Single Track Mind

Ask my wife and she will tell you I always have one thing on my mind…that’s because I like to focus on one thing at time, complete it, and then move onto another.  Right now my focus is single track…oh sure, I’ve got some upcoming gigs and I’ll get out and do some fly fishing locally, but for the next month I’m focused on single track.  That’s because my eldest son has talked me into entering a local mountain bike race.

Years ago I did a bit of racing, on a road bike.  I did plenty of organized rides and tours, a few cat 4 and 5 races, some duathlons and even one “mini” triathlon.  I liked doing these events because it gave me a goal, something to focus on in order to keep me riding.  During that time I purchased my first mountain bike…it had no suspension and was beefy, but I loved it.  Mountain biking provided a great change of pace…no cycling computer, no log to track my rides, just me and my bike in the woods.

So why would I want to enter a mountain bike race?  Well…two reasons I guess.  First, it’s a great way to spend time with my son.  Second, it gives me a focus…a reason to make sure I ride, even when the days’ stress tells me to head to the pub rather than the trail.  However, I refuse to add a cycling computer to my mountain bike, and I refuse to keep a log.  I simply don’t want to taint the joy I find single tracking through the woods.  That’s why my goal for this race is simply to finish.  I don’t care if I beat anyone, I just want to finish…in one piece.

That will be a big accomplishment.  It’s been almost a year since I went endo and broke a rib.  I was riding a private trail that I helped build last fall.  I was riding my new mountain bike and was getting pretty comfortable on it and decided I could bunny hop this log across the trail.  The log was wet, and a little slick…my rear tire didn’t quite clear the log.  The rear tire slid sideways and the bike stopped abruptly, and I didn’t.

I remember it felt like I was flying through the air in slow motion.  I was admiring the fall foliage as I went over the handle bar.  For a brief moment, time stood still and I felt like a cartoon character that just realized I went off a cliff…suspended in mid air, then crashing down…hard.  The impact knocked the wind out of me, but otherwise I seemed ok.  My new bike came through without a scratch.  I climbed back on and tried to ride.  I knew something wasn’t right.  Later that evening, I sneezed…that’s when I knew this wasn’t a bruise.

I got back on my bike in December but it has taken me eight months to regain my confidence on the trail.  In the past year, log crossings scared me, skinny’s scared me, drop-ins and whoop-te-dos scared me, but no longer.

This past week my son and I rode our home trail…the “hard” loop ends with a rock skinny, a wooden banked turn with an “up and over”, followed by a rock step over a big log, finishing with a skinny.  This all happens in about 100 feet.  I may make one or two, but usually ride around the skinny’s and walk the log.  This ride however was different…while a couple of climbs still beat me…I was determined to ride all the obstacles.  As I got to the end, I hit the rock skinny, caught just a little air went into the banked wooden turn and proceed to run right up and over the rock/log combo rode the last skinny.  I let out a satisfying yell!

While my stamina is still in question, I feel like my bike handling skills are back…but let me qualify that…these are 47 year old, don’t like getting hurt, not ashamed to walk around an obstacle bike skills…but hey, I rode that combo and my 17 year old son didn’t!

So for now I have a single track mind.  I’ll will enter my first mountain bike race next month.  Sure, I’ll be in the beginner, over 40 category, along with a bunch of other old farts trying to act 21 again, but that’s what keep us young at heart.  I just hope my heart, lungs, and legs hold out for the duration.  If not, I may have to change my focus.

You’ll know how I did by watching out on Craigslist under “mountain bikes for sale.”

Tour de Fish Kill

I’m just back from our fourth annual Tour de New and it might be the last…at least in its present form.  The Tour de New started a few years ago when my buddy Cope and I headed down the New River trail on our bicycles, toting along our fly rods.  The New River trail is a 57 mile converted rail-trail. We would start our ride in Fries, VA and ride to the triple shoals areas.  That stretch of water produced some 100 fish days for us and our bikes allowed us quick access, especially on the way back when Cope would say, “Do you hear that? 

It’s a beer calling my name!”

Over those four years we expanded our the tour to include a day on the Virginia Creeper trail, which is also a converted rail-trail along Whitetop Laurel Creek, a fine wild trout fishery.  We added a float trip on the New River with a guide service out of Pembroke…and we added more fishing buddies.  Six went this year, me, Cope, Rog, Fin, Sep and Chris.

However, we wouldn’t see a hundred fish day, not even between all of us combined, at least not on our favorite stretch near Fries.  We fished hard for a day and half, including an awesome display of wading prowess by Fin…he crossed some sections of the river that most couldn’t have done in a drift boat, let alone wading. Yet despite our best efforts, only three or four fish were caught…and I was skunked.  Something that had never happened on this stretch for me, and yes…I got my dauber down because of it.

As Cope and I rode back to the truck on our second day he said, “There must have been a fish kill.”

“Nah,” I replied, “We would have heard about it.”

Well…it turns out there was a major fish kill and we didn’t hear about, until we talked to a local that day, and apparently not many people knew about it.  In the spring, there was a spill…a tank filled with manure slurry ruptured and flowed into a small tributary that dumped that stuff into the New River right below the dam in Fries.  According to the news reports I Googled upon my return the river was shut down to contact recreation from Fries all the way to I-77 just above Foster’s Falls.  The news reports also talked about the drinking water issues, but nowhere, and I do mean nowhere could I find anything official about a fish kill.  This angers me quite a bit.  I can’t help but wonder if the fish kill was kept quiet due to the negative publicity that followed the fish kills in the Shenandoah and James rivers a few years ago.  I plan on contacting the Virginia Department of Inland Fisheries to find out more.  I’ll keep you posted but in the meantime, one of my favorite stretches of river won’t be worth fishing for years to come.  Our Tour de New may go away too…or at least change.  The bikin’ part may disappear but the fly fishin’ and beer drinkin’ won’t!

Waiting out the storm

Fortunately for this trip, we did have our float trip still to come, but before that me, Sep and Chris took our bikes to the Virginia Creeper Trail.  We parked at the lower end just upstream of Damascus and rode up the trail to some nice looking water. The trout seemed willing and each of us managed to catch a few before a thundershower chased us under one of the trestle bridges for shelter.  Chris was hesitant to tell me about his fishing to that point.  I guess he thought that odor he smelled was the skunk still upon me.  It wasn’t, it was just the previous night’s dinner. At any rate, Chris caught a nice brown trout before the rains came and I appreciate his considerateness, of not ribbing me about it.  None of the others on this trip would have done that.  Of course he did make a crack about me leaving my rain jacket at the cabin and my emergency poncho in my bike bag…I think it was something about a great organization called Boy Scouts that teaches you to be prepared.  He got me with that one…I hope none of my scouts read this blog!

Our day on the Creeper included a break at the Creeper Café and ended with bikers passing by and shouting, “havin’ any luck?”  “I was,” I thought to myself…before they shouted at me.  On the way back I decided to push it a little and ride like the wind.  An unseen rock, caused some wind…from my tire.  I changed the flat about the time C-man and Sep caught up with me.  Turns out we were just 100 yards or so from the truck.  All and all a good day with some fine wild trout willing to play with our flies, so contented, we headed back to the cabin.

Unfortunately, we arrived to one of the worst circumstances I have ever endured.  The cabins were locked, we didn’t have the keys and the cooler with the beer was inside, not outside the cabin as I had instructed the others to put it.  C-man was able to access one of the cabins through a window and produced a bottle of bourbon.  Sep produced a 6-pack of cowboy warm beer.  I enjoyed both.

They certainly look like they can catch fish!

The following day found us in Pembroke, VA where we floated with a guide service.  There was a mix-up in that they thought we were spin fisherman.  The gall!

Fortunately we had our own fly fishing gear, although maybe not the fly selections needed.  C-man and Sep fished with a guy that really didn’t know his fly fishing stuff.  It’s a shame and they let the guy know.  I hope the guide service makes it right for them.  We were all genuinely disappointed that they didn’t catch more fish, and that the guide really knew nothing about the long rod.

Fin with another fine smallie

Fortunately for the rest of us, our guides had at least fly fished  before and put us in the right place.  Fin and I fished together and fished topwater bugs the entire time.  At one point I thought I’d have to push Fin out of the raft if he didn’t stop catching nice smallies.  It wasn’t gangbusters, but we were catching quality fish.



Rog and Cope were also doing fairly well.  Cope caught his first citation sized smallie, 21 and 1/8 inches long; a nice fish on a fly rod…a nice fish on any rod.  Even better for Cope, he caught it on a fly he tied, a pattern called a “sex dungeon” presumably because it’s got a lot going on.  The fly was originated by Kelly Galloup.  Cope was fishing it on a sinking line, twitching and stripping it along a submerged rock wall when this big ole bronze back hit.  He claims that he lost another one of equal size.  Dang fisherman, always skewing the truth.

Cope's Citation

I too managed a citation smallie.  We were drifting some skinny water looking for cruising fish hoping to pick off a hapless cicada floating on the water.  Ahead I noticed some bait fish jumping…not frantically but more to get out of the way of something.  I made a long cast and let the bug sit.  A shadow swam to the bug and slurped it into his mouth.  I pulled tight on the line and lifted the rod tip.  I yanked on the line two more times to be sure to set the hook.  I had lost a good fish earlier and wasn’t going to allow that again.



Based on the shadow, I figured I had hooked into a 16 inch smallmouth bass.  I was wrong.  No…it wasn’t it smaller.  The fish jumped and even the guide said it was a big fish.  This smallie fought admirably and at one point I had the guide leaning over the raft to net him but the fish was under the boat.  I had no idea where he was but kept up the side pressure.  Soon the fish was in the net.  It measured only 20 inches but weighed in at 4 pounds, a damn good fish in anyone’s book.



Four pounder...weighed on a scale by the guide!

Well…I must say my dauber weren’t down anymore.  Neither was Cope’s and I think Fin had a good day too.  For the other 3, it was tougher fishing and at dinner that night I think they had their daubers down. 

I didn’t ridicule them though.

After all, I was the one moping around the first two days because I hadn’t caught a fish.  Some mistook that for ego.  While I admit I may have an ego (what warm blooded male doesn’t?), I’m not egotistical. I wasn’t really moping because I was fishless and the other guys weren’t.  Rather, it was just me, a hard core fly fisherman, trying to figure it out…it wasn’t ego.

Actually, I had a lot of other stuff going on in my head and I didn’t feel compelled to bring it all to light and share.  Regardless, I was on a fishing trip and I wanted to catch a fish.  Isn’t that why we do this? It’s an ongoing discussion for me.  You see I got lectured one time by someone while we were on a fishing trip.  We spent a lot of money and in three days, not one fish was caught.  Wouldn’t you grumble? This gentleman went on to say that he didn’t fly fish to catch fish but rather fished for the friendship of his buddies.

Bull shit!  Anyone that willingly picks up the fly rod does so to catch fish.  If we didn’t catch a fish now and then, why would we invest all that money into the equipment?  How many times have you reveled in catching a fish on a fly while your hardware chunkin’ buddy couldn’t catch a snag, let alone a fish?  Heck, if I didn’t catch a fish now and then, I wouldn’t go fly fishing. 

If I didn’t go fly fishing, however, I wouldn’t have attended my forth Tour de New with such a great group of friends.  I guess it’s a “cart before the horse” or a “chicken or the egg” sort of thing.  Regardless, I fly fish because I love catching fish on the fly…I have fly fishing buddies because I love razzing them when I catch fish…and I love when they razz me when I don’t.

Touring the New River in a raft...flyfishing along the way. A great way to spend a day, as long as you catch one or two

Who's Great?

Scoutmaster Tbone

This entry is a little off topic, but one that it is very important to me.  It’s about our Boy Scout Troop.  I’ve been a Boy Scout Leader for over 15 years and have accomplished just about all of the goals I set for myself.  I’ve received various awards and accolades as a scout leader but those are absolutely meaningless if it were not for the boys.  The Scouting program “is all about the boys” not the number of square knots I wear on my uniform.  Oh wait…enough about me, this entry is about the boys.

For the last 10 or 11 years I’ve been associated with Pack 438 and subsequently Troop 438.  Pack 438 has been around for about 40 years while Troop 438 was started just seven years ago when my oldest crossed over from Cub Scouts into Boy Scouts.  I spent six years as Cubmaster and I’m in my fifth year as Scoutmaster.  During that tenure there is a simple cheer we have…someone yells, “WHO’S GREAT!?” and everyone replies “438!”

I’ve noticed that as the boys get older that cheer is done less and less.  That’s ok.  Boys Scouts is boy led and they should do their own cheer.  However, our recent scout camp experience brought back the “Who’s Great!?” with a vengeance.

We attended our local council camp this year.  I like this camp because they have lots of fun contests our scouts can enter.  They also award a spirit stick to the troop that exemplifies true scout spirit each day and at the end of the week, one troop is selected as the winner of the spirit stick and gets to take it home.

My Assistant Scoutmaster, Fishy the Clown

Camp started out ok this year, but I guess my expectations were a little high since we had a fair number of older scouts attending.  Of course we also had a fair number of first year scouts and that always presents us Scoutmasters with lots of challenges.  For one, I’m a stickler for a clean camp.  We get inspected daily and our cleanliness scores have a bearing on who wins the daily spirit stick.  It was obvious with all our new scouts, many had never held a broom, let alone sweep…and I’m guessing most had never cleaned a toilet either.

Early on, our scouts didn’t seem too enthused about getting involved.  All I could do was prod them.  Remember that Boys Scouts are boy led and while I’m happy to give ideas and my opinion, I can’t do it for them.  I got tired of pushing them…because anyone with a teenager knows you can only push so far.  The trick is to push, then back off.

Then there was the homesick scout.  I’m no therapist, so it is very exhausting trying to figure out how to deal with a homesick scout.  So, by the third day of scout camp I had enough and announced to our troop that I was “done”.  This was not some reverse psychology ploy…I was literally done.  I told them it’s their camp, it's their troop.  I was there to make sure they followed the scout law and the buddy system and otherwise I didn’t care what they did.  Instead I hung my hammock and took a nap.

Amazingly my scouts decided that they would get off their collective duffs and get some things done.  They lashed together a gateway (needed to get a perfect camp score), they entered the Huck Fin race, the slushy chuggin’ contest, the flop from the dock, the photo scavenger hunt, and the tomahawk race.  In fact, they not only entered, they did their best and it showed.

Blue Man Scouts

I had a first year scout win the slushy contest…maybe not the best scout skill, but it may serve him well in college.  Three of our scouts built a raft using a footlocker and came in second in the Huck Fin race. A group of our scouts entered the photo scavenger hunt and needed a picture of a clown.  They also needed a picture of someone fishing. They convinced one of my assistant leaders to paint his face and grab his fishing rod.  Their effort paid off as they won the contest.  Once of my scouts also put his own pain aside as he won the flop from the dock...a belly flop contest where the redder your stomach and chest, the better chance you have in winning.

Then, without me saying a word eight of our scouts put together a team for the tomahawk race.  This is a scout skill based relay race.  Each team has to build a tomahawk and the participants must carry it from station to station.  I should have known we were destined for greatness by the size of the tomahawk the boys made…it was huge!  They did pretty well…not only did they finish first, they set a record for fastest time the entire summer.

Then there were the scouts that did the intangible stuff, like my Senior Patrol Leader dressing in a blue man suit to go to a campfire ceremony, or the scout that at assembly walked up and took a call…it was Lucifer he said…and he wanted his weather back.  We had boys do a great job with a flag raising one morning and we had scouts volunteer in the dining hall.  These things earned us the spirit stick for the day and I was proud.

At the closing campfire, when it came time for roll call of which troops where there, our scouts yelled, “WHO’s GREAT…438!”  I was stunned but also thrilled that they revived this cheer.  Several troops started making fun of it.  I sat and watched our scouts intently.  They took the high road.

Then the awards were handed out and it seemed that every other one announced was won by our troop or one of the boys in our troop.  It was amazing to see these guys, some I’ve known since they were in first grade, hoot and holler after each award we received.  In addition to the events listed above, we did enough to earn Honor Troop and then it came down to the last award for the week…they coveted spirit stick.

There were two other troops I thought had been outstanding all week.  Certainly my scouts had already earned more than anyone thought they would.  Excitement was high…there was a drum roll…there was lots of discussion by the spirit committee.

“And the winner of the spirit stick is…Troop….438!”

I screamed at the top of my lungs, “WHO’S GREAT!?”

Record Setting Tomahawk Relay Team

The boys responded, “TROOP 438!”

It was amazing…those scouts acted as if they had just won the Super Bowl, and maybe they had.  They accomplished this, and they did it without me pushing them every step of the way.  That was a better feeling than any award I’ve ever received.

And as we left the arena I heard a scout from another troop say, “Hey…I guess they are great.”  Yes there are…all of my scouts are great and I am thankful for getting to be a small part of their lives.

Summer Heat and Late Day Thunderstorms

Summer heat and late day thunderstorms often play havoc with my favorite outdoor activities. On an evening earmarked for mountain biking, a late day thunder boomer shut down my local single track. Once the storm had passed, the coolness of air begged me outside. I was still in need of some sort of outdoor fix to release tension of the day. I turned to my other outdoor passion, grabbed my five weight and headed to a local pond.

When I arrived, the pond was alive with activity.  Dragon flies buzzed and hovered, small bugs skirted across the water, turtles grabbed a breath, then headed back under the water.  As I watched, I noticed dimple after dimple…rise forms…caused by what I surmised were big bream. “A hatch,” I giddily said to myself. Something was definitely happening…there were some pushes from what looked like really big bream…probably bluegill or as the big ones are called “bull gills.”

I grabbed a flybox and looked through it.  I had to find a match for the hatch. There were some winged ants on the water and I guessed that’s what the fish were taking.  Several casts proved me wrong. I went with a small black and brown popper to match the small dragon flies I noticed, but again no takers. I was getting anxious…this was not a good way to relieve my stress.  I HAD to figure out what these fish were taking.

I decided that these fish were indeed feeding on the small dragon flies, but using some of my trout stream tactics when fish won’t take the dry fly version, I went with the “emerger” pattern. I figured that these fish were feeding on the bug as it was “hatching”. So I tied on a small black and brown wooly bugger and cast to a rise. I put the first cast right in the middle of the rings left from the rise. My line tightened immediately, but I wasn’t quick enough on the set. I casted at another rise and this time my timing was perfect. The rod bowed under the weight and for a moment I thought I was “under gunned.” Big bluegills fight well for their size…there’s an old adage among fly fishers that says, “if bluegills (or shell crackers, long ear, red breast or any other sunfish species, we often refer to as bream) got any bigger, I wouldn’t fish for anything else.”

After a few minutes I had the fish in hand…well not really…he was much bigger than my hand, nearly dinner plate size!  For the next hour I continued casting to rise forms and whacking the heck out of huge bluegills and shell cracker sunfish.  Now when I say big, I don’t mean “hand size.” I mean rod bending, drag pulling big ‘ole bream that use their dorsal fin spines, not as protection, but as a weapon! I couldn’t get my hand around most of these fish. On average they weighed a pound and a half, and a few were even bigger!

I don’t know how many of these fish I caught…I didn’t bother counting. I don’t know how long it lasted…I didn’t bother with my watch or cell phone. I just fly fished and it was just as rewarding as any trout stream or salt water flat I had ever fished. As the hatch ended and the dimples disappeared, I thought I had experienced fly fishing nirvana. I was wrong…nirvana was yet to come.

While the stress of the day had long left my muscles and mind, I was in fly fishing predator mode and was ready to catch more fish. As I pondered what to try now that fish had stopped rising, I realized that not a single largemouth bass found my fly…not even a small one. Something told me that the bass in the pond were ready to eat, now that the bream had left the buffet.

By now, the sun had set and darkness was making its way to the pond.  This is magic time for sportsmen. I tied on a stealth bomber…a surface bass bug I learned to tie earlier this year.  It has proven to be quite effective…this night proved no different.  I started working the fly along edges, near structure and even in the middle of the pond. Bass were apparently cruising.  Bass were apparently hungry.

The strikes ranged from subtle slurps to thrashing gulps. These were healthy largemouth bass…nice color and the iconic football shape.  While none of these fish put my biggest bass record in danger or fight quite as hard as their buddies that live in my revered Eno River, they did like to jump and pulled hard. I easily caught over a dozen in this thirty minute twilight period, the biggest going four pounds.

Then it was done. It was dark. I was thirsty. I headed home where my wonderful wife had kept back some dinner for me, which is no easy task with three teenage boys in the house.  Equally wonderful was the magic elixir of malted grains that accompanied my late dinner, a great way to end the day. And while I probably didn’t burn as many calories as I may have shredding single track, it was good to be blessed with such a great fly fishing evening.

And that’s the point of this story…I feel blessed every time I’m lucky enough to catch a fish on the fly. I don’t even need pictures to prove it. Fly fishing is always exciting, whether it’s bass and bream from a local pond or bones and big permit from an exotic flat. I don’t bad mouth any fish I catch on the fly, it’s bad karma.  Maybe that’s why I’ve been on a roll this year. As long as I get to fly fish, it will always be a great year fishing, but so far this year has also been a great year catching.

I hope it continues especially when I head off to one of my favorite fly fishing trips of the year when I get to combine biking on the New River trail with fly fishing for river smallies!