Glenbow

I personally think that we all have our own views on the subject, and we are all correct for ourselves. I don't mind sharing info or taking someone along to some new water for them to give them a fast-track in fishing some new water. That being said, I don't share everything either. I feel that it's my own personal preference to 'give back' as others have helped me & shared with me. Toolman makes a good point in suggesting the 'Get Togethers' section as a lot can be learned and new friends made through that. I'm glad to see the views expressed in this thread and that it has remained a friendly thread. This is a helluva community, this board. I am grateful that it is here for us all to enjoy and hopefully contribute to.

Sweet display, very original and personal. Love it.

Don, I can hook you up with some amazing Devlin specials that'll seem like a bargain compared to that!

Holy Smokes, there's a lot of amazing photos on here - you guys take amazing pics & catch some awesome fish! Some day I'll catch some fish like those.......some day.

Haaaawwwwgg. Nice Pike.

I understand it's good for snapper.

I suppose it might be 'how' & 'when' you use it, more than the size?

Good to hear Bhurt, congrats. It is a fun new dimension to flyfishing and I cannot say enough good about it. I'm stoked you dig your new stick. For a really good reel for not too much $$ I'd highly recommend the Pfleuger Summit or Trion in the 9-10 size. Very afforddable and not expensive ($80-$120). I have both & love both. The Trion is a mid-arbor and the Summit is a large-arbor.

Hey Pipes, Good to hear from you. Happy New Year to one and all, and may this be the best year of fishing for everyone yet. Hang in there Pipes, spring and happy times are coming! Thanks for the cautionary advice & for checking in. Take care.

Here's a pattern I stumbled across while in New Zealand - it's said to work like nothing else. I'm curious to see if it works as well here......

Go for Golden's, and do a heli-trip.

I had a chance to head into Australia's Great Dividing Range of mountains and fished the Oven's river and the West Kiewa river. The scenery is amazing and the cicadas in the trees are absolutely deafening! I was very cautious of snakes as they are deadly poisonous and also live in the tall grass and near the river's edge (which is exactly where I was) and I was scared silly of these things. The Tiger snake is supposed to be a very aggressive snake and is fairly common in the area. I was lucky to never have spotted any snakes at all. Here's the Oven's river. I saw 2 trout, landed one This is the West Kiewa river, upstream of Mount Beauty. It had lots of little, colourful rainbows in it that readily took nymphs.

Wanna get some gold in them thar hills...........

Here's a few more shots from Tasmania - some cool things to see there & I'd definitely go back. The first couple of pics are from the 19 Lagoons area in the western highlands - I went but could not fish it without waders that day, and the wind & rain were too much. It was Crowsnest windy straight in the face there, & it is a sight-fishing place so the day I went was a bust, but here are a few pics of some of the area. A picture of Great Lake from the hotel bar Some big boys on the wall in the bar: Some of the Tassie Locals:

I managed to squeeze in a couple of days of fishing in Tasmania before coming home. It was a bit daunting with not much direction, but a few magazine articles helped. I headed off from Hobart into the Central Highlands area for some Tassie lake fishing. I scoped out a couple of lakes and decided to try my luck at Arthur Lake. I rigged-up a 3 fly combo and went to work. After a bit of time & very little action I started turning over rocks to see what was on the menu. I noticed a large amount of small green scuds under the rocks, so I immediately tied on a green scud on the bottom of the rig (3rd fly) and started working the weed bed around 10ft down. As luck would have it, I got into a few browns almost right away! I had only about 1.5 hours of fishing before the torrential rain & howling wind took over & I left with 3 browns to hand, and a complete soaker. After stopping in at the local gas station/convenience store (that's all there is out there), I was asking about the fishing of late in the area to which the guy replied 'terrible - nobody's been catching more than 1 for the last week'. I could hardly believe it! I somehow managed to out-fish damn near everyone that had stopped in to that store in the last week in only an hour and 1/2! I felt really good about that, that I managed to find my way up to some water & get into a few fish and actually end up doing quite well all things considered. I have no doubt that it was mostly dumb luck, I just felt lucky to have both the dumb & the luck with me that day. The place I am fishing I saw a platypus swim by and my jaw almost fell off, it is such a rare thing to see. Too bad we hadn't got the camera ready in time as he dived away when he saw us but I guess I got the memory of it. There are some monster fish in Tassie as you will see from some pics that I saw at the local hotel bar.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a tight line. Great to meet so many of you this year & I look forward to meeting more of you. Looking forward to fishing with many of my friends from this board in the new year. Happy Holidays! Glen

Merry Christmas to the best bunch of fly fishers I know. I'm about to head home & it's Christmas day here in Melbourne - a day ahead of Calgary. I get home Christmas day, so it seems like I fly for 2 days on Christmas! All the best to all of you - see you soon. Glenbow

No Brent, I am in Yarrawonga which is somewhere between Sydney & Melbourne, a bit SW of Canberra. I am hoping to get to Canberra tomorrow for a few days & get up into the Snowy Mountains for a fly fish. I'm also looking good to get to Tasmania next week for a few days' fishing there & I am really looking forward to it. I am just visiting friends in Yarrawonga right now so I have internet access so I can keep an eye on you bozos & monitor the severity level of the shack nasties! I will return home on Dec 24, so I will see you guys soon.

SHARK SKIN RESEARCH COULD REDUCE AIRPLANE DRAG BY 30 PERCENT It may seem obvious that the surface of an airplane should be as smooth as possible to minimize aerodynamic drag, but that's not really the case. A bit of roughness can break up the boundary layer and improve efficiency. Sharks, with skin formed of rough scales called denticles, can slip through the water at speeds of up to 60 mph with minimal drag. This week, The Lindbergh Foundation awarded a grant to Dr. Amy Lang, at the University of Alabama, to study whether the surface texture on the skin of fast-swimming sharks, capable of bristling their scales when in pursuit of prey, could be mimicked and used to reduce the drag on aircraft. "If we can successfully show there is a significant effect, future applications to reduce drag of aircraft and underwater vehicles could be possible," said Lang. The technology has the potential to increase aerodynamic efficiency up to 30 percent, with savings of billions of dollars and substantial reductions in fuel burn and emissions. This is an article I found on an aviation news website - those guys at SA must be on to something.

I'm thinking about getting a big hook & with either a ball of cheese or a marshmallow on it on my arm. I was also thinking about getting "Fly Fishing Rules" tattooed on my wedding tackle, but I had to make the font too small to read. With regular font only "Fly F" would have fit. Damn.

Ya Weedy, You told me about him & I also got recommended to use him from the Fly Fishing New Zealand site (not the forum) - it's a site (can't remember the URL now, but it's at home on the Fav's list) that is packed with guides & such & I called the guy that runs the site & he recommended him. I also highly recommend him. I can hardly wait to go back. I'd hire him again & also spend more time out there on my own, now that i am more comfortable with sighting & conditions.

Thanks for all the great comments, guys n' gals - it's nice to hear all the cheering from home. And Weedy, keep your eyes on your own forum! (Just kiddin - I didn't know you were a lurker there!)

Let's keep it on track folks, remember, it's a family show. It's hard for me to steal time away from sun, sand & surf to remember to post more stuff. I hope you are all enjoying the nice weather at home, I am sweating my b@lls off right now. Even my beer gets hot before I can finish it. Just kiddin' folks, I hope to do a bit of fly fishing here now that I am down south somewhere between Sydney & Melbourne, I think a trip to the Snowy Mountains is in order. I will try to post some more stuff soon (it's not as easy to get internet as you might think). Be safe out there. I have poison snakes & spiders to worry about!

Hi all, Sorry to flood this section of the forum, I have the time today & an internet connection so I thought I'd make a few posts. I hope it helps pass the time away in the deep freeze! Cairns has been awesome. Scuba dived the Great Barrier Reef 2 days ago, did 3 dives & it was spectacular. 60ft of water is still bathwater warm, I managed to swim with some sea turtles close enough to touch them (I didn't though) and it is quite a life affirming experience. Saw a bunch of 4' long giant clams, some morays and a ton of other things. I went up today for a scenic flight over the Reef and took a bunch of pics - it was totally awesome. I went out for a charter fish yesterday & managed a smallish Trevally, it was bait fishing with spin gear but still fun nonetheless. There's not as much ffing here as one might think, but it would take some research and planning which I did not have the time or inclination to do. This part of the trip is a take-it-as-it-goes part, and it's the right kind of place to do things that way. It is an awesome place to see with lots of fun things to do. We are off to Melbourne tomorrow for a couple of days, we're going on a blues train (train ride with live blues music) and then some more screwing around before it's off to Sydney. Time's flying by - and my ears are peeling. Don't worry, I don't expect any sympathy - I'll take peeling ears over frostbite any day! I hope you like the pictures. Notice the wake in the background........(that one's for you BBB)

Hi guys, Here's a few more pics of my last days fishing on the S Island. After a day of all kinds of weather, I finally landed the fish I came for - and 8lb Brown on a caddis larva on 5x tippet! It was a spectacular fight, I watched the take and set the hook and the fight was on! He immediately bolted all the way across the river into the current & deep water on the far bank. I had to run with him downstream to keep him under some control, but with 5x it is a risky game at best. These big boys are STRONG! I had to maintain a lot of side pressure & keep changing his head direction to keep him from bolting & snapping off. I was positively shaking when I landed him & got him into the net. After breaking off so many big rainbows on the N Island, I tried everything to keep that from happening to this big boy. It was a big day for me. It rained most of the day & was howling wind & I often had to wait for a lull in the wind for a cast - an errant cast often results in a departed fish so every cast counted. I find that tremendously different to the bulk of fishing we do at home. I think that if you spent any amount of time in NZ you would end up a far more technically developed angler. At least that is true for me. Also, casting 15-18 feet of leader with a dry & a dropper into the wind is much harder than I thought it would be, being used to 9-11 feet. I strongly recommend anyone coming over to practice with those long leaders for accurate casts. I often put the cast exactly where I wanted it only to find the fly 6 feet ahead of where I planned it! That is just where my brain is still used to expecting the fly to land because of not being used to the extended leader length. It is the trip of a lifetime, and I will definitely come back again as soon as I can. Enjoy the photos! Hook-up! The One I came For - 8lb Brown