I remember before a few inches of snow and some really bitter, yes bitter cold temperatures saying something like that. Am I crazy....? I guess that would depend on who you ask, maybe my wife for one. Maybe me too sometimes. Anyone who would get up at 5:00am to pack lunches and gear, meet my client(s), and then drive for an hour and a half for more to get in a river that is hovering at around freezing and has so much ice in it that just pondering where you where you might even be able to make a cast ........well, maybe the word crazy is appropriate. But you know, we'll have probably all been there a time or two. You soon realize the itch that keeps me going is the same itch that is inside the person I am guiding, they and I just want to get out. And lastly, I think maybe its just another way to show our manhood, even if we freeze in the process.
We live in a place that we can pretty much fish most any day of the year. Sometimes that means going in less than perfect, even lousy conditions.....but there have been times that maybe we got into an unexpected hatch, or caught a really large fish....that we keep hoping that the day will be "one of those days." Like when Mark Stauffer and I fished an outright deluge this fall on the South Holston, only to catch a great BWO hatch and catch about 75 or 80 fish. And this summer, when a two day trip with Brian Fitzgerald, his wife Linda, and Linda's parents forced us to fish a section of river that we weren't planning on fishing. That particular trip Linda's dad Tom Wright caught a brown trout over 12lbs, a VA citation fish and the second largest documented brown caught in the state of VA in 2007. And then there was the bitter cold day with Mac Cheek in Ashe County last fall, when the river had pretty much frozen except for a few pools, and we ended up with a double digit day- - -something I'd not expected but that both of us were glad for. And then finally, when I met customers Jeff Terrell, Ken Whitescarver, and their friend Mel Harley up in Ashe Co. last year. It was Mel's "bachelor get away" before his big day and the guys had planned a trip in advance only to have a major cold front blow in. The temp when I arrived on the morning we were supposed to fish was 9F in the sun, the New River looked like something in the Artic circle, an ice cold flow complete with large chunks of ice bobbing as they made their way downstream. Our solution: enjoy the fire in the cabin, rig our gear inside, eat plenty of food, put on our waders, and in the meantime hope the temperature rose enough to get a cast or two off without the line freezing to the guides. The result? The temp warmed up to a balmy 20F, the line still froze to the guides, but a 15-20 fish afternoon from about noon til 4pm, with a couple of 18-20 rainbows and several nice brookies.....all on a day that seemed impossible at the start. Go figure. Sometimes in this thing called fishing you have to play the hand you are dealt. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. Somedays you count the fish you catch, other days you count strikes. And sometimes just the fact that you can catch a fish on a day like this is pretty amazing. And, all of it leads you back to that same question.....are we crazy? I know I am pretty often, how about you?
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