Hi,

The Great Waters Expo in Minneapolis this weekend was awesome!

There was a really wide variety of booths, presentations, and exhibits, and the intertwining of fly fishing with conservation and eductaion, I think, sets a standard for fly fishing shows everywhere. Tom Helgeson and Lew Beconne provide the heart and organization and are fantastic hosts. The live music is a nice touch, too.

I saw less of the offerings this year since I was tethered to my furling table most of the time (lots of interest, and some others furlers came by to share ideas, too), but I did meet (or re-meet) several FAOLers (Trout geek, Fly Angler, Chad, Jeremy, others I'm too dazed yet to think of to write down - sorry).

The layout of the Expo allowed a lot of people to fit well, I thought, and have one-on-one time. I had a chance to thank Dave and Emily Whitlock for allowing schools to use their clip art (we do), and to talk to some bamboo rod makers (Ron Barch, Don Schroeder, Jery Kustich) I see far less than I'd like. Mike Lawson and Kelly Galloup were circulating and accessible. The introductory session for women was very well attended - nice to see the interest! I did make it to both the session with authors' reading about fly fishing / outdoors session and the panel discussion on sink-tip lines, and to hear about the DARE Intitiative (plan for restoring the Driftless Area streams). The Bell Museum was there...

Its hard to recap without leaving things out... there was something for every taste, I thought.

BTW - On the flight home, a small jet with only 11 rows of seats, I looked down to see my house on the family farm in Michigan, the streams and lakes I grew up fishing with Lake Michigan and Lake Huron both in sight at the same time.

Kat