One day, just before school started at the University of Waikato,  I went over to the Whirinaki River (pronounced fear-uh-knack-ee).  It's a good long drive from any population center, and thirty to forty minutes down a metal (kiwi for gravel) road, so I was deeply disappointed when I found a guy fishing at the spot I pulled over to check out the water.  But he was a decent bloke, and suggested a nice piece of water upstream.  While I watched, he rose a small fish, perhaps 12 inches, didn't pay attention, and had it swim under an undercut bank.  He tried to yank it out, which of course lead him to part 5X company with the trout.  I went upstream to the appointed location, and made my way out into the water.  It was in fact delightful -- an absolutely majestic native bush, a podocarp forest, which came right down to the water on one side.  It would be murder to crash through, but I could get around on the other side or wade across when need be.  However, despite the fact that the stream looked quite like a Rocky Mountain freestone, and the fly I used was a very productive pattern, both here and in the Rockies  -- a humpy -- I had no takes.  I spotted a good rainbow in deep water immediately behind a large tree that lay across the river, and put on a heavily weighted hare and copper nymph.  But I just couldn't get the fly down to him, so I moved on.  A bit up the river I saw a decent rainbow rise up and take something just below the surface at the head of a run, but I couldn't locate him in the heavy water.  After a bit I left, having only risen a few smallish browns.  I retraced my steps to the spot I'd visited earlier, but thought better of fishing it.  The guy I'd visited with, and perhaps his mate, had worked it fairly thoroughly, and I suspected it was too disturbed to provide good fishing.  So I drove down a bit, almost to the town of Minginui, and pulled over at a sign indicating water supply.  (The obvious supply, I reasoned, was the river.)  Here I found a nice bit of water, which I intended to work over for about ninety minutes prior to heading home.  I walked across the water and came to a nice little pool, from which I spooked a good brown before I could draw breath.  Oops!

So I went up a bit, fishing the run immediately above my car.  It was a fairly heavy, choppy piece of water, so I clinched on a larger dry, perhaps a size 10 Royal Wulff.  A few casts later I sent it up and to the left of the remnants of a large tree that had washed down during flood, and then deposited mid stream.  A mighty head sliced up, engulfed the fly, and went down.  I set up without thinking (in New Zealand one often needs to count to 3 to hook up on dries, but here I set up as I would in the states) -- and had him on.  I knew it was a good fish, but then he jumped.  Twice.  Clear out of the water, with plenty to spare.  I got a real good look at him.  If this fish was less than two feet I would be shocked; perhaps he was more like 26 ".  And probably 6 or 7 pounds.  After the jumps, he ran up the river hard.  I didn't want him in that snag, so I put the brakes on, and leaned on my trusty Granger Victory (an old cane rod) trying to turn him.  In vain.  For a minute or so we had a stalemate, and then I thought I felt him giving way.  I leaned harder, but he didn't budge anymore.  And then after another minute or so the line just parted.

It took five minutes for me to calm down.  Sure I was disappointed to have not landed the fish, but in retrospect the strategy was all I could do.  (I returned to the scene of the crime about a month later, and found a virtual forest of roots above where I'd broken off.  Had I let him move up farther, it would have been over just as surely.)  And besides, I played this magnificent brown for the better part of five minutes, which supplied me with several weeks worth of adrenaline.

So, after this experience I cut back and changed the tippet from 4X to 3X.  Up at the flat below a deep hole just upstream I cast my lone remaining size 10 Royal Wulff behind a willow that overhangs the stream.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw it vanish, and set up.  Remember the bit about waiting for a few seconds after a take?  It seems this can easily be accomplished by day dreaming.  The fish was on, and put up a spirited fight.  It turned out to be about 3 pounds, and 18 inches, of firm fit kiwi brown trout.  In comparison to the one that got away, however, it seemed like a minnow.  No kidding.   Would I lie to you?