The Middle Fork of the Salmon River, one of the best fisheries in the world.
And this week i'm with Helfrich River Outfitters. We're gonna spend
six days in the Frank Church Wilderness. We flew in this morning from Stanley to Indian Creek to
meet them. Getting our safety talk in and we'll get going, welcome to the Salmon River.
Okay to my point about this being the best fishing river, oh i'm talking to the camera. Kelsey Helfrich
behind me. To my point about this being the best fishing river possibly in the world
we're about a quarter mile into this trip, 20 minutes. Tim over here in this boat with
master Ken Helfrich has already caught three fish. And Laurie back here just started fly
fishing she's been fly fishing for about 10 minutes and she already caught a fish so
the fishing is good on the middle fork, always.
So is the is this the best fishing river in the world? Yeah, yeah okay Kelsey Helfrich
thinks this is the best fishing river in the world not like she's biased or anything.
So like I mentioned earlier we're here for six days with Helfrich River Outfitter. It is Helfrich's
100th year anniversary, they've been in business for a hundred years. All helmed and led
by a Helfrich. Right now they're in their fourth generation with Kelsey Hellfich and
her husband Kid Youren. On this trip you'll see a bunch of different people but really it's just
two groups there's two families and then there's the Helfrich's, there's the guides,
and then there's me and i even have a family member on this trip. My Uncle is a guide for Helfrich
You can see that there's some green fluorspar here. So we are at
Little Soldier Campground it's about six miles from Indian Creek where we started today. So a real
short day means we got 69 miles left. Since we had a short day there wasn't a whole lot of fishing
that could be done but i think Bob or Tim or one of the matriarchs of this family caught 20 fish.
The way they rigged these flies up i saw it last time is they put two flies on the line. I think
one's an indicator and then the fish normally strikes the second one kind of tagging along
but the fishing on this river is so good there's a lot of times you'll get two fish on it once and
i was seeing that happen quite a bit today. I have a ridiculous amount of room in this tent
all this room that will soon be strewn with my camera gear and charging station and batteries
and things of that nature. Damn i'm tired. It's only day one too, it's gonna be a long week.
So this is the bathroom situation. Very nice groover this is changed out every day.
Got your toilet paper and you just sit here and do your business and
it's very nice. And a run of eight for 16. Oh my god.
This is Uncle Tim, he taught me to play this game
on the river, and here we are again playing it on the river.
Eight, you see eight there? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, oh and a pair for 10.
This is the best coffee that you could ever have outdoors, this is how they do
it it's 5 30 in the morning and my uncle is making coffee over this open fire back here.
Pours the grounds in, grounds sink to the bottom no filter needed, it's delicious stuff.
The unique things about drift boats are they don't splash like a raft, so if you're sitting
in the front of that drift boat even when you go through big rapids you won't get wet. And they're
better for fishing, you can stand up in them and they're very maneuverable, they're really unique.
No one on this trip knows anything about my youtube channel and so when i do things like
this like hold a camera over here and talk to myself uh i can feel them staring at me.
It's day two, day two you just kind of settle down and
and you really get into it so that's what we're gonna do today, we're gonna get into it.
Morning of day three, i have skipped breakfast and hiked my ass all the way up this ridgeline.
I wasn't allowed to bring the drone because we're in the wilderness so now i got to do this old school.
From up here you can see how big this canyon really is and we haven't even hit the biggest
section yet the Impassable Canyon. This is the Frank Church Wilderness and it's the biggest
wilderness in the lower 48. If you don't know who Frank Church was he's kind of a big deal in
Idaho and definitely a big deal in the outdoor pacific northwest community. A pioneer and a big
reason Idaho is the outdoor playground it still is today. Not a bad legacy to leave with the
biggest wilderness in the United States being named after you so thank you Frank Church. Also
i can see my camp packing up so i better get down there and hitch a ride on a drift boat.
So the backcountry plane system here was grandfathered into this wilderness.
Typically in a wilderness you're not allowed to have any kind of motorized vehicles.
As wildernesses were designated that any of the traditions or ways of life that
were already taking place in these areas were allowed to continue. So that's why you see
planes back here, jet boats in Hell's Canyon, and i'm sure a number of other unique things in
different wildernesses. My name is Prince Helfrich and my business is taking people down these various rivers.
Prince Helfrich was the first person to guide trips on the Middle Fork. In the past you actually had to have
boat skills and know how to raft and be able to do your own trip to go down these rivers
and people like Prince made it possible for the masses to experience these places. So Prince's
Grandson is here Ken Helfrich, and then his daughter who's taking over the business Kelsey
Helfrich is here. Really cool to be able to go down the Middle Fork with a family that lives it.
And then yeah i also got my uncle here. My uncle who was the first one to ever take me rafting
on the South Fork of the Boise that's how i actually was introduced to Idaho when i was a kid.
Yeah sure. What? Oh i guess i thought you were questioning why we're sitting next to each other
oh there we go. Through somehow they're weird Helfrich magic we're running
rivers together like 20 years later right when did we first start running rivers?
Yeah it would have been probably even longer ago than that. Yeah actually, yeah when you would come
visit and we'd go on little floats and yeah. And then we didn't float for a long time and then
all of a sudden through this company Helfrich here we are floating again. I was thinking of that
yesterday as i was floating down the river how exactly did you get connected with Helfrich? Oh
my gosh i think that i had a i had a piece for Visit Oregon that i needed to do on the Owyhees.
I reached out to Kelsey asked her if i could do that trip. Later when i was working for Visit Idaho
i asked her to do the Middle Fork trip and i did not know that was the trip you ran like i knew you
worked with them every year but i didn't know your schedule. Right. And then all of a sudden there
you are. There i am. Yeah i'm pretty sure this one was intentional, the first one probably was too
but this one certainly was so we could do it together again. Yeah Kelsey probably was like
i better put him on a trip with his Uncle Tim, i mean again that's their thing right? Yeah it is.
I am hiking the main trail through the Frank Church Wilderness here. I mean you could backpack
this hundred miles if you wanted to and this is the trail you would use. I'm realizing that it
is a lot different experience when you're in the wilderness alone versus when you're with a group
because i was really zoning out when i was by myself, just vibing on the Frank Church Wilderness.
Well there it is, the Middle Fork.
We had some fun.
We had some laughs. We caught some fish. We saw some stars. We hit some rapids.
We did some hiking.
We did a lot of eating. We made new friends, we saw old friends, and we spent some time.
And that made us closer to each other, to this, to everything.
Thanks for watching, we'll see you next time.