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Over the next year I often thought about that fish. My thoughts focused on why I had not been able to catch
it. Should I have used a different lure or fly? Maybe some high tech stuff like synthetic glowing eggs that smell?
Or a jiggle worm made of plastic? Fishermen in Alaska had given me some special "Alaska fish catchers"
along with some Yukon Jack fishing tips. As I rode my motorcycle back and forth across the backbone of the Rocky
Mountains south towards the end of the earth in South America, I thought I had it figured out. Back in Wyoming
I made a detour and back to the Big Horn River I went. Another morning, the same fish (but bigger) and different
bait. Again, no fish in the frying pan. So much for Yukon Jack and Alaskan fishing secrets. Frustrated, I got back
on my motorcycle and rode to the bottom of the earth, Ushuaia, in Argentina, and then up to the top of Norway and
the North Cape, as far north as you can ride in Europe. There I met Norwegian fishermen. They shared some novel
ideas and techniques on how to land my elusive cutthroat back in Montana. We talked during nights as bright as
daylight that were filled with Laplander swill.
Finances caused my motorcycle trip around the world to halt so I came back to the United States and sold some
photos and articles to prevent me from having to eat sand and push my motorcycle as I passed through Africa. During
that unscheduled stop, I again waded into the Big Horn River, both at dawn and dusk, this time armed with ammunition
from Norway. Mr./Ms. Cutthroat was not fooled by any of the Norwegian gizmos. I suspect the fish laughed at my
efforts to tempt it. I saw it twice, but both times it ignored my foreign presents.
This spring, after having survived Africa, Asia and Japan, then Los Angeles rush hour traffic, the first thing
I did after unsealing my little house in Montana was set the alarm clock for 3:30 a.m. I wanted to be standing
in the fringes of the vortex on the river as the sun came up. Mr./Ms. Cutthroat was about to learn why sushi is
so common in Japan. The Japanese have some pretty good techniques for landing fish and a few had been passed on
to this wandering motorcyclist.
Standing in five feet of cold water up to your armpits at 4:00 a.m. is not pleasant. It is like riding a motorcycle
through Germany in November in the rain. You can do it, but you have to love what you are doing. I have done both,
but prefer the motorcycle ride because it usually takes some time before the cold water finds my unit hiding under
a layer of Gore-Tex or PVC. Not so in five feet of cold water on the Big Horn River when the sun has yet to rise
above the tree line.
Sometimes I think the fish chuckles as I stuff a yell into my clinched fist while wading out to where I know
it is lurking. It probably thinks, "Here comes the Indian eunuch again."
This year the fish was huge. It had obviously moved up the food chain from flies to fry. It was the same fish,
I could tell by the twisted and bent dorsal fin, but in April it must have weighed nearly 10 pounds. Life had been
so good its belly was swollen or it was holding hundreds of eggs.
The Japanese may know fish, but not Mr./Ms. CutThroat of the Big Horn River in Montana, USA. After an hour of
my best Rising Sun presentations the fish made one full back and forth move of it's tail -- now the size of my
hand -- slipping deeper into the water and out of sight. I went back at dusk, only to see it rise minutes before
my shriveled unit and blue legs said "Enough!"
Summer 2000 found me being pulled by several forces. One was money: I needed to fulfill some of my contractual
writing obligations, and pay bills. Another was love and lust, the love of what I do best, ride motorcycles, and
my lust for two-wheel wandering. I have a map of the world on the wall, at eye level, next to my bed. At night,
before I turned off the light, I found myself looking at places I had not been -- Bhutan or Taiwan. I also looked
at places where I liked having ridden, like the Alps of Austria, Italy and Switzerland, the South Island of New
Zealand and parts of South America.
As I traveled around the world over the last four years one of the things I often heard from other motorcyclists
was, "When I retire I want to do what you do, go see different places on my motorcycle." I smile, wish
them the best, and offer to help them if I can, but deep down know they will never do it. When they retire they
will be too old to do what I do. Even now I am starting to feel the creaks and cracks of bones I used to ignore
when I get out of my sleeping bag in the morning.
When I ride into a town past a motel, I find myself wishing to use its fresh sheets, bed, channel clicker, air
conditioning, telephone, shower with hot water, toilet (with toilet seat, and toilet paper), and locks that work.
Upon retirement my motorcycling friends, at best, will sign up for a guided motorcycle tour for more money than
I spend in six months to ride a motorcycle for two weeks somewhere on the globe. I am not saying that is bad. Actually
I think it is good, they are living their dream within their limits. I do know they will not want to travel like
me, sleeping on the ground behind some gas station in Argentina in a tent while trucks roll in and out all night
because I have to manage Argentina on $1,000.00 for the month it takes to see a major part of it. Wanting to do
what I do and how I do it will have dropped from their want list.
Another force that was pulling on me this summer was more Indian, cosmic, or mystical. One journalist friend
of mine in Germany calls it "Indian hocus pocus," because he can not understand or relate to the forces.
Maybe I spent too much time making faces at religion, UFO's or Ying and Yang to explain the calling of those forces.
I will just refer to it as my Indian spirit.
I know that at this point in life I should be smoking on a big Cuban, swilling fine wine and watching the stock
market. I have a long closed trunk filled with handmade suits and several diplomas to prove to me that I was trained
to be doing those things at this point in life. The fact that I am doing none of them makes me wonder if maybe
there is something out there pulling me away from things that are bad for me. I do believe that was I born 160
years ago I would be pretty much the same inside, a wanderer chasing the sun. But instead of riding a motorcycle
around the world I would have been riding a horse around North America (ducking U.S. Army bullets), and trying
to figure out how to get across borders.
Late this summer I decided to accept an invitation for a motorcycle rendezvous in Katmandu. Nepal is nearly
halfway around the globe from the Big Horn Mountains on the Crow Indian Reservation. In the Big Horn Mountains
we have the "Little People," some people we Crow Indians do not talk or write about. The media wants
access to these people, but the Crows have been adamant. I support the Crow Tribe in that decision.
In the Himalayas where I am bound there is Yeti. Everybody knows where Yeti lives, what Yeti is, and in five
or 10 years there may be bus and motorcycle tours to the "Caves of Yeti." Before those tours start I
want to make contact on my own.
The earth is small, about 24,900 miles around, most of it being water. I'll fly over the water and ride a motorcycle
across the rest. Some have done similar global romps on 125 cc motorcycles, others on 50cc Vespas. My friend and
hero Dave Barr humped a Harley-Davidson 83,000 miles around the globe, and Dave has no legs. Ted Simon, a Brit
who knew not TDC from GPS, flogged a Triumph around the world in the 1970's. Another hero of mine rode a Henderson
around the globe in 1913-1914.
This will be my third motorcycle ride around the earth and I will do it on several different motorcycles. One
is more than 50 years old, another designed more than 50 years ago, and a third one an Autobahn screamer. I plan
to taste the continents on motorcycles manufactured on those continents, like a 1947 Indian Chief in America, an
Indian (Enfield) through India (Indian roads by an Indian on an Indian?) and an Amazonas through the jungles of
the Amazon.
"I'll take a quick ride, for love and lust," is what I thought when I woke up two months ago and saw
Nepal on the map before my feet slid off the bed. My plan is to jump on a bike, go back to Brazil, then a fast
run up and down the European Alps a couple times, jump over to India, ride into Nepal, hire a couple Sherpas and
tell them to take me to the Yeti Cave. Catch Yeti in a few photographs, write a few Yeti stories, get back on the
motorcycle, swing through Bangkok, then over to Taiwan (where I hope to have some knock-off Yetis made for 2001
sales at K-Mart), and finally back to the United States. Maybe I will stop in Japan and let those sushi guys know
what Mr./Ms. CutThroat thinks of their gear, or I may slide through New Zealand where there are supposed to be
some pretty good trout catchers.
This much I know: In April or May of 2001 I will again be nipple deep at dawn in the icy water of the Big Horn
River as the red rays of sunrise chase night west around the globe. I have six months to figure out what I have
been doing wrong, absorb new advice from Asian fish catchers, and wait for Mr./Ms. CutThroat to lose their edge.
When I do catch the fish I will let it go. It has outgrown any frying pan I own, and should be left to roam
the Big Horn River from the depths of its home in the vortex. It has earned its freedom. In the meantime I will
hunt Yeti, which I have a far better chance of catching than the Big Horn cutthroat trout.
Gregory W. Frazier
October, 2000
On The Road, Roaming Around The Globe
www.horizonsunlimited.com/gregfrazier
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