Sometimes, An Hour Is Just Not Enough

I decided I’d try to get out for an hour’s worth of fishing this evening. I had quite a few things to do, so an hour would suffice, I told myself.   When I drove up the lane, two massive Herons greeted me by flying over my vehicle and making their awful loud squawk  – not exactly song bird material, but I’m not complaining.  Then, an Osprey swept over the large pond in full view. I noted it had no fish in its claws. Was that a sign for the evening?

When I parked my car, I could hear the songbirds in the trees. It was a very pleasant 20 C, not a touch of a breeze.  I looked over at the large pond I had parked near, and this is the view that I met with:

It was just gorgeous!  As you can see, some of the trees have their leaves starting to change colour. In another month, there will be shades of crimson red, blazing orange and bright yellows here.  I just spent a few minutes taking it all in, and marveling that I was the only person there.  I had the area all to myself.  I almost wondered if I should fish this evening – perhaps just a walk and observing everything I could observe, was a thought.  But no, I decided to fish – and observe all that I could observe. with rod in hand.

One thing I observed was that no fish were rising – not even to the minnows in the area.  I again observed the Ospreys flying with no fish.  I hope that is not a “sign” for my former teammates on The Ospreys heading to the Canadian Fly Fishing Championships later this month! :).  However, the Belted Kingfishers seemed to be doing okay along the shoreline. A family of ducks – the mother with her little ones that were growing were frolicking in the water on the other side of the pond.  When I walked down to the shore after I first arrived, they taxied along the water and took off into the air, only to return a few minutes later, this time skidding on the water as they all landed, quacking away.

I decided to take it all in from the shore, casting my flies to various parts within my casting range.  But to be honest, this evening I was not focusing much on the fish but instead simply appreciating what surrounded me.  I noticed a single turtle sitting on a stump out in the pond.  Sometimes I see several turtles sitting out there, and wondered where the others might be. I’m not sure where the turtles make their home.

Then I decided to include listening as well as my observing. Crickets. Lots of crickets chirping, almost in some sort of unison as if they all know how to chirp together to make some kind of the most beautiful natural song. I smiled. It reminded me of an evening in Jasper, sitting on a hotel balcony. “Do you hear the crickets?”

“No, I don’t hear crickets?”

“You can’t hear the crickets, baby? Really?  Just cut out the other background noise and see if you can hear them.” There was some kind of mill or something running in the distance, but I could hear the crickets too.  We still laugh over that.  This evening I was thinking of calling and putting my cell phone up in the air and asking loud enough to be heard, “Do you hear the crickets?!?”

The area is also on the commercial jetliner route from the west to Toronto’s International Airport, and every 15 minutes or so, I could hear and see mostly WestJet passenger planes on their approach to Toronto.  But they didn’t ruin the surroundings.  It won’t be long until I am on one of those flights, heading out of Toronto and am hoping to fly fish the Freeman River in Alberta, north west of Edmonton and perhaps a couple of other places.

An hour passed. “I was only coming for an hour in the first place, right? So shall I pack up?” I thought to myself. That is when I decided to get into one of the row boats. “Only half an hour longer,” I said to myself.

That’s when I started to make noise, and any of the wildlife that might have stopped to listen and observe me must have been wondering what on earth sort of behavior this human was doing.

Someone recently put new oarlocks on the boats, and I had to bang away with my fist, along with some choice words uttered, at not being able to fit the pin on the oar into the oarlock. I’m sitting in this boat, all ready to go – even remembered to grab my life jacket out of the car – and the oar pins won’t fit into the oarlocks! The ducks stopped quacking, the Ospreys seemed to fly a little closer, and the crickets stopped chirping.  At least at that point, I couldn’t hear them, as I tried to wriggle, and then pound with my fist, against the oar.

If I remember, I’ll take some grease over the next time.  But I finally did manage and rowed out and thought I’d just cast my fly in whatever direction I felt like.  I wasn’t in a competition, and I wasn’t practicing for a competition, and I didn’t really care if I caught a fish this evening.  I could cast over the bow, even if I was in the stern. I could cast behind me, even if I was very slowly drifting the other way.  I could look around, and decide not to bother changing my fly, even though I had a hundred different patterns, and what I was using didn’t seem to be working.

I was focusing on enjoying the moment. The sounds, the evening, And you know what happened next? A vicious strike to my Viva Zonker.  My rod bent over as I set the hook.  Now once again, it was the turn of the other wildlife to listen to me:

“Yes!! Alright!  Woo hoo!”

But not for long. Although I had the fish hooked for about 15 seconds, it managed to shake it. And no, there were no coloured words from me, rather a smile and a feeling of “hey, that was cool. Maybe there’s more about like him ” If my son David were around, he probably would have said something like, “Dad, you scared the fish right off the hook with your woo hooing.”  At least that is what he said the last time it happened when he was with me, with a cheeky wee grin on his face. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I should have focused on performance and improving skill, rather than the sheer pleasure of feeling a fish on the other end.  Who knows? We’ll just call it “another long release.”

Shortly after 8PM, I was drifting and casting to the east, and observed a glorious display of an almost full moon rising above the trees.  The reflection of the moon could be seen on the surface of the water, almost right in front of me.  Sometimes, when everything is just so wonderful, it’s one thing to enjoy it on your own.  But sometimes, you really want to share that with another person. And I could wait not longer, and called Colleen to tell her how much I wished she could be there and experiencing what I was enjoying.

“Have you caught anything, Ian?”

“Well, no, but I did have one on and lost it a few minutes ago. It doesn’t matter though. It’s just so .. beautiful right now!”  And I told her about the moon rising, and tried to take photos while I was talking with her.  With the sun behind me still still shining it’s brightness even as it was setting, I couldn’t see what I was looking at through the digital camera’s screen.  But I did get some nice shots of the moon’s reflection.

As the sun set further, I decided I should head back to the dock, even thought the bright moon provided enough illumination to see where I was going. After securing the boat, I thought I’d have a few more casts from the dock.  An hour is just never enough sometimes.  It was interesting.. several soft taps and tugs over the ten or so casts that followed, but no solid hook ups.  Finally I decided it was time to leave, but before I did, I looked behind me to the east, and this is what I saw just before leaving:  If you look closely, directly above the reflection of the moon in the water, just where the trees are reflected, you’ll see a ripple. It’s more clear in the larger size image. A rainbow trout had risen.  Also, if you look to the right of the moon, you can see Jupiter which also showed up in the photo and was very clear to the eye.