DAYS OF YESTERYEAR
Winter is dragging on. True, the days are longer and the sun sets later and later in the evening. Still, the season is a long way off up here.
It’s not true cabin fever. Maybe Shack Nasty’s as Betty would call it. Anyway, I do find myself looking forward to the coming season. Still, motivation can take a hit! I started an article 4 weeks ago and never finished it. Since my computer died Thursday evening, I lost the draft. It wasn’t a very interesting blurb anyway!
The coming season is too far off to really get into the spirit, so the next best thing is to flip through the fishing journals from yesteryear.
I only have journals dating back to when I arrived in Quebec. I was too young and foolish in my youth to think about such things. Back then, I guess I figured I could remember everything! I suppose that these journals covering the past 23 years will have to do!
I’ve read and re-read these pages so many times I don’t actually READ the words anymore. The first 3-4 words in an entry are enough to whisk me back a year or twenty. There are also a few real standout entries I always seem to go back to. The 3 days I got to spend with JC and Deanna, a memorable sea trout which was hunkered down in a lie 60 feet out, watching one of the local old-timers bring in a monster salmon on the #28.
While I browse through the pages I also seem to time warp from the past to the future. Past outings set the stage for new ones to come. I recently met up with a brother and sister who will most probably give fly fishing a shot this coming season. Pure rank beginners, I’ll want to set them up somewhere to have fighting chance for some action and still be able to learn to cast comfortably.
I reach down to the floor to pull up one of the older volumes. Aha! 1996. I seem to remember a nice beach where we can learn to cast and also find salmon and big sea trout.
The number 43 pool on my home waters is a nice run (up here, the French language calls all holding water a “pool” or “fosse”, even if it’s a run, a riffle, a rapid, pocket or true pool). It’s a left to right run with a deep riffle at the head, 200 yards of run and a shallow rapid at the foot.
The trail leading to the #48
On the far side, a deep back eddy holds some truly monstrous sea trout.
Since the first time I discovered this run, I’ve spent many a day or evening on it. There’s a 100 yard trail leading from the pull out to the beach. Quite often, over the course of the day, I’ll end up ferrying down chairs, coolers, BBQ and kitchen to the beach. At the end of the day, it could appear that someone is setup there for the season!!!!
The #48 is a nice wide open run. When the river is running at anything less than a blow out, there is always a beach and easy wading.
It’s always handy to be on such a run. When one’s back cast isn’t quite high enough, at least I’m not going to be tying on a new fly!!!
(André – Keep thy back cast upeth!!!)
The #48 is a good place to start beginners. There is a nice steady current. There is lots of room for a back cast. The presentations are relatively simple.
... and when the big bruisers come out of the back eddy, they are really willing to take a fly!!!
Looking back on the old journals is a small ray of sunshine on a gloomy late winter day. It also opens up visions of the season to come!!
Christopher Chin, Proulxville Quebec.