Thankfully

I have a lot to be thankful for. I have a great Wife (who made an amazing Thanksgiving dinner) and two awesome sons. I have a good job, a nice house and lots of opportunities to get out into nature (and a Wife that puts up with my adventures, did I mention she's great?). I was also raised by some pretty great parents and had the opportunity to get out fishing with my Dad for Black Friday. 

Nothing quite like waking up at 2:30 am the morning after eating way too much turkey, but at least it wasn't to go shopping. No, we were hoping to maximize our time on the water by getting there at the crack of dawn. 

Ever wake up so early you feel sick to your stomach?

Got there a little early, even for us, but the fish were ready and willing. We got a lot of little ones early on, almost every cast, on pretty much any nymph we tried. It quickly became clear that we needed to try some different spots to find the better fish. So we headed over to a spot where my Dad hooked into a nice fish last year, only to lose it, and hoped that he could get some redemption. After only a few minutes Dad again hooked into a great fish only to find that we had left the net back up at the truck. In the two minutes that it took to go and get the net the fish found a way to come unbuttoned and my Dad was thinking luck wasn't with him. Thankfully he was wrong about that.

Great lookin' bow

Of course the one that got away was bigger, as they always seem to be, but this was a great looking rainbow. Next it was my turn to find a couple of nice fish.

I was pretty satisfied with the trip at that point! My Dad had found a couple of nice fish and landed one. I had managed to catch a couple of nice ones. Now we only had to try and find my Brother a decent fish (not that he needs much help). We figured that this spot was spooked so we ought to try some other areas. Among these was a spot where I caught my personal best rainbow just last January. The problem with this spot is that it seems like I'm the only one that likes it much. I can't really blame them though, the spot does seem to favor me. Sure enough, after a few casts with my olive woolly bugger, I hooked into a quality fish. I played it as tough as felt I could, but it still was taking line whenever it felt I was getting too close. After about 4 times of getting her close only to induce another run the hook just came free. That fish worked me over and left me standing on shore looking like an idiot. 

This seemed like a good time (to My Dad and Brother, I never want to stop fishing) to go and do a little rabbit hunting. I knew going into the trip that this was part of the deal. Now, don't get me wrong, I like hunting. It's just that I love fishing. Especially when the fish in question tend to be nicer than the fish I usually catch. Just had to go with the flow on this one, and ended up having a good time. After some indecision, some arguing, and finally letting a coin decide our fate, we decided to spend the night and do some more fishing in the morning (and some more hunting in the afternoon). It didn't take long for my Brother to find the fish that eluded him the day before on a red zebra midge.

Check out all those spots

Then I hooked into a good one on my olive woolly bugger.

At this point we decided to hit up a spot that had given up some nice fish in the past. We found some small to average sized fish that were coming to hand on about every other cast. As long as you could keep the weeds off your fly the fish seemed to be pretty easy, and there were a couple of bigger fish mixed in to keep things interesting. 

They are such fat fish

When it was getting to the point that the wind was dictating the drift more than the current it became clear that it was again time to go hunting. But before we got out of there, my Dad found another quality fish.

Good times

It was a great weekend of fishing and spending some time with my Dad and Brother. With any luck we'll be able to do this a few more times this Winter. Hope you can get out, be safe, and enjoy the outdoors. 

-Kidder