My fishing guide, Shiloh Patterson, vividly remembers the first time he hooked a king salmon back in 1997. The fight lasted only 10 seconds before his line snapped, but it was all he could talk about on the long drive home, and for weeks afterward.

“I don’t get excited very often when it comes to big fish anymore, but I get to relive my first time every day with a new guy,” Patterson said. “I’ve helped guys who’ve been coming up here for years get their first salmon.”

He handed me a fly rod and pointed to a spot in the Salmon River where he wanted me to cast.

I’d done a little fly fishing, but this wasn’t fly fishing. In fact, it was nothing like any kind of fishing I was used to. But after a few dozen casts, I started to get the hang of it.

Patterson looked up from a knot in a fishing

See Full Page