At my age (36) people around me place tremendous importance on two things: children and property. By choice, my wife and I have neither. Oftentimes, whether intentional or not, those closest to us tend to diminish and devalue our time, experiences, and the very nature of our existence because we haven't created life and don't own a small, rectangular patch of land with a house on it. Occasionally they even have the nerve to pity us. In these moments I often think of the fly fishing adventures I've had while travelling over the past five years as well as the first line of Rutger Hauer's unforgettable monologue in Ridley Scott's Blade Runner:
In reality, the standard 2.5 kids and the house with the white picket fence just aren't part of the plan for everyone. For some it's not practical and others just don't want it; in our case, it's basically both.
Upon our return to New Jersey after graduating from college we were met with a budding recession, Chris Christie's war on educators, and my shitty family, all of which led to personal, financial, and career struggles that took years to climb out from under.
It took about 8 years to be relatively free from those issues and after having lost over a decade of our youth to college, career setbacks, crippling financial stress, and my family's bullshit, we chose a life of adventure and exploration within our means rather than shackling ourselves to the perceived ideals for which society said we should strive.
Everyone's path is different and we've chosen to live unapologetically on our own terms, doing exactly what we want to do with the time, energy, and youth we have left and I refuse to let anyone tell me that my life has less meaning and value because I don't have kids. It can sometimes be lonely, but I'm proud that we found our own path rather than mistakenly and futilely trying to conform to others' ideals because it would have been just another case of the square peg in a round hole scenario.
For the remainder of this post, I want to highlight some of my favorite fly fishing adventures from our travels over the past five years as a way of reinforcing that you don't have to live up to anyone else's expectations and goals to find happiness and meaning in life.
Kananaskis Country, Alberta, Canada (August 2016)
After making an exhausting late-afternoon hike up a mountain to reach this gorgeous lake on our first trip to Alberta, I was greeted with a killer caddis hatch and rising cutties everywhere. Watching my first cutthroat trout come up and sip my caddis off the surface is such a cherished memory for me.
In and Around Calgary, Alberta (August 2017)
My first trip fishing with my good friend, Todd, from Calgary featured a crazy, unplanned all-nighter spent hopping around multiple sections of two rivers including the Bow in Calgary, chasing bulls, browns, and rainbows with streamers. I didn't land anything big that night, but I did fall on my net and shatter it and I was able to get back to the Airbnb to get 30-minutes sleep before a planned hike with my wife.
Great Smoky Mountain National Park, Tennessee (August 2018)
My first-ever native brook trout were caught during a trip to the Smokies in Tennessee in August 2018. Because of the water temps, I stuck to small, freezing cold mountain streams within the park having a blast catching native brooks and wild rainbows on dries that whole week.
George Washington National Forest, Virginia (April 2019)
This trip to Virginia taught me so much about the difference in recovery time of lowland streams and mountain streams. The last few hours of the evening drive there were spent navigating through torrential rain and the next morning I found that the creek I had planned to fish was pure chocolate milk. Instead of giving up, we went to Murray's Fly Shop in Edinburg where I was taken over to a contour map and shown a blue line in George Washington National Forest that may have had enough time to recover. What I found was a pristine small stream loaded with aggressive native brooks that I had a blast catching for hours while nymphing with my then-new 2wt glass rod.
Bow River, Calgary, Alberta, Canada (August 2019)
For my third trip to Alberta, Todd gave me VIP treatment and not only took me to fish water that most visitors to the area never even hear about, but he also introduced me to some of my favorite people I've met in fly fishing: bull trout expert Jon, all-around great angler Lem, and guide and streamer-master Brett, the latter of which we spent the day with on his drift boat, floating the Bow River through Calgary. It was my first time on a drift boat and one of my favorite fly fishing experiences.
Old Man River, Alberta, Canada (August 2019)
The events of August 16, 2019 on the Old Man River were such an important part of my experience as an angler that I wrote about it in a previous piece, titled Old Man.
Adirondack Mountains, New York (October 2018, 2019, 2020, etc.)
Some of our trips are just short weekend road trips, like our annual October visits to upstate NY, and I don't always have a ton of time to fish and sometimes the conditions aren't ideal when we're there. On our trip in 2019, I had three hours to fish and chose a section of river near the cabin that had easy access, but mostly held stocked fish. Aside from this day, I haven't specifically targeted stocked trout in roughly four years, but boy did I have fun crushing stockies in the few hours I had, beginning with a 20" rainbow on the first drift with my girdle bug.
White Mountains, New Hampshire (September 2020)
Sometimes it's hard to plan in advance your approach to fishing new water far from home, so you have to be flexible. On our trip to New Hampshire in September of 2020, I rigged up my 2wt glass rod at the Crosstrek to nymph a small brookie stream and as I was walking through some high grass I realized I was surrounded by hoppers. An hour and a quick rig change later and I was having the most explosive surface action I'd had in years with ferocious brookies literally torpedoing themselves out of the water to take my hopper.
Green Mountains, Vermont (July 2021)
Many times, travelling affords me the opportunity to meet awesome people in person who I had previously only interacted with through this Instagram account. Last month I had the pleasure of meeting up with Aaron of Crooked Feather Outfitters to fish a river in Vermont during a weekend trip to Manchester and though we didn't get into many fish, it was great hanging out with and learning from a great angler and person like Aaron.
Pocono Mountains, Pennsylvania (July 2021)
During a weekend trip to the Poconos in PA to visit my wife's family visiting from Florida, I woke up at sunrise the first morning and snuck out to the blue line in the backyard. Unable to find anything online about the stream I had no expectations and was so pleasantly surprised to land one of the biggest and most colorful native brookies I've ever landed among others on a dry-dropper rig.
Teton County, Idaho (August 2021)
My trip on the drift boat of Will of WorldCast Anglers two Saturdays ago was the most successful, action-packed day I've had in my 6+ years of fly fishing for trout and one I will never forget after catching a mix of more than 35 trout, mostly browns and cutties with a few cutbows and rainbows mixed in (The South Fork Slam) and even a surprise whitefish. The day started by twitching foam stones up top and later in the morning shifted to a hopper-dropper rig. Plenty of action up top and below with powerful wild trout smashing or sinking foam and screaming off line while making big runs and swimming circles around the drift boat. Some milestones hit today: first trout in Idaho, first ever cutbows, PB cuttie, most trout in a day, biggest brown of 2021 (so far), most species of trout caught in a day.
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming (August 2021)
Two days after topping my personal-best cuttie a few times on the drift boat, I landed this beautiful, hard-fighting, new personal-best cuttie in sight of the beautiful Grand Teton range in Wyoming. I missed it on the first take but saw it flash and knew it was big then hooked it on the next drift, stopped it from hanging me up numerous times, and finally landed it.
Pennsylvania (2018-Current)
Even though these trout aren't from overnight trips or long vacations, I'm always excited for each day trip to PA in the Crosstrek. I've landed so many of my favorite trout there over the past three years since I made the decision to focus on what in my opinion is the best state for trout East of the Rockies. I've landed trout on eleven different streams in the Keystone State and that isn't even a fraction of the amazing streams that PA has to offer.
Final Thoughts
We only get one shot at this. Life, that is. Beware of the influence of structures and constructs such as family, religion, government, and society and find your own raison d'être (reason for being) through adventure and experience.
"Your future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one." -Dr. Emmett Brown
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