I took Sharon and Richard Donnel out for a day of fly fishing in the Smokies with a generous dose of instruction last weekend. They’re local folks from the Knoxville area who decided they wanted to spend more time in the stunning mountain scenery so close to their home. Both were pretty quick studies when […]
Waders Should Look to Mountain Streams for the Best Fishing This Week
Mountain streams throughout the Smoky Mountain region are in great shape right now with good water levels and water temperatures. The photos in this post are from just a few days ago and the dry fly fishing has been pretty good in many locations. We started to see some unsettled weather yesterday as a front […]
Five Minute Video Vacation: Bald River Gorge Wilderness
Here’s a spiffy little video we found which features one of our favorite places in the greater Smoky Mountain region. The Bald River Gorge isn’t in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, but very close by in the neighboring Tellico Ranger District of the Cherokee National Forest. This isn’t a fly fishing video, but it will […]
August in East Tennessee
The past few days have seen the weather in a cloudy, muggy funk. While there have been some downpours, there has been plenty of dry time to get out. Unfortunately the unsettled weather (and flows) have had the bugs and fish waiting for more consistency. The rain has seen stream flows up and down and […]
Reelin’ In The Years
It’s been on my mind since spring and I’ve tried to avoid it, but lately a few things have been impossible to ignore. Running our own guide service and raising a couple of kids makes it tough to dwell on anything minor for very long, but when some seemingly random points come together to create […]
Catching Our Breath
The past few weeks have been a blur. There has been tons of guiding followed by a fishing trip up to Maine, and then home to more guiding and the start of the school year for the kids. August is generally a time when we do some guiding but the volume is much less than […]
Summer Time Change Up
It’s that time of of the season when we’re ready for a change of scenery along with some different types of fishing. I know it’s hard for most people to envision, but floating the same sections of river and wading the same stretches of stream start to wear on you enough that it seems more […]
Hot Summer Days on the Water in East Tennessee & the Smokies
There’s no doubt about it. It’s the middle of summer in East Tennessee with hot weather, high humidity, and pop up thunderstorms. Fortunately the afternoon storms are keeping the heat contained, but the humidity out on the big rivers coupled with bright sunshine can be tough on a guy who rows a boat. Things are […]
Progress Report: Lynn Camp Prong Brook Trout Restoration in the Smokies
Last week Charity and I volunteered one day when the Great Smoky Mountains National Park fisheries biologists went to check on the brook trout population in Lynn Camp Prong. This stream was recently restored with native brook trout from other streams in the Smokies after all rainbow trout were removed from the stream. This is […]
A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Words
Not a bad day in the drift boat