Fly fishing, writing and art seem to go together quite well, don’t they? There’s something about fly fishing that appeals to an artistic mind, or maybe it’s the other way around. Either way, the fly fishing world is crazy with art and literature inspired by the practice.
I enjoy reading about fishing almost as much as actually fishing – almost. The great story tellers can put into words many of the feelings that surround the angling experience, and provide some relief for those days when you can’t make it on the water. I take it David Van Wie feels much the same. From his home trout waters in the Dartmouth College Grant to spring creeks in the Driftless region of Wisconsin, north and east to Katahdin, and everywhere in between, he’s been haunted by fishing writers from the past.
“Storied Waters: 35 fabled fly-fishing destinations and the writers & artists who made them famous” chronicles David Van Wie’s six week road trip to walk in the footsteps of those famous anglers who went on before, and meet new ones. Van Wie journeyed from Maine to Wisconsin and back, fishing most every day and journaling along the way. He dug deep into the history of each special place he visited, met the locals, tried his hand at the fishing, and moved on.
The ultimate destination was Uncles Pond – fellow readers of fly fishing lore would remember it as Frenchman’s, the beaver pond that John Voelker (pen name Robert Traver) made famous through his wildly popular angling stories. Voelker had a cabin on the pond, and spent a great deal of time there in his later years. His daughter and son in law take care of the place now, and invited Van Wie to visit and cast a line. That’s what started the trip, and if you’re going that far, why not stop and fish along the way?
Starting at Walden Pond – an urban fishery in Massachusetts where Henry David Thoreau connected with nature back in the 1800’s, Van Wie continued to Vermont, where he fished with some of the Orvis folks on the Battenkill. Not long after, he was floating in a driftboat down the Delaware River in New York, and eventually found himself in the spring creeks of Pennsylvania. It would seem quite a ways from there to Wisconsin, but it was worth the trip to fish the same water legendary conservationist Aldo Leopold worked to restore in the 1940’s.
Fishing in the shadow of Robert Traver in Michigan must have been quite the experience, but as DVW worked his way back east, he still had lots of storied water to visit. Experiencing Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom and the rivers of western Maine, and journeying all the way to the shadow of Mount Katahdin topped off the trip.
Henry David Thoreau, Corey Ford, Aldo Leopold, Robert Traver, Ernest Hemingway, Louise Dickinson Rich, Edmund Ware Smith, Arthur MacDougall, and many other well known anglers and conservationists brought unique perspective and color to the waters Van Wie visited, and he tells some of their stories along the way. He also mixes in modern local flavor and useful tips and tricks for fishing these storied waters. And yeah, he catches a few fish.
“Storied Waters” is a unique combination of angling history, modern day story-telling and fishing how-to, all in one easy reading package with some great photos to boot. You even get a bit of DVW’s outlook on angling, conservation and life thrown in for free. And among his many thoughts, one resonated with me above all: pond fishing is a game of Cow-Flop Bingo. I’m with you on that one Dave, and it may be an idea worthy enough to find its place among the greats in fly fishing literature!
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