After a 10-hour drive from their dens in New Jersey, Jim Rikhoff, president of the National Sporting Fraternity, Drew Holl, a sporting-art dealer and Lamar Underwood, editor of Harris Publications of New York, winced in unison when I greeted them with: “High water and hard fishing.” Stan Bogdan, builder of the superbly crafted reels that bear his name, smiled and said, “Tie on a bigger fly and keep fishing.” The remarkably fit octogenarian, whose main lodge is in Nashua, N.H., arrived at my house earlier.

Minutes later, however, glasses were lifted when I predicted we’d have good fishing at our next-day destination, Millbrook Farm Camp on New Brunswick’s Upsalquitch River. Because the river was settling and clearing and salmon arriving off the full-moon tides were beginning to hold in Millbrook’s pools, I felt confident in making that chancy cast.

When we arrived there the next afternoon, we were greeted by Millbrook’s owner, BDN publisher Rick Warren. With the exception of Stan Bogdan, a gentleman by all standards, Rick has displayed sportsmanship and resilience by continuously inviting the aforementioned to his camp. When he told us he released a salmon that morning and raised another, I didn’t tell my entourage “I told you so,” but I grinned it.

A drizzle was doing its best to become rain when, with our assigned guides, we went onto the Upsalquitch for the evening fishing. Because the river’s high, swift current made wading practically impossible, we fished from 24-foot river canoes as stable as sidewalks.

At Home Pool, the anchor line strummed to the rhythm of the river while I covered the classic salmon water with a No. 4 Lady Amherst. But to my knowledge, the fly that is my favorite didn’t get so much as a second look from a fish. Toads were tuning up for their nocturnal chorus when Bill Murray, Millbrook’s manager and my guide that evening said, “I haven’t seen a fish show his face. There were a few here this mornin’, but they must’ve moved upriver.”

“Either that or they’re anti-social,” I answered. “Let’s head in and hear what the others have to say.”

While the blazing warmth of the fireplace drew the dampness from our bones, fish stories filled the camp’s sitting room: At the Mouth Pool, Jim and Stan each released a grilse. Jim’s fish took a Green Highlander, while Stan’s couldn’t resist the charms of – heaven help me! – a Lady Amherst. I was devastated. My faithful Lady had forsaken me for an older man. At Moores’, a salmon gave Lamar Underwood’s rod a severe case of the bends before coming unstuck. Drew Holl’s invitations, however, were totally ignored.

Handy to the serving of soup and sandwiches, Bill Bullock, the “head guide” at Bangor’s Merrill Merchants Bank joined us. After listening to our discussion about moving fish not being taking fish, he said assuredly, “You guys haven’t got the right fly. What you need is a John Olin.” As you might imagine, the ensuing casts on the subject of flies grew long and, like most long casts, impressive but unproductive. Typical of the first night in all camps, the embers in the fireplace were sleepy-eyed long before the snoring started.

Pewter-toned clouds were smudging a putty-colored sky as Rick and I arrived at Church Run the next morning. “You fish first,” he said. “There aren’t any fish in this drop.” What are friends for? But you know what they say about payback: no sooner did our host start “fishin’ and wishin” when he became the victim of a hit-and-run grilse. As it turned out, no one’s tackle was tested that morning and, come evening, thunder rumbled through the graveled gulches of the Upsalquitch. Consequently, no fish were caught that night.

But what a difference a day makes. At Crib Pool the next morning, a grilse quickly swatted my Green Hornet, a fly I created for the trip. Owing to my appetite for poached salmon and egg gravy, I kept the silvery prize. With that, I was done fishing for the day in accordance with a regulation implemented in New Brunswick this year. Directly, my fishing partner Jim Rikhoff lost a grilse on a Green Highlander, then promptly hooked and landed another, which he kept. To top things off, our guide Bill Murray borrowed my rod and wasted no time in putting another grilse in the canoe’s fish box.

So it went: At the Mouth, Drew lost a grilse that took a Green Hornet and Bill Bullock landed one that latched onto a John Olin. At Moores’, Lamar hooked and lost two salmon. His luck changed that evening, however, when he and Stan fished at the Mouth. On his first cast, Lamar hooked and landed a grilse that he elected to keep. Stan then followed suit by hooking a grilse on his third cast. After the fish was released, he landed and released another, which ended his day’s fishing. The new regulation also states that an angler who releases two fish is “off the river.”

Having watched that performance from the riverbank, I drove to Church Run, where Rick and Drew were fishing without results, and informed them of Lamar’s and Stan’s success. Suffice it to say, the Mouth wasn’t vacant for long. Although the drizzle veiling the river had turned to a downpour, Drew caught and released a salmon that was stung by a Green Hornet. Shortly thereafter, Rick acquitted another fish of its folly via an involuntary release.

Let’s just say the spirits in camp that night were as festive and bright as a fresh-run salmon. The record showed we had caught 11 fish, lost six and raised several others. But the rains that roared throughout the night and all the next morning turned our final chance at fishing into a washout. Call it pure luck that we arrived at Millbrook when the river was dropping and the fish were holding long enough to put a fly over them. But also keep in mind that God’s best friends were fishermen.

Tom Hennessey’s column can be accessed on the BDN Internet page at: www.bangornews.com.