An Evening Turned Into Thirty Minutes

So, my allergies were bothering me so badly today, I couldn’t focus on work. Decided to take a Claritin and pick up some eyedrops, and then head to the Grand River for an evening’s fly fishing. Arrived just upstream of the “power lines” entrance and was surprised by the number of cars parked on the side of the road but got set up and walked down to the river anyhow.

Another angler was fishing the spot I wanted, so I fished some other water before he left. When he left, I waded over to the area he was fishing in and had a few casts when I noticed a nice trout rising in a lovely bit of “glide” water. I cast to it a couple of times, and the second cast was awarded with bringing this nice 13 incher to hand. Snapped a couple of pictures before releasing it:

Grand River Brown

 

If you click on the image, you’ll get a larger view.

 

Just as I was releasing this fish, a couple of anglers came wading down the river, right through a nice pool behind me that I wanted to fish, and in fact one of them planted himself 20 feet right behind me. Sheesh! Fishing etiquette should also include some common sense, don’t you think? Anyhow, I told the guy that if he didn’t move, I wasn’t responsible for my fly tearing out a piece of his ear on my backcast. He grunted and left.

 

Some thunder and lightening was happening in the distance, but then the wind picked up and the rain drops turned to a downpour with lightening going on around me – I figured it was time to get off the river. Last thing I want is to be standing there with a long piece of graphite pointing skyward when the electrons in the atmosphere decided to find ground. I had only been fishing for about 30 minutes, and I also wanted to protect my camera, tucked into a pocket in my vest, from the rain.

 

By the time I got to my van, I was totally soaked – but what the heck – a nice brown trout in the 30 minutes I was fishing, caught on an Ian James tied “Tap Dance Caddis,” size 20. Good enough for me!

 

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