With our due date of the birth of our twins approaching I knew I'd better get out and fish while I could. I don't like to miss the North River outing anyway so I talked momma into letting me go on this one last fishing trip for long while. The weather, again, was a little rainy and chilly but the fish were eating. On Friday Marty, David, Donna, and I split up and hit a small tributary of the Tellico River. The water was a little higher than I like but still at a fishable level.
With the conditions the way they were I decided to go ahead and fish a dry/dropper combo. A parachute Adams for my dry with a fox squirrel tail nymph below it. Most hits were on the nymph but a few took the Adams. I fished with a newly acquired Don Recker North Fork Special. It's a 7'6", 5 wt bamboo rod built on a Winston taper. It was a pleasure to cast and fish with. It casts a double fly rig easily and accurately and it's not too much rod when you fight those small but scrappy mountain trout. I caught about a dozen small rainbows on Friday and lost at least half that many. A little better than I expected with the weather and water conditions.
Marty fishing his 7030 Granger
The day was capped off that evening with bone-in rib-eyes, baked potatoes, and big salad. Then down to the campground where everyone else was camped to sit around the fire and tell lies. It was a good day for sure. And it was a good thing too because I had a call that night back at the cabin with news that my wife's grandfather passed away and we needed to head out to Texas for the service.
I gave my dry fly fishing class Saturday morning, fished for about 45 minutes (caught two more) then packed up and headed home. It was just my luck too that the sun had come out and was shining nice and bright. I just knew that the bugs were going to start coming off the water heavy that afternoon. Oh well, next time. Off to pay my respects to a fine man who lived for 95 years and many more changes in the world than most of us could ever imagine.
