2017
Always Explore
Memorial Day Weekend, our family took a trip to a park we had not explored yet. Ralph Stover State Park, located in Bucks County is a gorgeous park with plenty of great trails and an excellent stream (Tohickon Creek).
Down from the parking lot there was a very promising spot. A beautiful covered bridge with shade and a big pylon in the middle of the creek. Usually in slightly deeper creeks, the pylons create fantastic pools where a lot of larger fish lurk.
My son and I took up shop right by the pylon, and began to fish our ultra-lights. We caught a few sunnies (Sunfish) which are pretty common in most streams or lakes throughout PA.
The water was maybe a foot or two deep, so my oldest son climbed up on the middle pylon (always be careful with fast moving water). After fishing with a worm there was a commotion. My son had spotted and nearly caught a fresh-water eel. Unfortunately eels can be extremely strong and it keep stripping the worm from his hook, no matter how well he secured it. I waded upfront of the pylon and began tossing spinner baits and other lures, with no success. I even switched to my fly rod and tried dropping a variety of flies over the cover area of the eel. We spent close to an hour and a half trying to catch that one eel.
After having no luck, my family had gotten bored and went up stream along a hiking trail to explore. Bull-headed, I remained at the same spot, throwing everything I had at the pylon. I managed to catch two more sunfish, before becoming fed up. I begrudgingly made my way up stream to catch up with the rest of the family.
Upstream from the bridge is a phenomenal fly-fishing stream, with a ton of deep pools on both sides of a fork. I hit a few pools that I absolutely thought would contain some sort of fish, but wound up with nothing. Another fifteen minutes of catching nothing and I finally declared that the entire stream was “fished out”. I pulled in my fly line and started storing my gear.
My prize. Yes I’m really that ugly.
I made my way up further upstream to catch up with my family and for whatever reason I found an area that I wanted to fish again. On my second fly cast my line went straight as a board. I thought I had snagged a branch, but the line started moving at a high rate downstream. Fish on!
A pretty decent fight later, coupled with a heart attack when the fish breached near the shallows, and I had landed a fairly nice rainbow trout.
Moral of story. Try not to be so focused on one fishing area, that you miss out on a vast area of other fishing opportunities. Also, if you are getting frustrated, take a moment and relax. Remember you are doing what you love to do.
Unless you are stranded and hungry. Then start panicking…..Unless you are Bear Grylls. He can find/eat anything. Is this thing on?
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