I started fly fishing at the age of 8 and I am now going on 50! I can say the best times in my life were going fishing with my Dad and Grandfather.
To get across the river I remember my father putting me on his shoulders and carrying me across the stream so I wouldn’t get wet. But inevitably I would fall in, usually being soaked and that water being really cold as it was in March. Nevertheless, I would always keep going. As soon as I would hook a fish the coldness always seemed to go away!
When I first started it took me about a year to finally catch a trout on a fly! I remember using my old Fenwick 5wt with a Martin reel. The fly I used was a number 12 Hares Ear, a fly that my father used a lot back then. I remember my first catch was a 10 inch wild brown trout that I caught in a friends creek. I was proud to finally have caught one on a fly and on my own without switching to bait again.
My Dad and I would catch fish and take out the hibachi grill and cook a few trout streamside in aluminum foil wrapped in bacon with potatoes and onions and they always tasted great!
Now at almost 50 my Dad and I, who is 76, still go fishing a couple times a week. We are both slower and have a lot of aches and pains but we still enjoy going together as much as we did when I was 8. Now we release the fish we catch or we bring them home alive and put them in a stream behind my Dads house that we dammed up and feed them all summer ’til a mink or herring decides they are hungry and take a few.
I learned to hunt and fish from my Dad which has been the best thing in my life. It’s kept us close all these years . . . hoping there will be more to come.
Written by Steven Wolinski
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Do you have any memories with your Dad fishing as well. Let’s hear your stories in the comments!
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