Eclipse

 Emily and I trod out into a snow-covered clear cut in Northwestern Maine, with hardly a cloud in the sky and the sun bright overhead. It was warm despite the snow, perhaps 55 degrees at that time. We'd come to this place for a very specific reason, and for once it wasn't fish or snakes that had gotten me to Maine. We were two of many in fact. People of all walks of life had driven to a strip of Northern New England to watch a quirk of astronomy that has been stunning earthlings for as long as there've been such critters scrambling around the surface of this planet. We had all come here for the solar eclipse. 

I've been captivated by the world in a very absolute way as long as I can remember, from microorganisms to such cosmic displays. I'm drawn to see and experience as much as I can while I'm here. That all consuming need to be wherever something huge, powerful, and awe inspiring is what drives my storm chasing. The feeling of being in front of the updraft of a supercell or braced against the wind of a landfalling hurricane isn't easily described, but I know I need it like I need water, food, and sleep. I can't stand when I miss a tornado within 10 hours of home. The idea of missing the eclipse was similar, if not more so considering how easily predicted they are. But I must say, my excitement was tempered a little. Not knowing what to expect was the tricky thing. How many people would there be? Would there be an immense traffic jam that would stop us from getting there? would it actually live up to the hype?

But that had all settled when we found that clear cut. There were two other small groups, each a hundred yards or more away, so we more or less had a spot to ourselves. The view was tremendous, and the clean snow would make a canvas for a mysterious phenomena known as shadow bands to dance across. We laid down a blanket and made a snowman to where an extra pair of glasses, then settled in to watch as the moon slowly began to traverse the face of the sun. 

Shadows on the ground soon began to take a crescent like shape, mirroring the shadow being cast by the moon. The light began to take a more and more bizarre quality. Though every morning the sun is shadowed the same amount as it rises and sets, the way that light looks is so familiar. It's refracted by the atmosphere in just such a way, coming from just such an angle. Coming from almost over head its something else entirely. Then, as totality approached, shadow bands wavered across the snow. And in moments it was nighttime, if only for a few minutes. 

It's pretty easy to understand why people without the knowledge of the earth's orbit around the sun and the moon's orbit around earth though the world might be ending for just a moment, then chalk the event up to a higher power's wrath, or even a warning. It was astonishingly surreal and breathtaking, more so than I'd anticipated. It moved me nearly to tears. 

I'll be 47 the next time an eclipse's path of totality will cross the contiguous United States. There's not much that could stop me from being there to see it happen again. It's very much one of those things that must be seen at least once, and to me left a need to fulfill that same feeling the next time the opportunity arises. Like seeing a humpback whale breach. Or flipping a rock and seeing the vibrance of a smooth green snake underneath. Or looking up into the heart of a massive, rotating thunderstorm that could at any moment touch the earth with the ferocity to kill and destroy. When people don't feel a raw and intense emotion from such experiences, I don't understand that. When they do, to the point of taking off time from work, getting friends and family in the car gathering in a place far from home all to see the same natural spectacle, it makes much more sense. And in some ways it's almost as beautiful as the spectacle itself. 

hank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, Sammy, and Cris & Jennifer, Courtney, and Hunter for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version. 

Giant Brook Trout

 I can catch oodles of eight inch brook trout in Connecticut. Those are wonderful, special little fish, and I never take them for granted, but I try to make a point not to travel for a fish I can catch at home. Maine has big brook trout, still. Certainly not as many as it once did, but they are there. When I go to Maine, that's what I want to catch: brook trout that thoroughly dwarf those I could catch back at home. That hasn't always happened, but I've gotten better and better at manufacturing it with each trip. 

Back in Late September with Noah, I'd already gotten some fantastic and healthy fish to hand (read here), but was very much hoping for something even a little bit larger than those. It had become fairly clear from that experience that fairly thoroughly covering quite a lot of water would be necessary in order to find larger fish in these small creeks with lake runners, as they were clearly not evenly distributed and even some of the nicest looking water may not be holding. 

Though we were only about six hours from home, this was very different territory. I traversed high grassy banks along shallow, gravely runs before dropping onto sand bars pocked with moose tracks, staying low and moving swiftly but with intent so as not to spook any fish that might be in shallow, visible lies. I didn't really see fish for a long time, it was clear that most were holding in the very deep, slow pools. That made sense, it wasn't spawning time yet so there was little need for the fish to put themselves at risk in the shallow tailouts and pockets just yet. They were likely hopping from deep spot to deep spot on their way up, with some time in the faster runs with lots of cover as well like where I'd caught them the day before. 

But even those didn't always seem to provide the pull I was looking for. Then I came to one dark, deep bend pool with an overhanging tree and loads of wood in the water. This one had to be harboring something large. The head looked extremely juicy, with the main current dumping over a beautiful gravel shelf into the depths of the pool and a foam covered eddy on the other side with branches sticking through. I dangled and tightlined the big, heavy Ausable Ugly through the faster current, then pulsed and retrieved it through the eddy. Not believing there wasn't a fish there to be caught, I then went back through it again making extra certain the fly got down deep. As small one obliged, maybe 10 inches... that wasn't it. I moved on to the heart of the pool, counting the fly down and retrieving gradually, forming figure eights with the line in the palm of my hand then raising the rod tip in little jumps as the leader neared the tip. Still no satisfying thump. I had moved down to the tail when Noah rounded the corner. We both remarked how incredible this pool looked and that there must be a large fish in it. Looking back to what I was doing I saw a large dark shadow streak out from one of the many logs. I struck, my rod flexing as the hook point found purchase, and said "Oh there she is!"

Large brook trout often don't have the piss and vinegar of other salmonid species, and though this was one of the heavier trout I'd stuck in a while it wasn't terribly hard to control. We had it in the net in just a short time. The fish of the trip was indeed a hefty one, and dressed up in proper brook trout finery. 

It had been a number of years since I'd tied into a Maine brook trout this size, and to do so in a lesser known fishery made it all the more satisfying. It was yet another reminder of the magic these fish I've long adored hold. Brook trout were one of the fish that brought me to fly fishing and made me obsess over it, hiking and biking sometimes 60 miles in a day to try to find new streams before I could drive. I'm less brook trout obsessed than I was back then, but they do remain a driving force in my angling- the hard headed, gaudy, and aggressive native that they are. It is hard to deny the appeal. They stand both for wilderness and the fact that we haven't quite snuffed out wild things yet, even when we've done our damnedest to do so. In Connecticut, there are still wild brook trout swimming behind shopping centers and through neighborhoods. In Maine, there are still big, darkly colored brookies residing in lakes and ponds and a few rivers. They are a stubborn relic of what this land once was. 

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, and Sammy for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

One Run (Big Maine Brookies)

The Maine woods are a contradiction. Though vast and mostly very quiet, much of it is little more than a mono-culture crop. Pine trees grown, then are cut down, then grow again. This keeps them at a level of unnatural sterility, as that's not how woods are supposed work. Luckily its possible to find more natural state forest nowadays, especially in proximity to water. We've gotten a bit better at not wrecking everything and understand that clear cutting a riverbank is an inherently bad idea. The woods Noah and I traversed along a small lake tributary had been allowed to do their things for a good while and were a healthy mix of hard and softwood with some different maturities and a few clear areas where berry bushes and wild flowers grew. The mature trees kept shade on the stream, which tumbled through big pale granite boulders before becoming more sinuous and slow moving at its lower end, with grassy cut banks and deep, dark pools.

It was late September, the very end of the general trout season in Maine, and we were after big, colored up lake run brookies. I'd fished this area before a number of times, once with Noah, but never for the glorious fall season. My late friend Alan Petrucci was very much responsible for my infatuation with the Rangeley Region and for much of my knowledge of where and how to fish it. This particular stream was one of his favorites. I'd fished it before a few times, memorably with my father one July. The resident fluvial brookies were small and scrappy, but left me wanting more. Now, in September, the migratory fish should be showing their faces. Alan had made mention once of an 18 inch male he caught under one bridge on an Edson Tiger. Such a fish in that small, tumbling freestone stream... it was hard to picture but easy to want. 

Noah and I picked our way down, encountered a scattered number of the same small resident fish I'd remembered catching here before. Knowing the nature of migratory fish, though, I understood that the biomass could be very concentrated and isolated to a restricted length of stream. I pushed further and further down, plying deep plunges and long glides. It was relatively fruitless until I reached one particular deep hole. There were sizable fish rolling- not rising for insects, rolling like salmon -on occasion. I worked that pool for a good long while and missed one large fish, but came up empty handed in terms of the sort of fish I was after; just a few more smalls. Ah well, downstream I continued. 

Not that far below that the stream braided. I followed river right, mostly because it was a path of least resistance. A few emblazoned maples overhung the river, dropping some bright orange leaves. I wanted to find some equally well colored fontinalis. I reached the bottom end of the braid I'd followed and looked up the one to its left. Just up it was a classic little run, complete with undercut bank, overhanging tree with a solid root mass, and a perfect seam along the cut. I eased up to the tailout, crouching low both to stay concealed and get the right low angle to shoot casts under the overhanging tree branches. I was nymphing with a Harvey style leader and a single size 8 Ausable Ugly, casting upstream and leading the fly with a gentle bow in the fly line. That was my sighter. There was no need for colored monofilament, long light rods, or fancy little nymphs here. The technical aspects came in the form of perseverance, understanding how to cover lots of water without spooking fish, and narrow casting windows in the brush. I knew that these fish would eat the fly and eat it well, leaving little doubt as to whether I had a take. The fly line would straighten, I'd set the hook. That's exactly what happened. 

I was then treated to one of the most productive 10 minutes of small stream brook trout fishing I've been lucky enough to experience. One colored up, hefty male was followed by another. For a bit it seemed like there might be a nearly endless supply of them in that little tiny run. 

Eventually the onslaught did end, but for a while there I was like a kid in a candy store. An addict of big gnarly char like myself dreams of small stream fishing like this. Of course they weren't really small stream fish, they'd grown to size in a different environment and were entering this small stream environment for purposes of spawning. In the coming days they'd likely continue to push further and further in, especially if rain made a pulse of flow to ride. Migratory salmonids can be there and gone in so little time. I think back to an obsession I developed for large "river run" wild brown trout years ago. I'd found little smolt-like wild brown trout in a tiny tributary stream that didn't have any resident fish of any size, certainly not large enough to be producing these fast growing young ones. I realized they must be coming and going from the larger river the stream flowed into to spawn. I began visiting this little tributary in October and November, hoping to encounter these bigger fish on some semblance of a run. This stream was so small and so short in length from its mouth to the first migration barrier that I knew with certainty that I'd find the fish if I hit it right.

The telling moment occurred one late October time frame, within 24 hours. It was quite cold, frosty even, when I headed out one early morning to pay the stream a visit. I walked it from barrier to mouth with nothing to show for it but a few small brook trout. It was a good baseline, I knew a bit of rain was in the forecast for later in the day and into the night. Perhaps I'd find what I was after the next night. Sure enough, I returned to the water level just starting to drop and clear the next afternoon. I repeated my routine once again. To my surprise, I found a completely vacated redd toward the bottom end of the brook. In just over  24 hours, the fish had come, done there thing, and gone. 

Though not as extreme, Noah and I would come back to this same magic run the very next day and find that it was completely devoid of fish. They'd already moved on. 

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, and Sammy for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

Multispecies Fishing in an Old Maine Harbor

Maine's old harbors can hold an abundance of fish, though in my experience they at time hide themselves very well. Despite absurdly clear water, bergalls, pollock, sculpins and mackerel often hide themselves quite well. Sometimes it takes dropping down a bait, lure, or fly to determine if there are in fact fish present. Then the shapes materialize from them depths and the excitement begins... sometimes. Noah and I struggled the first time we went to Maine. Finding fish turned out more trick than we'd anticipated. A few trips down the line though I've learned a bit and have started to get a bit better at consistently finding something to catch in Maine harbors.

A couple weeks ago I went to Maine with my field herping friend, Bruce, to look for snakes. We found plenty, enough so that by the end of the last day we were satisfied enough to spend hour last hour or so at the ferry dock seeing what swam these water in mid September. We'd already seen some mackerel surface feeds earlier that morning, and there were some on the surface just opposite the dock. What was present at the dock in abundance was large bergalls. It didn't take me long to catch a few of these. 

These were moody bergalls though, and after a little while they became much more shy to the fly. Not being a snob has its perk and I had no qualms chunking up the next bergall I caught and using it as both chum and bait. This, unsurprisingly, resulted in a feeding frenzy that not only got the bergalls fired up but drew in some pollock and mackerel too. Soon I had what one might call a Maine Harbor slam, a few of each species on both bait and fly. I was using the 1wt, of course, and the fights were tremendous. It was a great way to round out a successful trip. 

Until next time, 

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, Geof, Luke, Streamer Swinger, and Noah for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

Jetty Cunners

 Bergalls or cunners are a very common wrasse along the New England coastline. I've heard them called a number of inaccurate names. They are sometimes misidentified as baby tautog. On Cape Cod I once heard them called rock bass, by a tourist using crickets in the Cape Cod Canal... I kid you not. So, as wide spread as bergalls are they aren't the most well known fish in the world. They're generally small and uninteresting to most anglers.

I, of course, am not most anglers. Bergalls don't obsess me or anything like that, but I definitely enjoy catching wrasse and bergalls are often the most available wrasse species in the Northeast. It also seems that the further north you go the bigger they get, with Main and Massachusetts producing some of the largest I've seen. Somehow that's usually not what I encounter, but I still find some big enough to eat a fly. 

On our way back towards home on the Maine trip, Cheyenne and I briefly stopped in Rockland. My hope was to perhaps catch a handful of mackerel there, but the water seemed a bit too warm and the tide too low. There were, of course, plenty of bergalls around. 

Sometimes bergalls are pretty unwilling to eat an artificial fly. Their moods aren't predictable either, there's no sure fire way I've found to know if you'll be able convince them to take. You just have to find some, put flies in front of them, and hope they're interested. Small nymphs are my primary fl for these little guys and the 1wt glass rod is the perfect delivery system. This was the first time I'd gotten to use the one weight on bergalls and it was pretty darn fun!

This was a situation where sight fishing was necessary. I couldn't feel the takes at all, so being able to pick out my fly six or more feet down through a background of irregularly colored aquatic plants and rocks was imperative. It was not easy at all, but I managed to make it work. Of course the result was just tiny little wrasse, but if your tackle is well chosen there's no reason fish like this can't be fun. And some days you just have to accept that you are probably catching jetty cunners or nothing at all. 

Until next time, 

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, Geof, Luke, Streamer Swinger, and Noah for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

At The End of the Country

 The easternmost point in the Continental United States is a wind battered, fog draped lump of rock on the Maine coastline called Quoddy Head. At the mouth of the Bay of Fundy- where the largest tides in the world happen -whales seals, and countless fish pass by through turbulent waters. Fishing vessels have been guided safely through by the West Quoddy Head Lighthouse since 1808 (re-built in 1858). 

On our last morning in Maine Cheyenne and I went as far East as we were allowed without passports. It was my good friend Ian Devlin that had suggested we go to Quoddy Head, and I was thankful for the idea. I really would not have gone otherwise, I'd never heard of the place. It turned out to be one of the most spectacular locations I've ever stepped foot. The drive took us through proper small Downeast Maine communities: quirky, slightly depressed, and oozing character. There are a variety of reasons I love this state, and seeing a replica of the blues mobile parked next to someone's barn is one of those reasons. The town of Lubec, where Quoddy Head is, was just as full of character as I wanted it to be. It was also a border town, which makes it even more interesting.

If you're wondering, I did fish a bit over there. But it wasn't the point, and I didn't catch anything. I'd like to at some point but this wasn't the trip for it. There was actually quite a bit we didn't do or see over there though, and we'll have to go back. 

Maine is a cool state. I intend to be spending quite a lot more time there over the next few years. 

Until next time, 

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, Geof, Luke, Streamer Swinger, and Noah for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

Maine Retrospective

 It's easy to get cheesy about travel. Experience different cultures, expand your mind, live life to the fullest. All these fund baby millennial and gen-x'rs out there going to exotic places and writing up faux deep captions to put under photos of almost disturbingly blue water and white building with red roofs are enough to make me sick to me stomach. That's just too much cheese. And I eat a lot of cheese.

That being said, whether you are an angler, hunter, hiker... whatever you like to do, it is endlessly enriching to do new things as much as you possibly can. I'm a fish person. That's my primary motivation for going, well, anywhere. Of course, for a fish person like myself, seeing fish places and meeting other fish people is as important as the fish themselves. That's basically a very archaic and yet also somewhat longer way of saying that I'm endlessly fascinated by fish and the places they live and take every opportunity to meet and talk to other people whose lives are also entwined with the pursuit of fish. It really doesn't matter where I go in the world, I'm likely to find exactly what I'm looking for, because there are fish, fisherman, and scientists that study fish virtually everywhere.
The best thing about that is, if you are ate about by fish, you really don't have to go far to experience something wildly different a new to you. For Noah and I, Maine was just a hop, a skip, and a jump away, and filled with possibilities.

Any good journey has stops along the way. For Noah and I, really, there's an end destination other than home, just a string of stops going from and then back to. If you can visit family or friends, that's every bit as important as a fishing destination.

Take time to be in awe. Nowhere I've ever been didn't have something to look at and be amazed by. Nowhere.

Try to meet new people. Chat with locals. Go to tackle shops, and not the big box ones, the small ones that actually might have things you've never seen before and whose owners and employees know the local scene well, because they take part in it day in and day out. Go on a charter if you can afford to do so. Learn as much from the captain and crew that you can in what time you have with them.

Or, do none of that. Stay home. See the things you see every day. Never learn anything. Never be happy. Not everyone can just on a whim drive to far Northern Maine to fish for relict Arctic char, or Florida to look for big snook or exotic cichlids and catfish, much less fly to Montana for a few days to fish for wild cutthrout or to the Seychelles for giant trevally, but I guarantee every one of you have the means to do something you've never done before. Open your mind. I promise it will make you a better angler.

Maine was awesome. I can't believe I got to catch a blueback trout. I held a cod in my hands that I'd wrenched 160 feet from the bottom of the ocean with a 10wt fly rod. I watched a wild brook trout over 20 inches rise up, gulp down my dry fly, then turn back down towards the bottom. I watched a hailstorm bear down on me at a remote mountain lake. I saw fish and birds and reptiles I'd never seen before. I am a very lucky person. We all are. Look around you. This planet is unfathomably spectacular. 

Until next time.

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

 If you enjoy what I'm doing here, please share and comment. It is increasingly difficult to maintain this blog under dwindling readership. What best keeps me going so is knowing that I am engaging people and getting them interested in different aspects of fly fishing, the natural world, and art. Follow, like on Facebook, share wherever, comment wherever. Also, consider supporting me on Patreon (link at the top of the bar to the right of your screen, on web version). Every little bit is appreciated! Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, john, and Christopher, for supporting this blog.

Haddock, Cod, and (almost) Hake on the Fly

After tooling around southwest Maine somewhat aimlessly for a day and a half, Noah and I found ourselves in the quaint little town of Ogunquit among a very un-quaint, very annoying crowd of tourists. I'm not a fan of tourists. Noah and I technically fit the definition of tourists but we don't look or act like them, to the extent that wherever we go we at some point end up being mistaken for locals. As such we believe we've earned the right to bass the kind of tourists that walk slowly down the middle of the road or poke a Portuguese man of war while taking a photo of it with their phone... Noah and I are idiots but I'd like to think we never look that dumb. We also try to avoid tourist traps as much ass possible, it was part of the reason we didn't spend much time in Acadia.

But there we were in Ogunquit during tourist season, getting annoyed by all the other people that were there. We didn't have a choice though, that's the town out of which the Bunny Clark runs. Noah and I had been talking for a while about booking a headboat trip in Maine. We knee it would be a good way to knock out some new species that we just wouldn't be able to catch by our own means. I was fully prepared to use conventional gear if need me, but I'd fished for tautog and seabass with a fly rod and artificial flies in 60 feet of water. With a very heavy lead and modifications to my bottom fishing rig, I figured I could potentially fish up to 200ft. The problem would be fly line... Fly line is thick and get pushed by current. It would be the biggest issue in presentation, because I refuse to count fish caught on a rig that doesn't utilize fly line as a key part of the equation. I opted for a long length of braid ahead of the fly line, allowing enough of the full sink fly line in the water that it would impact my presentation. In fact, every inch of mu fly line would be in the water, and it would prove to let me bounce my rig around in a very effective way.

The big question was, would the crew actually let me use a fly rod?

We'd booked the afternoon four hour trip. It didn't seem to be quite full but there were enough of us to take up most of the fishing space on the deck. After the first mate and captain, Anthony and Ian, had given a quick talk about what we were going to do and Ian had distributed gear and teasers and whatnot, I made my proposal. Unsurprisingly, it took them both a little by surprise. But I was given the green light as long as I got up on the bow. Braid tangles easily, being further from everyone else made sense regardless of what kind of rod I was using. When we got about 16 miles off shore, Noah and I took our place on the bow and got ready to fish.

I let my two fly rig, weighed down with an awful lot of lead, plummet to the bottom. It felt like it sank forever, but eventually my weight clunked onto the sea floor, 160 feet down. My fly line caused the line to bow, so when I lifted and dropped, my rig moved probably 4 feet laterally. That was great, my fly line was allowing me to actually cover water a bit. Unfortunately that also limited me, because after a few lifts and drops, or just a little while letting the rig sit, I lost all sense of contact with my rig. And cranking it back up, with or without a fish on, was hell.
It didn't take long at all for me to get hits though, and in no time I was pulling up something. Unfortunately, it turned out to be less than a whole red hake, so I can't really count it as a new species. It did give me confidence though... I could do this with a fly rod.

1/3 of a red hake, Urophycis chuss

Noah caught the first whole fish, a really cool looking cusk.

Cusk, Brosme brosme

In a short time I felt a take, slammed it, and cranked from the depths a new species.

Lifelist fish #139, haddock, Melanogrammus aeglefinus. Rank: species

A short time later Ian moved the vessel to the next spot. My first drop went without a take, but as I brought it back up I felt something take and start to fight. It ended up being a much larger pollock than any of the little harbor sized schoolies we'd caught in Acadia.

A few drops later I really got rattled, and after some serious cranking, brought up a cod pollock double! I was very pleased with the cod, it was quite a handsome fish.

Lifelist fish #140, Atlantic cod, Gadus morhua. Rank: species

Although it felt like barely any time had passed, it wasn't much longer before it was time to head back to shore. Noah and I were already discussing plans to return. Though we each only got a small number of new species, we'd seen a number of things caught by others that were strange to us, and one sea robin that was nothing like anything listed from the Gulf of Maine at all.

We'd already known the potential to catch a ton of new species, but now we had some understanding of how we could better get that done. Besides that, the crew was great, the boat itself was great, and the price was great. I'd go back just for the fun of it. Noah and I both plan to make the trip again just to fish on the Bunny Clark. 

That evening we fried up the cusk Noah had caught. It was one of the best eating fish I've ever had, no question. Just delicious. The next morning, after an unproductive stop in Kittery hoping to find some winter flounder, we were on our way home at last. Maine is amazing. Just an incredible place. I can't wait to go back.
Until next time.
Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.



 If you enjoy what I'm doing here, please share and comment. It is increasingly difficult to maintain this blog under dwindling readership. What best keeps me going so is knowing that I am engaging people and getting them interested in different aspects of fly fishing, the natural world, and art. Follow, like on Facebook, share wherever, comment wherever. Also, consider supporting me on Patreon (link at the top of the bar to the right of your screen, on web version). Every little bit is appreciated! Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, john, and Christopher, for supporting this blog.