Snake's Scenic South Fork Lures Anglers -- Fly-Fishing Float Trip Memorable, Even When Using Woolly Buggers

EVEN WHEN THE water runs high because of melting snowpack and clothing gets soaked by a downpour, anglers enjoy a fly-fishing trip on the Snake River's South Fork.

At the end of a day's float and fly-fishing on the South Fork of the Snake River - the section that runs through Idaho's Swan Valley - my cousin's assessment was unambiguous.

"This," Don said, "is the most magnificent river I've ever seen."

It had come well-recommended by Ron Simmons, another cousin. Silver-haired, patrician, a Westerner (from Salt Lake City, like Don), Simmons fishes everywhere, dedicating his semi-retirement from architectural practice to the pursuit of trout.

Don and I go way back as fellow fishers. We'd dunked worms in our teenage years, then cast flies as young men in Utah's Uintas and Montana's Bitterroots; but it had been decades since we'd fished together. When we had the chance to remedy this long oversight, we looked to Ron to suggest a spot.

"Go to the South Fork," he said.

Rising high in the backcountry of Yellowstone National Park, the South Fork flows through the Tetons into Idaho, through the Swan Valley, and on to the confluence with the Henry's Fork (also a great trout river). From there, the Snake charges west across Idaho before turning north to form that state's western border. In Washington, it joins the Columbia on its journey to the Pacific.

"I bet the Snake irrigates half the potatoes grown in this country," Don said.

The Swan Valley, where we floated, is tucked into Idaho's southeast corner, about 40 miles from Idaho Falls and 50 from Jackson, Wyo., at the foot of Grand Teton National Park. It's broad, open, classically Western country of fields backed by mountains.

Driving along Route 26 to the South Fork Lodge, where we had booked our guide, we had scant sense of the river we paralleled, since it was out of sight in a deep canyon.

By the time we finished our float at about 8 o'clock the next evening, with that canyon deep in shadow, we knew it well.

On the river since 9:30 a.m., we were tired from mercilessly flogging the water with our fly lines, questing for trout. No doubt "Ooley" Piram, our gregarious and hard-working guide, was far more tired, but he was too good-natured to complain.

It seemed days ago that, after a leisurely breakfast at the lodge, we'd shaken hands with Piram, hopped into his battered Suburban and headed a few miles upriver, his trailered drift boat rattling along behind.

Called a "McKenzie boat" after the Oregon river where its design was developed, boats like Piram's wooden, high-bowed dory have become the standard for float-fishing on Western rivers. It's astonishingly stable, essential since fly-casting is far better done standing than sitting. The stubby craft has revolving seats fore and aft for the anglers, while the guide rows from the middle.

By the time Piram stowed the gear and settled us aboard, it was clear he was there to do the work and we to have the fun. In addition to doing all the rowing, he'd tie on the flies if we wished. He'd net our fish - as much a conservation measure as a convenience to us, since his release technique (using forceps) was sure and speedy. His hands rarely touched the fish, greatly increasing chances of survival.

Our job was to enjoy ourselves, which we did from the beginning, though the morning was gloomy under a gray sky that threatened rain. More serious, the river was high and discolored - very high, in fact, from heavy snowpack - and far from ideal for angling.

Dry-fly fishing - that delicate, elegant, and exciting sport with diminutive tufts of fur and feathers dancing along the surface in imitation of aquatic-hatching insects - did not appear promising.

But these negatives mattered little. I was happy to be on the water again with Don; easy going, gentle, generous, he's the perfect fishing buddy. Watching him lay out a line and study its drift with rapt concentration swept away the years, and it was good once more to be sharing things we both loved: the beauty of the West, the anticipation of trout. And if the fishing wasn't fast and furious, all the more excuse to let the eye and mind stray to the beauty of the place - reason enough to make the float even had there been no fish in the river.

Piram took us into a side channel where the current was gentle and where the trout typically take refuge from the power of the high-running river. Instead of a jaunty dry fly about the size of my pinkie fingernail, he handed me a green bead-head Woolly Bugger, a bristling, heavily weighted fly about the size of the whole pinkie and designed, presumably, to imitate a minnow or perhaps a leech.

Getting the hefty Woolly Bugger where it needed to be - dangerously deep into the brushy pockets of shoreline - involved an unaesthetic "chuck-and-duck" method of casting. As we drifted easily along, Don and I bombarded the shoreline, hanging up now and again. Soon I was into a good-sized brown trout, which duly came to net, and then another. Clearly Piram knew where the fish should be.

"My daddy wouldn't let me on the river until I was 10," he told us, "but I've been fishing it ever since." He's been guiding for 20 years and is a strong, superb boatsman - the perfect match for this strong, superb river.

By the time we'd swung out of that first side channel, I'd hooked another fish. This one dived into what must have been tangled brush and branches deep below the surface, so I had no choice but to break the line. Though we were practicing "catch-and-release" fishing, this wasn't the kind of release we had in mind. (Regulations on this part of the Snake allow keeping two trout daily, less than 8 inches or more than 16 inches long, but a no-kill approach better preserves the fishery.)

Soon the little dory was grabbed by the current and whisked away by the impressive power of the big river, but always under Piram's sure-handed control. As we glided through riffles, we could hear the eerie rattle of pebbles below us on the river bottom, ever in motion. We were in a sort of riparian paradise, an unspoiled Eden of picturesque cliffs and lush forests, an isolated world alive with the power of the river and yet hugely peaceful.

"Cast to the seams," Piram advised us, meaning the places where boulders broke the flow, where chutes spilled into pools, where back eddies formed. This is where trout should be - and sometimes, in spite of the high water, they were. Don, casting from the stern, got into a robust rainbow trout, which he brought to net.

As we rode down river, clouds parted and the scene became sun-splashed and shadowy by turn. A heron stood motionless by the far bank. A mother merganser floated by with three youngsters in tow. A sandhill crane soared overhead.

Now and then Piram would beach the boat at a promising spot so that Don and I could cast from shore. Other times he'd drop the stern anchor to hold us in the current. Always, when we were in good water, he'd back-oar to slow our progress and to hold the boat steady for casting. "Stay, precious, stay," he'd say, cajoling his craft into cooperation.

We were getting deeper into the canyon. While this was hardly wilderness, it felt a lot as if it were, and we saw only a handful of other anglers. Limited road access is one thing that makes the South Fork such a splendid floating river. And only four outfitters' boats daily are allowed on each of the river's three sections, assuring that the feeling of remoteness is preserved.

"This canyon is one of the best eagle rookeries in Idaho," Piram said, pointing out an immature bald eagle flapping overhead. "But when the fishing is slow, you don't see many adult birds. They go somewhere else to fish."

We were just finishing the shoreside lunch of sandwiches and fruit packed by the outfitters when the first drops of rain fell. Back on the river, we fished through a storm that began as a drizzle and ended as a torrent, soaking through what I previously had considered rain gear. Piram offered a proper slicker and rain pants from his duffel and, after demurring for a bit, I pulled them on and was glad to have them.

By mid-afternoon, the rain and clouds had vanished, and bright sun, doubly welcome now, baked the dampness out of gear and clothing.

Now backed by cliffs, the river was more beautiful than ever. As the sun dropped and the landscape's colors grew richer, we startled a flock of eight pelicans into flight; parvenus on the river, they eat their weight in fish daily - and they weigh 40 pounds apiece. We couldn't tell how the fishing was for them, but we knew that - because of the storm or the bright sun that followed - it had slowed to almost no strikes for us.

But the river was lovely and we were warm and dry in the late sun, so with Piram's blessing we lingered, casting again and again into the slow water along the banks until finally, sadly, the float was completed. We'd caught a dozen trout between us, a mixture of browns, rainbows, and cutthroats - not many for the South Fork, but a long way from being skunked.

An hour later, after a long ride on a rutted dirt road, we settled down for dinner at the Last Cast Restaurant, attached to South Fork Lodge. Yolanda, a sunny waitress with an irresistible Polish accent, brought steaks. Conviviality reigned.

Don and I made a pact to return next year - when the water would be lower, and the trout would rise to dry flies. But as we toasted the day we'd just spent, we hardly could imagine improving on it.

If you go . . .

Idaho Falls, 42 miles from South Fork Lodge in the Swan Valley, has good air service, as does the Jackson Hole Airport, 52 miles distant.

You don't have to be an avid fly-fisher to enjoy a float on the South Fork, nor an expert to catch fish. Water conditions for 1999 are expected to be normal, which means that good dry-fly fishing should get under way with a salmon-fly hatch about the first of July.

You need to plan now if you want to book a trip in July, August or September.

Mark Rockefeller (of the New York Rockefellers) bought the South Fork Lodge; Spence Warner remains as manager. About a dozen guides work regularly out of the lodge (800-483-2110). A typical package: three nights, two guided fishing days, lodging, and all meals costs $780 per person or $1,020 for deluxe accommodations new this year. A full-day float by itself costs $360 per boat (one or two persons). For more information, visit the Lodge's Web site: www.southforklodge.com.