May Long Weekend Fly Fishing – Part 3

Finally! Colin caught his first fish on the fly rod. I think I was more excited than he was.

Once again, the weather was not great – it felt like about 5C with very brisk breezes and overcast skies – but the GVCA website indicated the Grand River flowrate at the Shand Damn was down to 10 cubic metres per second, so I decided we’d try over by Inverhaugh. Now, because I’m competing in the upcoming Canadian Fly Fishing Championships next month, our team members have all agreed to keep secret the fly patterns we are using – so don’t expect any information on this until the competition is over. But generically, we were trying a few different nymph patterns and located some fish that were feeding.

Turned out to be chubb – but fat and healthy chubb which still were fun to hook and land. I caught three in about 8 casts and then called Colin over to take over my rod so he could have a go and try his luck. First cast, he had a strike but no real hook up. A few casts later, stripping line, all of a sudden – there was his first fish on the fly rod! Yup, it was a squeaking chubb but for me, it was a relief that after this disappointing weekend weatherwise, he finally caught one.

A few casts later, he even managed to hook a brown trout which broke the tippet section of the leader. Tough luck on that one. Then, the fish seemed to stop feeding – and the wind was still blowing, Colin was chilled to the bone so we decided to go into Elora for a bite to eat at the “Gorge Country Kitchen.” We thought we’d warm up and return for another hour and half of fishing before dark. The Country Kitchen has good food – but perhaps because they were so busy tonight, it seemed to take forever for our dinner to arrive at the table. I ordered Garlic Bread to start with – it took 20 minutes before the cute waitress brought it to us.

After dinner, the cloud cover completely disappeared, the sun was shining and the wind had stopped. We returned with anticipation – but pretty much zilch. Several patterns were offered up – I did get a couple of hits from browns sipping the skim of the water with a caddis pattern, but that was all we had.

It was close to 9:30PM by the time we returned to the van – just as the GVCA guys were driving in to the area asking if we were packing up and leaving. The 45 minute drive home was marked with periods of watching fireworks as some celebrated Victoria Day along with some conversation with Colin who wants to stay another day to have another go at more fish on the fly rod tomorrow. We’ll have to talk to his mom and convince her that it will be ok for him to miss two days of school – personally, I don’t mind – he’s getting an education on the river that he’d never get in school for those two days, and the time I get to spend with him is very valuable to me!

So, there may be a part 4 to our May fly fishing long weekend. Check back to see how successful we are at not only the fishing, but convincing mom that Colin can stay another day!