November 22, 2009
Has the fumes of the opposite sex and adolescence sincerely taken over the vice of passionate portrayal? Due to the typical collegiate outlook, it’s been over a month since my last blog, and sadly, I’ve forever lost quite a few memories shared with new lifetime friends all sharing the same passion as myself. Women… bars… also known as ‘teenage wasteland’ has left me closing my eyes in unfamiliar places. and taken up the lay time I usually, though now seldom, devoted to my concentration on fly fishing. Razz, a friend I met through the fisherie.com forums, has been at me for weeks about getting to the water together. I finally had enough after countless threads that were posted with laurel highland fish that make even the novice angler’s heart race just a little faster at the tug of a swing or slurp of a dry. I twisted and turned the night before, rising just after 5 am and began the journey into the upper reaches of the Appalachian mountain range. After a brief introduction with Razz, we loaded the rods onto the straps that reside on the hood of his car, and were soon ginking our dries while quietly approaching the wild rainbows I had put my research in over the past year to locate. Our groggy eyes were quickly opened just a bit more as we saw a scurry of wild fins race upstream, forcefully reminding us that stealth, not fly selection, was the key to our success today. After missed opportunities, the splash of a small wild brought out the second nature of a fly fisherman, the hook set, and Razz and I were photographing the first catch of the day, all smiles, and a sense of optimism now touched the ground with each tread upstream.A few wild bows photographed, a few missed strikes that were accompanied with laughs, and the sun now high in the sky, we ventured to another wild stream that I had heard nothing but positive reports about, but surprisingly never ventured to. Easy public parking and a community center bordered the stream’s access, instantly bringing on that pessimistic outlook on wild fish being in the vicinity, however, was quickly diminished after wild brook trout was swimming out of my hands after the second drift into a hole that cut and eroded the bank, showing the roots of healthy, thick maple. With little time to fish, and the desire to swing some buggers to the fall stocking of fish in a local dhalo, we focused on the best stretches of stream, and moved rather fast. In the distance, I could see the mecca of the freestoner; a run that ran 40+ yards with a plunge pool at the head. As Razz slowly worked the tail, I could see an abnormally large fish sitting at the bottom of an emerging rock. Razz quickly id’d the fish and threw a size 12 stimulator a few feet to the left, and behold, a 16 wild brown turned to it’s side, slowly making it’s way in perfect harmony to the fly. A gentle sip and the firm set of Razz’s bamboo set the fish into fight and flight, ripping and tearing through the stretch desperately trying to break his tippet, but to no avail. Not a soul was seen on the waters we walked, adding to the story book experience. It’s days like this, when we, as anglers, set off into serene places, absorbing the tranquility of nature at it’s finest, that we are reminded the simplest things in life are actually the most complicated, yet most treasured things to acquire.
Happy Thanksgiving
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