I Couldn't Resist



Amawalk Outlet-Muscoot River

 This past weekend I was making a solo day trip upstate to visit a friend who was home preparing for his wedding at the end of the month.  We decided to hang out for a few hours and he wanted a little Tenkara demonstration to determine if he would like it or not.  There is a nice size pond in his parents backyard filled with largemouth bass and bluegill and we figured it would be ideal.  His step dad even told me of a neighbor who has a rather large pond on his property that he stocked years ago with lake trout, man would I love a crack at them!  Anyway, I knew my trip would take me within a couple of miles of my last trip to Amawalk Outlet and the Muscoot River.  This was more than I could resist and I wanted to take another crack at that large brown I lost at the end of June.  The pool was an excellent one and I figured there was a good chance he would still be there.  When I arrived I was greeted by a white-tailed doe standing in my path about 25 ft from my jeep.  She didn't seemed too concerned by my presence as I was busy putting on my wading boots.  I kept a sideways glance on her but only turned my head for a split second and then she was gone without a sound or any kind of sign of her presence.  I have always been amazed at the "ghost-like" qualities of how deer move through the woods.  One second there, the next gone without a trace.  I thought it was a good beginning to the day.  The stream was running a little lower and clearer since my last visit but still looked to be in great shape.  I worked a little up and down stream of the pool and unfortunately failed to find that brown again.  However I did managed to get a few smaller trout including the guy below.

I thought this guy looked a little familiar.  There is a nice line of red spots running in an almost perfect line along his lateral surface.  Sure enough when I checked a photo from the last trip I had an identical fish.  I had caught this guy in the exact same spot also.




Brown trout from last trip



Brown trout from this trip

I took him on a Killer Bug and had several LDR's from this section of stream as well.  Even though I didn't catch that big brown I did get another surprise.  I caught almost a dozen bluegill.  I have never caught a bluegill in a stream before.  All of them were taken with two different sakasa kebari.  The first fly was my latest experiment the Coxing Kill Kebari and the other was another excellent kebari called the Blue Poison Sakasa Kebari.



Blue Poison Sakasa Kebari

This was a fly I swapped for from fellow Tenkara angler Karel Lansky.  Unfortunately, I did not get any pictures of the this fly in action as I went back to the jeep an accidentally left the camera there before I went back to the stream.  Suffice to say, the bluegills could not get enough of this beautiful little fly. I look forward to using this fly again and get a nice picture of it hanging from some trouts jaw.  As with most trips, there was no disappointment at not meeting that one particular brown trout again. Time on any stream with the sights and sounds of wood frogs, deer, birds, flowers, running water, buzzing insects and trout can only help me to reset my mental clock and appreciate what are the most important things in life.