Justin Witt
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Hi Loren; no, the boca in question has no direct communication with the ocean, and this fish never saw salt in it’s life.
Last year I received a whole set of these (http://www.flextec.co.uk/Products/Rods/Single-Handed/CRX-88-Fly-Rod) as samples and the 10′ 6/7 was the one I ended up connecting with and continuing to use.
What a neat thread; thanks for getting it started Curtis. Here’s a few of my usual gang – some of them Argentine, some of them Yankees like myself, and even one of my Mom who I still manage to drag out onto the lake every time I’m stateside for a little bit of throwing poppers at the Bluegill. Hope you enjoy.
The only times I’ve been spooled or seen clients spooled it’s been due to outside physical forces aiding the fish and against the angler. Last year we had it happen twice, once while in a boat on a lake that the wind was ripping across so hard I had to stay hammering at the oars just to keep us straight so we could ride the waves without tipping, and once while wading a super high river when the fish swam straight into a class five rapid and kept on going with the current at his back. The first one we finally lost, the second one, amazingly, we landed after an embarrassingly Brad Pit like near drowning experience (no clients were involved in this latter episode). Basically other than those types of conditional events though, it never happens. I do use larger than normal reels and keep plenty of backing on them all the time, but for the most part trout and salmon, even the really big guys, aren’t going to spool you. Backing on the other hand, we see a lot of down here, so it helps to keep that stuff fresh.
I agree with Colin’s last statement; it’s always a losing battle, and in the end, for me anyway impossible.
I use an electric beard trimmer and as long as I concentrate on what I’m doing and don’t drink too much Patagonian wheat brew at the tying bench it works great.
I think you hit the nail on the head Zach – “If anything I think the browns are freaked out by being up on the shoals and uncovered during the day time…” I, for one, have had great success chucking big streamers over there at night.
Glad to hear Lauren’s Grandfather’s doing better.
I’ll throw in my two cents here, since up in the states I have a drift-boat and down here in Patagonia I use a raft almost every day of the season. One thing I didn’t see mentioned in the thread was the issue of trailer necessity. I agree with almost all of the above comments about the relative advantages/disadvantages of the hard boat vs. raft question in terms of on the water comfort and function, but the main reason we use rafts down here is to take the trailer out of the equation completely. Granted, our road conditions (or total lack thereof, as the case may usually be) down here aren’t anything like most of the southeastern United States, but I can think of some areas in North Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia that I have put in before where it would have been nice not to be trying to drag a trailer through the woods. One way or another, less wheels on the ground means less chances of things that can go wrong, and while a flat isn’t too big a deal if you’re just headed out to fish, it sucks when you are with clients or if you only have a limited time to get in and out because of work or some other silly non-fishing related activity. When we roll down here the raft (an Aire) just goes in the back of the truck in a big bag to protect it from light and wear, and the frame (NRS) goes in right on top of it. Then the oars and gear and all the what-nots fill the spaces in between. When we get to the river we’re usually in the water in less than twenty minutes, and while the boat certainly doesn’t handle like my Freestone Guide (Montana Boat Builders) up in the states, it does get us where we are going and also doesn’t require much in the way of bottom repair when the season closes every year – just a good soft-scrub bath and then a cool dark place to sit through the winter. I’ve been running the same boats for four years now and never patched a single one of them, and they look more or less like new. All of that having been said though – if trailer-ing and storage are not an issue I’d go with the hard boat. Although my reference of materials of course, would be wood…
