Yesterday provided an unexpected and delightful reminder of why I fish, and it came via a somewhat unconventional (for a dyed in the wool, Northern-Rockies trout guy) channel – the Orvis Bass on the Fly event in Plano.
Steven Palmer, the Orvis Fishing Manager there, tagged three regional guides who put on one of the best two-hour casting clinics I’ve seen in a long time (followed by an afternoon of indoor talks), focusing on the fine points of hucking big bass flies on what ended up being a damned windy and unseasonably warm, sunny spring day. The crowd, which amazingly grew to over 130 fishers at the peak of the day, didn’t seem to mind one bit that the back parking lot did double duty as the bass lake / casting pond.
That’s Rob Woodruff above and Steve Hollensed below making it look much easier than it really is…
Good food, free beer from Tupps Brewery, and a chance to rub shoulders with local legends like guide Alvin Dedeaux of All Water Guides in Austin (far left below) and fishing manager / local fly genius Steven (with the water bottle), coupled with a gear giveaways (including a rod in fact), kept folks smiling.
The icing on the cake was raising just shy of $1,300 for Reel Recovery, one of the most impressive fly fishing oriented charities in the game these days; that was done selling $10 raffle tickets for part of the gear giveaway, though I heard several stories of folks giving much more “just because”.
But perhaps the best of all – this was a half day spent with folks from damned diverse social, educational and professional backgrounds who came together to talk about fly fishing. Not a word was uttered about immigration, health insurance, the judiciary, taxes, the economy, gender-identity and bathroom choice, racism or whether or not the above average temperature yesterday signaled the climate apocalypse.
Sometimes it just is about the fly fishing and supporting good folks like the Reel Recovery guys and gals.
