Wild life | 18 April 2013

Colobus monkeys in the forest were throat singing like Tibetan monks. Mist rose from the Kericho tea gardens above us in the gloaming. My son Rider gazed longingly at the water. For a ten-year-old boy obsessed by fishing, patience is impossible. He yearns for that trout with every atom of his being. I was just trying to coach him on the joys of fishing even if one never caught a thing when the clouds above us tore apart with the noise of a B-52 bombing run, followed by rain that came in grenade-sized drops — and then the rod in Rider’s hand quivered and bent down as a rainbow trout hit the fly and stripped out line all the way to the backing. Panic erupted as I barked orders and, realising it was a good fish, tried to grab the rod from Rider’s hands. He fought me off and fought in the fish, which played so heroically it seemed to pull our little boat across the dam’s churning surface.