Cabelas

Sakasa Kebari with a "twist" of green antron fiber

Recently, my wife and I had a chance to get away for the weekend and take the girls on a "kid-oriented" mini vacation.  For the last few summers we have visited Hershey and Amish country in PA.  My kids are 6 and 3  and really enjoy going to Dutch Wonderland.  It's perfectly geared to kids their age.  These trips have usually  been focused on them with little room for Mommy or Daddy's interests....and that is perfectly fine.  But this time I had to make a little detour on the way home.  For a little while now I have been dying to visit the Cabela's in Hamburg PA and I decided this year I wouldn't miss it.

The centerpiece of the Hamburg Cabela's (about three stories tall)

Looking down from the second floor of this huge diorama

I'm glad I went.  Even my wife was impressed with it's size and what could be found in it.  I primarily wanted to visit the fly shop to pick through some fly tying materials but at around 7 ACRES of floor space the rest of the store beckoned me.  The first thing you notice entering the doors is a "mountain" in the back center of the store that is about three stories tall and filled with various big game animals.  The taxidermists that put this display together did an incredible job and it's worthy of any great natural history museum.  An outdoors man or woman could spend a full day in this place very easily and not see everything.  Unfortunately, we only had an hour and a half to spare before getting back on the road to get through NYC before the rush hour traffic started and I didn't get to see everything.  Bottom line....if anyone one is traveling along I-78 in PA you owe it to yourself to stop in and take a look at the place.

A purple Royal Sakasa Kebari

But I digress....I went to get some fly tying materials....and I did. I managed to pick up some materials for some experiments that I plan on tying and hope to display soon.  For the time being I have two to show off.  The fly above is a Purple Royal Sakasa Kebari.  It's tied just like my favorite sakasa kebari but I used purple Pearsall's gossamer silk thread and purple dyed peacock herl.  I don't know how much I'll use it but I think it looks cool.  The fly pictured at the beginning of the post is a sakasa kebari tied with a twisted body of green antron (ala Jason Klass' twisted kebari).  I really like the way this one looks and can't wait to tie more with the other colors I picked up and then fish them.  It was enjoyable and productive visit.  However, for a while my 6 year old had a hard time trying to understand why Daddy was so happy to be in a "store" until an elderly woman passing by explained that THIS store was like Dutch Wonderland to Daddy.  At that point...She clearly understood.