Back From My Hiatus

The fishing was poor to say the least, but given the condition I was in a week ago I will take it! I have been unable to hit the water in several weeks due to the fun and enjoyment that comes along with gall stones. I finally felt some what mobile this past week, and hit the river on Wednesday. It was a gloomy day, and a bit cooler (75 or so with constant rain)-a welcomed change of pace from the typical Richmond dog days.

I entered the river via the pipe line walk; it was quiet with not a single person in sight. That was until the rail road crew showed up and started pulling rail spikes from the tracks above. Seems innocent enough, right? Well sure, but these workers were dropping the spikes and other large pieces of steal to the ground and trail below-I stood in the middle of the run watching as chunks of metal cascaded down on my only route to the bank. In the above picture, you may be able to spot one of the rail worker in bright yellow standing high on the rails, below which the catwalk that allows you to acces the river sits. My only options was to explore the chain of islands situated in the middle of the river and occupying roughly 500 yards of river. I attempted to wade my way upstream and back across to the shoreline, but I found my self slipping into some deeper water and swimming once or twice. Eventually I found a small stretch of rapids below the main channel and was able to get back to shore. I am not even going to mention the string of young kayakers that insisted on pulling out right where I was wading while some paddled downstream of me to remove boulders from the flow. That is fine yet they found it necessary to see who could throw the rocks farther and the holes I had moved to fish (to avoid the yakers) served as their landing pad.

Despite these dilemmas, I still managed a pretty little blue gill on a rather large sparkle hair streamer. So, I beat the skunk and that put a smile on my face. It is always pleasant, in fact it keeps me sane, to step outside of society's current and into that of mother nature so long as hers does not take me home. Till next time, keep jerking it-the flies that is!