice has never led us astray. Several years ago, Sammy and I had our hearts set on hiking up the trail about a mile and fishing a section of the creek that pours through a series of medium-sized falls. This section receives very little pressure from anglers because a nasty bushwhack is required to reach it. In our minds, the pools below those falls were chock full of gargantuan rainbows and browns that rarely saw a fly. When we relayed our plan to Appy G, he just shook his head, saying, “I wouldn’t waste your time up there.”

Pressing him a bit more, he said that several years ago otters had made their way into this section and had all but devastated the once-thriving population of fish. Of course, being young, naïve, and mistrusting by nature, we called his bluff and went anyway. After a tricky and dangerous descent into the valley we finally began to fish. On the second upstream cast into a foamy, fishylooking plunge pool, the graphite tip of my 5-weight suddenly snapped. I could feel it in my bones. “You gotta be kidding me!” I exclaimed. Just then, as if on telepathic cue, a fuzzy head poked out from behind a rock on the far side of the pool. Equally as shocked, the otter paused to glare at me.

I could almost hear him say, “Serves you right!” before disappearing into the same pool where I had been casting. A bit dazed by what just happened, Sammy gave me a sideways glance before bursting into a fit of laughter. “Shoulda listened to Appy G,” he said. Guess so.

The hike up to the barrier falls takes just over two hours and is a straight shot up the valley. Not many people are willing to put in the amount of sweat and effort it takes to pull off a trip like this, especially for a 6-inch fish. The brookies in this stream are gorgeous, but as is the case in most southern streams, a 12-inch fish is a trophy. Fishing gear weighing heavy on our backs, legs aching and lungs burning, we made our final ascent, the barrier falls thundering into a gorge about 100 feet below the trail. Above the gorge the stream gradient becomes gentle and even. The freestoneand-boulder-clad nature of this creek makes for some interesting wading, especially in high water, but it is a welcome reprieve from other regional streams this far back into the hills. You would do better with a carabiner, harness, and climbing ropes on the majority of neighboring native-containing flows.

After making our first stream crossing a safe distance above the falls, we decided to take a break from the packs and stretch our legs. For a moment, we all stood staring at the gurgling stream, amazed at how much water was present this high in the drainage. Several cartoonish butterflies fluttered clumsily across the water as soft rays of evening sun illuminated an iridescent green

mattress of moss on the far bank. “You think this is brookie water?” asked Dan. “Dunno—only one way to find out,” said Sammy. In 10 minutes our lightweight rods were lined and short leaders were tied to the bushiest dry flies we could find in our boxes. The thing about fishing with friends is there is no competition. We’d each prefer to see the other land a nice fish and celebrate, or even just sit on the bank and take in the surroundings. After a brief strategizing session, we all decided to split for 15 minutes and test the waters.

After heading a short way up the trail, I managed to find a clearing in the rhododendron that would allow for decent stream access, but didn’t require an all-out army crawl. Creeping up to the bank, my excitement grew as I saw a languid glide with a foam line down the center. The water was clear, but at a distance almost took on the turquoise coloration of glacial melt. Carefully studying the scene, I noticed a half-dozen caddisflies bouncing on the water on the downstream side of a midstream boulder. All else was quiet: no rises and no activity along the stream bottom.

On my knees and low to the bank, I stripped line from my reel and made two quick false casts, laying my fly down next to the exposed rock. My fly slipped around the boulder and into the pocket where the caddisflies were. No take. I quickly recast, this time several feet above the boulder. As the fly began its drift into the cushion of water just above the rock, the water erupted in a blur of orange and white. The battle was

quick but spirited, and after a few seconds I slid a beautiful Appalachian brook trout into my net. After popping the hook from its jaw, I lowered my net into the water, admiring the auburn coloration of the fish’s abdomen. More beautiful than the handiwork of even the most skilled artisan, the little fish darted around my net showing off a striking mosaic of colors on its flank: deep red spots with blue halos and yellow dots akin to the drippings from a paintbrush. After a moment, I tipped my net and watched the fish swim back into the current and disappear, its vermillion pattern blending with the multicolored stone streambed.

The rest of that trip proved to be one of the most euphoric and memorable angling experiences in my decade of fly fishing: good friends, camp coffee, sunny spring days, and no shortage of specs willing to rise to a freshly dusted dry.

Brook trout streams are special and should stay that way. We determine the future of these resilient little brookies and the pristine high-country habitat where they thrive. Their success is inextricably tied to our own, as we will both undoubtedly perish without clean, cold water. Those willing to make the journey into the remaining wild and secret places left in our country might be rewarded with the splashy rise of a brook trout—and the clarifying realization that we have the opportunity to participate in something much greater than ourselves.

The path is ours to choose. I suggest the uphill trail into the rhododendron.