Well, I Sucked – Day One

What a muck up this Canadian Fly Fishing Championships is turning out to be.  Both on an organizational level and my own fishing.

First, I sure did get less than three hours sleep last night – because of a work related issue, I was up all night.  So without sleep, I left the house around 5:30AM, and drove the meet-up place at Elora  Conservation Area.  My first beat was on the Conestoga River, scheduled for 8AM, but when I arrived there at 7:30, no one was around.  in fact, no one showed up until 8:15.  My competitor did arrive – but we had no “controller,” so we decided to start fishing anyhow.

Without sleep, and the schedule being messed up, I was already a bit frustrated – but time to go fishing! Wrong. Well, I did fish, but the darn deer flies were buzzing around me, biting at my wrists, trying to crawl into my hair, and I started making lots of mistakes.  I was using flies that had been productive on this stretch previously, and even had two takes to one fly, but then after that, nothing.  So, switched flies.  Hooked a few chub, but they don’t count.

Then I realized I had left my fly and line floatant in my vehicle. In the water I was fishing, if one wanted to use dries, it was pretty important stuff to have around.

At the half  time mark, myself and Claude changed places on the beat – and I discovered he had caught a couple of fish on the upper half.  So, I was looking forward to seeing if I could do the same – I tried everything but got nothing!

My confidence was totally shaken, as Claude even managed to get fish on the lower portion of the beat where I had been earlier.  All I got was chub.  I was quite embarrassed by this turn of events, and was not looking forward to reporting in to our Team Captain – but it turned out both he and his competitor on the beat they were fishing were skunked.  So, I didn’t feel so bad, except for the fact that my competitor did come away with fish.

So, we finished up a bit later than the scheduled time, me with deerfly bites all over the backs of my hands, and I wanted to pick up a bite to eat but was told I needed to be on my afternoon beat at least half an hour early.  Well, I arrive, and again there is no one.  I wait.. and wait.. and wait… a judge finally shows up and I have a pleasant conversation with her, during which I’m told that there was a bagged lunch for all the competitors available.  Since no one has shown up yet to fish these beats, the judge offers to go grab my lunch – I was famished so of course I agreed to that.

But, when she arrives back with the lunch, everyone else shows up to fish the beats – but they are all about an hour late.   The sun is shining brightly, and of course tired and disorganized me forgot to  bring along sunscreen. So, I’m standing in the river for the final three hours, in hot blazing sun, no sunscreen, and trying to figure out the upper portion of the beat I’m on.  Beautiful fast water, with deep pools, no fish seem to be rising.  I am making perfect casts to the bank, drifting flies under the bush and trees – notta.

Well, chub.  But they still don’t count.

When we had first checked out the river together, my competitor and I walked up stream along one bank.  Because I  already had all my gear with me, when we flipped a coin, I agree to just stay upstream and await him to get ready.  So, I’m checking out what I think is my half of the beat, and it seems the only fishable water is this long fast current section that’s deep.  However, my competitor, while he is fishing downstream, can see that there is actually an island – what I’m thinking is the far bank – and there’s another section of river that could be fished.  But for where I am, I have no idea that this exists.

I didn’t realize it until after we traded places, and then could see this other water coming around the other side of the island.  *Sigh*

So, in my first hour and a half, just a few chub.

My second hour and a half was more promising – good riffle water with some nice pools – the area my competitor had just finished fishing, and he apparently picked up two browns there in the 90 minutes.

Well, I did pick up one, and with this being Canada, we had to measure in metric – the fish was 20 cm.  I had a few more takes after that, but no solid hook ups except for more chub.

So that is how my Day one ended.  One fish. I’m probably in last place right now in the standings!! So, I’m heading to  bed to catch up on sleep, missing out on a team bar-b-que – but I really need to get a good night’s sleep before Day 2.

And yeah.. lots of Vitamin E skincream soaking into my skin right now too. Apparently, my face is past being red – it’s maroon.