Freshened!

I’ve been sitting back today, reading a bit, and enjoying the freshness of new mown grass on the cool air wafting through the window. It is hard to beat the fragrance and the feeling of rain washed mountain air!

At last, that endless run of dark, stormy heat and humidity has departed the Catskills, and all seems lovely and new again. It is a Sunday and the rivers are high and off color, doubly not a fishing day, and there isn’t much of anything I have to do.

I watched a Canadian TV show on YouTube this morning, one showcasing Atlantic salmon fishing on Nove Scotia’s Margaree River. My friend Dennis Menscer recently returned from his own trip there and I wanted to see some of the places and people he told me about.

I have always been intrigued by the thought of salmon fishing, it’s great history and literature have entertained me through the long days of winter, particularly the tales of the Golden Age recounted by the late Dana Lamb and his contemporaries. Cape Breton Island and it’s Margaree are beautiful, and I have seen the magic of the Atlantic salmon touch people like Dennis and my old friend Ed Shenk.

I sat and talked with Dennis about a week after his return, and the energy of the place was still strong within him. I could hear the excitement in his voice as he related his experiences and spoke about building new bamboo rods for next year. Of particular interest was the summer dry fly fishing on the Margaree, a special kind of magic that would easily captivate me!

I have long dreamed of a salmon fishing trip, but that remains as much a fantasy as a mythical sojourn for Labrador brook trout. I have no expectation of being able to experience either, though the dream still lingers…

Across the room there is and old, dented aluminum rod case that bears some split cane with a salmon angling history. That 5-5/8ths ounce Orvis Battenkill was owned by an author, Dr. Livingston Parsons, who shared his years at a family salmon camp in his book “Salmon Camp: The Boland Brook Story”. A classic Hardy Zenith reclines nearby in a tackle bag, the perfect compliment to that fine old rod. Sitting back and smelling the freshened air with pictures of the lovely Margaree in my mind, it is easy to imagine myself casting that Battenkill on one of her famous salmon pools.