Last Hurrah

I convinced the family to go on one last comping trip before the Minnesota weather turns terrible and none of us ever want to leave the house again... During this time of the Coronavirus, Minnesotans and all Upper Midwesterners seem to be heading to campgrounds in droves, so it was a little tough to find a spot that wasn't already spoken for, but eventually I was able to find a fun site, not too far from our house. It is my newfound policy to never give out the location of our travels, so let's just say it was somewhere in the northern half of the Continental United States. If you expect more info you clearly don't know me very well.

Our home away from home.

The entire weekend was pretty much perfect, except for the annoyingly loud family that was playing catch right outside our camper well after quiet hours on the first night. Thankfully they quieted down as soon as the hero of our story went and looked at them menacingly. Oh, he also asked nicely, so maybe that is why they quieted down. Being menacingly polite usually works wonders, if you ask our hero...

On a hike/death march.

In our party were 2 pre-teen girls. Apparently they were too cool to hang with us, so in this pic from our hike they are up near the end of this gravel road. 

The weather was perfect, the terrain was beautiful, the hikes/death marches were not too grueling, and the food was amazing. What more could you ask for?!?! Oh, yes, and the fishing was superb, too! I got up early both mornings and got a little bit of fishing in. To be honest, I got up too early the first morning, meaning I had to sit around in the front seat of the Family Truckster, waiting for it to get light enough for me to see my hands in front of my face. Who knew that the sun comes up so late in the middle of October? Not this night owl, that's for sure...

Waiting for the sun...

I told The Missus that I would be back in time for breakfast, so once the sun finally came up I had about an hour to fish before I had to blast. I know the fish in this particular stream love Wooly Buggers, so I tied on one of my Mushroom & Swiss Buggers, and it proved to be the correct choice. At the end of the hour I had landed about 15 trout and one nice chub, and I missed many others. It was epic.

A wonderful spot.

I had a little bit more time on the second morning, so I decided to park in the same spot, but head downstream to see if the fish got bigger the farther they were from civilization. The action wasn't as fast and furious, but I did manage to land about 8 trout in an hour and a half or so. Plus the 2nd day's chub was quite larger than the first day's chub. So there's that. And I would say the average size of the trout was bigger than the first day. Epic yet again!

This big boy wouldn't stay in the net, so I snapped a quick pic before I got him back in the water. Not the best photo quality, but oh well.

The rest of the weekend was spent with the family, hiking, exploring, eating s'mores, and just generally having fun. A wonderful way to end the camping season. Can't wait for next year!

Last trout of the trip, and probably of the calendar year for me. A great way to finish things up!

 

Getting Together

 As I have written before, I have a couple of buddies who are as nutty about fiberglass rods as I am, and we sometimes get together, with our glass rods, and do a little bit of casting out in the yard outside my office building. I will call these two buddies Peter and Greg, because those are their names. If they wanted to remain anonymous they shouldn't have become buddies with me...

Just a few of the rods we were trying out...

With all the Covid stuff happening this year, we hadn't gotten together to do any casting all summer. We finally were able to get a day that worked for all of us, so these two nutty dudes came over last Thursday at high noon. Somehow we lucked out with the Minnesota weather, as we had a beautifully warm and cloudless day. We all brought all the rods we had acquired since the last time we got together, plus a few others, and we had a fun hour or five of casting. 

Greg (foreground) & Peter (background), trying out rods.

Greg has fallen deep into the world of rod building, and he has started to pump out some beautiful, high quality builds using Lamiglas blanks. I believe he now has every rod in the Lamiglas Honey Blank lineup, and he brought them all. My favorite of those was his 6'6" 3wt, not necessarily because it seemed like a good fishing tool, but more so because I had never felt a rod that flexed so far into the handle. It seemed as though the reelseat itself was flexing along with the rod, which I think is impossible, but that's what it felt like. If I was actually fishing, I would have chosen one of his other rods, but for casting in the yard, that little 3wt sure was something...

Four of Greg's Lamiglas rods. The 6'6" 3wt is 2nd from the bottom. That is one noodly rod!

Peter brought his two Fred Paddock rods, which are both super sweet, along with his Orvis Superfine Glass and Orvis Fullflex "A" 6wt. I brought my two Vince Cummings rods, my Larry Kenney 5wt, and a few others. All of the rods were sweet. As you may have heard me say a billion times before, I believe that the fly rod is the coolest tool that man has ever invented. Can't wait for the next casting get-together!

Winston glass.

St. Croix glass

Because of the Corona and susceptible family members, we wore gloves and masks for the first time at one of our get-togethers. Afterwards we all went out and robbed a bank. Don't tell anyone...