2009 Fishing Trip with Nbowa
This is something I meant to post back in January, but neglected to get around to it.
Almost exactly a year ago I went to Iowa to show nbowa how to fly-fish on some of the spring creeks in northeast Iowa (original post here: http://roby-panther.livejournal.com/12824.html). These are actually the streams that I first learned to fly-fish on starting back in 2001.
When we reached the stream and made our way to the first decent looking spot, my intention was to show Nbowa a few quick pointers about how to fish the spot and then let him get some practice in. So I made one cast to show him how to approach the spot, and what happened was the last thing I wanted to have happen. In that one cast, I hooked a medium-sized rainbow trout. Fly-fishing is often far from easy and even experienced fly-fisherman dread the first cast fish as a bad omen for the day to come. And, with Nbowa just starting out of course, what followed was a lot of casting, line-untangling, and tree & brush hookups without any fish. Thankfully the day didn't go badly, with Nbowa quickly learning the basics and catching a fair number of fish, including a couple nice, wild browns toward the end.
The start was pretty comical though and as a Christmas & Birthday gift for me, Nbowa commissioned this awesome picture, in a comic strip style to illustrate that start to the day. The artwork is done by John Prengaman, Jr. He is the author of the awesome web comic Sandusky at sandusky.comicgenesis.com/ . I highly recommend checking it out. He's on a temporary hiatus right now because unfortunately the real mountain lion that was the inspiration behind the strip recently was found to have very advanced cancer and had to be put down. Check him out and give him a shout out if you get the chance.
Thanks again for the awesome pic Nbowa! :)
Almost exactly a year ago I went to Iowa to show nbowa how to fly-fish on some of the spring creeks in northeast Iowa (original post here: http://roby-panther.livejournal.com/12824.html). These are actually the streams that I first learned to fly-fish on starting back in 2001.
When we reached the stream and made our way to the first decent looking spot, my intention was to show Nbowa a few quick pointers about how to fish the spot and then let him get some practice in. So I made one cast to show him how to approach the spot, and what happened was the last thing I wanted to have happen. In that one cast, I hooked a medium-sized rainbow trout. Fly-fishing is often far from easy and even experienced fly-fisherman dread the first cast fish as a bad omen for the day to come. And, with Nbowa just starting out of course, what followed was a lot of casting, line-untangling, and tree & brush hookups without any fish. Thankfully the day didn't go badly, with Nbowa quickly learning the basics and catching a fair number of fish, including a couple nice, wild browns toward the end.
The start was pretty comical though and as a Christmas & Birthday gift for me, Nbowa commissioned this awesome picture, in a comic strip style to illustrate that start to the day. The artwork is done by John Prengaman, Jr. He is the author of the awesome web comic Sandusky at sandusky.comicgenesis.com/ . I highly recommend checking it out. He's on a temporary hiatus right now because unfortunately the real mountain lion that was the inspiration behind the strip recently was found to have very advanced cancer and had to be put down. Check him out and give him a shout out if you get the chance.
Thanks again for the awesome pic Nbowa! :)