About West Virginia's Elk River, my boyhood home

In the picture above is the house I grew up in. The Elk River is on the left.
This satellite picture was taken sometime my beloved black Dodge truck
(318 eng. manual steering and brakes) I used to have is parked in the
driveway. You can see two horizontal lines below dad's blue rig truck. One
is my boat, the other is dad's canoe.

I'm often asked about the Elk River. In my weekly outdoors column (oh,
yes, I write for a living), I always refer to it on first reference as ''West
Virginia's premiere river,'' which it is.

The most common response I hear is ''Don't know where it is, but it must
be a place where elks live.'' Yes and no. The name comes from a translation
of an Indian word "tiskawah,'' meaning '''a place where elks live.'' That was
true until the 19th Century, when, unfortunately, the eastern elk became
extinct.

At 180 miles long, the Elk is the longest river flowing entirely within the
state of West Virginia and is one of the most remote along its winding
course. Because of geology and its flora, I suppose, the Elk has a unique
emerald green water unlike other rivers in West Virginia which are a duller
green hue at normal flow.

In its headwaters, it is one of the, if not the, best trout streams in the
Eastern United States. A few miles down from its source, the river actually
disappears, seeping into a six-mile long network of underground caverns.

On the bottom two-thirds of its course, it is one of the state's best musky
and smallmouth bass fisheries. I grew up on a mile long section of the Elk
known as Jarrett's Ford, and could literally step out of my backyard and
into the river. The river is shallow enough to wade that entire mile-long
stretch and I spent many summers as a boy wading those waters for
smallmouth bass.

I live about an hour away from the wonderful river now, which makes each
time I can see that emerald water the more enjoyable.

Dave

I took this picture of a doe drinking out of the
elk while I was drifting down the elk on my boat
in June 2007.

Here's me flyfishing for smallmouth bass near
my parents' house. I can step out of their yard
and wade about a mile's worth of fishable
river.

(Above) This old Johnboat has served me
well since I was a kid. It was originally my
grandfather's. He and my dad were traveling
on an interstate at when it fell out of the
back of the truck, spinning along the
four-lane at 65 mph and it was once caught
inside and carried away by a tornado. BUT,
she still floats.

I don't know what this grass is here, but I caught it in bloom June 2007.
This is the only plant that will grow, besides a few scrawny sycamores, on
the numerous islands in the Elk that are above water only during the
summer.