 AGAINST THE FLOW — Part 1: Rambling along the Orange River — by Clive Will
Against the Flow is a 13-part TV show which appeared on SABC 3 in December and January, documenting a road trip undertaken by four friends who journeyed the course of the longest river in South Africa — the Orange or Gariep River.
For more information about this trip visit www.againsttheflow.tv.
THE first fly-rod and reel I ever owned were given to me as Christmas presents by my aunt and uncle. Considering it was a 2-piece, concealment was tough and I was only partially surprised when it was handed to me. However, as I opened the gift my face wore a huge smile.
After tackling up, my uncle and I strolled into the garden. I led the way with the elongated fishing device, and he followed with a smoking pipe hanging from his mouth. I can still remember that the reel was wound with a dark olive-green sinking line, and if I heard the drag make just one tick, my uncle would imediately stand over me, wrapping me in the comforting aroma of his pipe tobacco, and take hold of everything I thought I was in control of.
Like a stringless puppeteer he manipulated my willing arms to demonstrate timing and line speed. It was well intentioned, but a little sophisticated for a seven-year-old, and if I was to be brutally honest, I think at that time I enjoyed the passive pipe more.
UNCLE TOM’S MENTORSHIP
And so it was that my uncle, Dr Tom Sutcliffe, introduced me to flyfishing. In the years that followed we chased the energetic doctor to various syndicates in the Dargle area. For a long time casting was a tall order, so we mostly trolled large Walker’s Killers and black Woolly Worms off the back of a boat. Taking fish and landing them was predominantly interspersed with fighting about paddling duties.
One misty afternoon, on the 25 acre Kimber Dam, I took a stunning, deep-bodied rainbow, weighing possibly a pound or two. Lacking a priest, my older brother, Graham, made use of an oar, and in so doing dislodged the fish’s eye. I was so upset with the disfiguring of my trophy that I refused my rowing rotation, left the vessel and rounded the dam on foot.
Having an uncle like Tom meant one got to rub shoulders with flyfishing royalty. One legendary figure was the late Jack Blackman. Short, energetic and in his later years, he offered casting lessons at the Kloof Scout Hall. Jack would bind the butt of the rod against our wrists with an old sweatband and shout, “Ten-to-two!” Sadly for us, just as we were getting the hang of things, my uncle left Natal and relocated to the stream-abundant Cape. Although we continued to fish, it was never with the same input or intensity.
I moved to Johannesburg and entered the film industry in the mid-1990s. A friend I made along the way, Greg Spitzer, also grew up in Natal, but as a surf angler. Having been deprived of the sea, he somehow made it all the way to freshwater flyfishing. Greg persistently invited me to the Vaal to catch indigenous yellowfish, but my mental image of the Vaal was of shirtless gentlemen wielding large rods, sucking on brandy and coke while targeting carp. Needless to say, I was not keen. Just for the record, I’m not knocking the approach, just trying to highlight my ignorance.
Read the full story in the February 2010 issue of FLYFISHING. |
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