Nothin much

Ive just been chillin. nothin much goin on except for work and more fishing. ill have a good story on friday after i go to a secret creek with my dad and a friend.

Incredible Fishing!

Yesterday I went fishing with my dad and our long time friend Jeff Currier. He is an incredible fly fisherman. Actually one of the best in the world. It's always a ton of fun being with him. Watching him fish was incredible, how much he knew and how good he is was the coolest thing in the world. We went to the Last Chance stretch of the Henry's Fork where we slayed the big Rainbows, Jeff caught one that was probably 22 inches and I caught one that was about 20. My dad caught a 15 incher and broke off a big one. I hooked into a fish that was easily 20 inches and it was a pig, I fought it for about 10 seconds and then the hook literally broke in half. Currier said this is a very rare thing so that was frustrating. But this was by far my best fishing experience to date and I will definitely be back at that stretch of River. Incredible Day all around! There's absolutely no way me or my dad could have caught a fish without Currier there. Were lucky to have him as a friend. I look forward to fishing with him again in August with the rest of the fam!

A Little Mad!

Sorry about that last blog. I was just pretty upset about what happened. Sorry folks! Won't be anymore of that happening.

Sorry For No Blogs Lately

I have been super busy and really tired when I get back from work. I will add another good one tomorrow.

Good Day At Work And Even Better Fishing

Today I woke up again at 5:45 AM for work and opened the shop up at 6:50. It started out slow but the day picked up for a little bit and we sold a rod and reel to one young couple. That brightened our work day a bit. But then it got slow again and when I say slow I mean REALLY slow. So I ended up getting let off work early and was able to go fish at Mr. Sayers' house again where I caught this pretty nice 16 or 17 inch Snake River Cutty. Not huge but it was an awesome fight and it was definitely a beautiful fish to catch. He is most likely trying to spawn with his really bright colors around his neck area. He was an awesome fish and I will probably make another trip back there tomorrow to try and get my mom on one of these hogs! Stay tuned!

Hard Days Work

Today I woke up at 5:45 AM for work and had a super long day. Good thing is we sold a ton of stuff and had an awesome day in the shop. Then my mom and I went to dinner at Dornan's where I met two more guys I will be working with later on which should be fun. They are both right out of college and fun to hang out with. The next two work days should be good ones. Stay Tuned!

Solid Day Off

Today I slept in and it felt incredible. I woke up at 9:45, took my shower and then took some inventory down to the shop in Moose today. Then I got a few flies and waited for my mom to be done with her volunteer work so we could go fishing. Instead of driving two hours up to the Firehole in Yellowstone, we just went to Mr. Sayers' back yard where I proceeded to catch one small cutty and my mom tried for a little bit but then put down the rod for a book...After that, we went home and got ready for dinner with Chris and Emma Mathews, they were both really nice and fun to hang out with. Tomorrow, I'm back to work from 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM so tomorrow night's blog might be a little Slow. I'll just go ahead and apologize in advance for that. But it could be good ya never know. Later folks!

Less Work And More Fishing

For the past few weeks I have been really focusing on honing my skills with my fly rods and flies. I have still been working really hard and long hours. I am now working from 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM. It's a super long day! Work is still a lot of fun though and I never get tired of it. The other night, I went to dinner with the Beamans and that was a lot of fun. I got to talk to my good friend Natalie and became an older brother to little Jackson! He's an awesome kid. Then I went to work all day today and it was a pretty busy day at work selling people flies and licenses and other random things. Then, I went to dinner tonight with my mom, Mr. Sayers, Raif, and Shannon, all good friends of ours. It was a lot of fun. I got to fish for a little bit but Fish creek rose a ton in the past few days and the fish were definitely a little more suspicious. I got one little hit from a big fish on my own fly, but it was in the middle of me stripping my line in and I ended up missing the fish. But it's whatever I'm glad I got that beast to bite at my own fly I created. I have tomorrow off and I'm going into the shop to work on a few things and get a few flies, then I'm taking my mom up to the Firehole river to help her try and catch some trout. She has been with me so far and I can't possibly thank her enough. It's time I give back to her a little bit! She's been awesome and one of the highlights of my trip so far. Stay tuned because tomorrow's blog should be full of good stuff!

What A Week!

By the way, this is one of the fish I caught last week.

My mom and I started off a hike on Jenny Lake to try and find another lake and tributary that attach to it. Little did we know it was going to be about a 9 mile hike round-trip after looking for the lake, running into two bears on the trail (both black, but very big and intimidating), and then having to walk all the way back to Jenny Lake parking lot...With no fish. That was a bummer but it was narly to see those bears that close. That day, my mom and I just sort of hung out and then went to dinner with our cousin Katherine who is the bartender at Dornan's. She was awesome and really fun to hang out with. The next day, I went back to work and had sort of a normal day at work except for how super slow it was. Then I went fishing at Mr. Sayers' house and was unlucky for the 45 minutes that I fished, but I was excited to still get a few nibbles on one of my flies that I created myself. The three of us went to dinner at the bistro and it was really good. Then today, I had another day at work from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM except that it was super busy and that made it go by fast. It was a fun day. Then, I came home and my mom pretty much passed out on the bed and I went to Mr. Sayers' house again to fish and I caught a reasonable 15 or 16 inch cutty on another one of my own flies. I was super stoked! I then saw a beaver swimming in the water and ran to tell Mr. Sayers, because I knew we wanted the beavers dead. So he brought out a sweet S&W M&P AR-15 in a .22 long rifle and he shot the beaver. The beaver didn't die on the spot but we hope it did. It floated/swam off before we could get another shot on it. It has been an action packed week and tomorrow we are starting work at 7:00 AM and closing at 7:00 PM, those will be the store hours for the rest of the summer, it is going to be a very long day. But then I have three days off right after that so it should be another fun week. Stay Tuned!

Such A Long Day

Sorry folks, I have had another super long day and I'm soooo tired again. I promise tomorrow I'll blog and get back on schedule.

A Lot Of Wildlife

I'm soooo tired from today so this blog will be very short. Actually, I'll tell you guys everything in tomorrow's blog. I work tomorrow from 8:00 to 5:00 so another long day. Stay posted because tomorrow's blog will be very interesting.

A Very Much Needed Day Off

Today I woke up at 6:40 AM and went to work at 7:30. This was actually supposed to be one of my days off but the shop needed me in for a little bit in order to train a newbie. I trained the newbie for a good two or three hours and sent the Scenic float trip out at 8:00 AM. Everything in Moose literally just shut down, nobody came into the shop the whole time the Scenic trip was out. It was the slowest most boring morning of my life. Finally, the Scenic arrived around 11:00 AM and I was eventually let free. I then came home and read more of my book on Snake River fly fishing written by SRA's own, Boots Allen. Boots is an incredible fisherman and an even better dude. I read his book then went into town with my mom to stop by and see our long time friend Granny. It was good to see her. Then I came back home and emailed her husband Jeff Currier to make sure I could reserve a fishing spot with him sometime this summer. Talk about one heck of a fisherman and an even better man himself, Jeff is awesome! Then I went and fished Jenny Lake and I forgot that I didn't have my waders or wading boots. And if your not in a boat on Jenny Lake, you have to at least have waders in order to get out a little from the bank. I got snagged a few times by the overhanging trees and I knew I had to have waders in order to be more successful. So I am waking up early tomorrow to go back to Jenny and I am determined to catch a good Lake Trout. I'll keep everyone updated.

Back In Business

I got back from Idaho yesterday around 1:00 PM to a rainy and cold Wilson, Wyoming. The Trip was incredible. It is way to much to type about so I will sum it up as much as possible. We went and fished the Henry's Fork on the first day and we caught a few fish but hooked some BEASTS but couldn't land them. But that is a part of fishing. I learned to row a drift boat which was awesome and I can't wait to be a guide someday in the near future.
We then went back and camped out on a goat farm for 2 nights and I was fortunate enough to meet the founder and owner, the CEO, and the product manager of Patagonia clothing. It was incredible. In ever thought I would ever be able to meet such important people and get their card and have them teach me and the other fly fishing outfitters about all of the new stuff Patagonia has to offer for the spring of 2012, 2013, and 2014. If you like Patagonia stuff, let me know because I can hook you up. No joke! But it was an awesome experience and it was great meeting those guys.

Then, this morning I woke up and went to breakfast at Nora's with my mom and Katherine Beaman. It was fun to see her and the pancakes were incredible. Then I had another full day of work and little action in the shop. Tonight, I went to dinner with our cousin Catherine who works at Dornan's.

And tomorrow, I have to be at work at 7:30 AM to train a new guy and stuff. It will be an interesting day!

Packin' For Idaho

Sorry for no blog last night, the internet connection here in our little apartment goes on and off, but the last two days have been awesome. Yesterday, I did my usual work day from 9:00 AM to 5PM, but I got to work at our shop in Moose. This was an awesome experience because the Moose shop is so much more mellow and really chill. It's awesome working in that shop instead of the one in Jackson. I think I will be able to work in the Moose shop a lot more now and I'm lovin' it. After work, My mom and I went to our good friend Hanley Sayers' house for dinner and I was able to fish in the spring creek in his backyard which harbors HUGE snake river cutthroat trout. These fish are very smart, easily spooked, and very hard to catch. But the reward of catching one of these beauts is incredible, I was fishing in this stream for a good hour and had had no luck, the trout would come shooting after my streamer but then turn away at the last second and I figured out why, I pretty much had to lay down in order for these fish not to see me. So I bombed another cast across Fish Creek and sure enough, while I was stripping in my Silvey Sculpin, it got hammered by a very very nice Snake River Cutty. I fought it for a good 6 or 7 minutes and it was absolutely awesome. It was a 21-22 incher and very fat...Very unlikely for this early in the season. I was ecstatic to get my first Cutty of the season. I was stoked!

Today, I went to work again in Moose from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM and made some serious cash. We had a huge day with beautiful weather and people screaming through the store in waves, getting anything from AIS (Aquatic Invasive Species) stickers to rental rods and and purchasing Costa Del Mars. It was an awesome day at work. Then I spent another good day at Mr. Sayers' house landing another good Cutty by stripping the classic Sex Dungeon (<-- A type of fly).

Tomorrow, me and my friend Ben Miller from Snake River Angler were designated to go and represent Snake River Angler at a Patagonia Presentation. This Presentation is like the Catalina Wine Mixer of Fly fishing, this event is huge and sponsored by Patagonia. Fly fishing outfitters from all over the west will be there. And, we also get a bunch of free Patagonia stuff. Also, I recently got signed up for a Pro Deal with Patagonia meaning I can get anything I want from Patagonia for fly fishing and get a HUGE!!!!! discount on anything. I recently got $500 Patagonia waders for $200 and a $70 Patagonia fishing shirt for $29.99. It is the greatest thing in the world. But also, the greatest part of all, there is a Salmon Fly Hatch on the Henry's Fork (<-- The river we are fishing) right now which means...KILLER FISHING!! Usually with a Salmon Fly Hatch, HUGE Brown Trout, Rainbow Trout, and Cutthroat Trout come out of the depths and feed on magnificent and very large dry flies. This will be an awesome experience and the fishing will be killer. A Narly trip all around. I can't wait for it...I will be camping for the next 2 nights so the next blog will be in 3 days. I will tell you all about the trip. Stay tuned because this is going to be Awesome!!!

Another Day At SRA

I woke up a good hour and a half early again today for my job. No matter how long I try and sleep for, I just have to get up. Everything is so exciting and fun for me so it's impossible for me to just lay in bed. I went to work again today from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM and had another awesome day at work. It was a little slow again but I got some new waders and wading boots, with my employee's discount and also a sponsorship deal with Patagonia...IT"S AWESOME!!! So the prices on all my toys that I buy have gone down a ton. I wanted to go see if I could go catch a lake trout today so my mom and I drove into Yellowstone National Park for Jenny Lake. I fished for about an hour with many different colored zonkers, clousers, buggers, and other big streamers and got absolutely nothing. I was furious with myself. Granted, I didn't have a sinking tapered line which is a HUGE part in catching Lake Trout, but I was still furious with myself and I have decided that for the next few weeks, my life will be fly fishing and work, that way I can get all the experience and information I need to get before the season really starts up. I was so mad after catching nothing that now I am incredibly determined to prove myself to the people of SRA...It was an overall good day and my mom and I finished it off with dinner at Dornans. Now I have been doing all of my homework on lake trout fishing and other techniques so I will be able to prove myself and make a name for myself at the best Fly Fishing Outfitter in Jackson Hole, Snake River Angler. New post on tomorrow's fun!

Sorry For No Blog Last Night

Sorry for not blogging last night. I was exhausted from yesterdays work and then I had to go to dinner right after. Then My mom and I came home and just crashed. I will have a new blog up tonight.

Work At Snake River Angler

I woke up this morning around 6:30 and I have no idea why. I guess I'm just so excited to be out here that I want to get all the time in I can (3 months just wont cut it). My mom finally got up and we both got ready to go to breakfast. But I forgot we had planned to go to breakfast and I ended up just eating a bowl of cereal. I told my mom that I was going to Snake River Angler to check in and just tell them I was in town and was ready to start working as soon as they needed me...Thinking that would have been tomorrow. Well I walked out of the apartment to a cold 35 degrees and down to the car, I put the key into the ignition and it didn't budge. The key just would not turn, I went up and told my mom and we called my dad who always knows what to do in these situations. The steering wheel was locked and so I had to toy with it a little while trying to turn the key...Finally the car started. So I backed out and headed over to Grand Teton National Park and into Moose, Wyoming where one of the Snake River Angler (SRA) shops is located. I walked into the shop and saw a friend of mine talking on the phone behind the counter. He got off the phone and we began to talk and he then asked me "So, are you here to start working or are you just stopping in?" My initial thought was jeez, he's already putting me to work? Whatever, I got nothin else to do. So I told him I was ready to work. We then spent the next few hours getting my name into all these systems and going over all of the things I would need to know about in Jackson and in the shop. I caught on pretty quick to everything he told me and I was able to sell things by my first customer...Which consisted of a little thing of chapstick and some sunscreen, a big sale in my book. It's amazing how quickly and well I learned all of the things he was telling me about fly fishing and the geography of the land, when I can barely pass science over a nine month learning period. But what was supposed to be just a quick greeting and stop by, turned into a six hour work day from 9:00 AM-3:00 PM. But tomorrow I will be working in the main shop in Jackson with the big dogs, I better step my game up if I wanna hang. Anyway, it was an awesome first day and work is sweet. I get to buy many new toys for myself with an employees discount at the shops, I'm super excited about that. I think my mom just went on a bunch of walks and workout stuff around Teton Village. And now she has volunteered for a job at a horseback riding school for the disabled. It makes me proud to be her son. After work, I went fishing behind a friends house on Fish Creek (Ironic Huh?). Where I proceeded to see no hatch (Where bugs are coming out of shells and flying around on the water and in the air) and no fish rising, and actually no fish at all. Then I saw my first Snake River Cutty, it had to have been at least 25 inches and a truly beautiful trout. I threw everything I had on me at the time, I threw dry flies, of all different colors and patterns, and then I didn't see him feeding on top so I dropped a nymph off the bottom of my dry fly. Still no luck, finally after about 20 minutes of hardcore casting at this trout, he swam up stream and I had had enough on fish creek. But fishing all over JH is tough right now with possibly the biggest runoff in history and the fish are all freaked out. It will be a very interesting season and I will have another blog tomorrow night. Stay tuned!

The Trip For The Cowboy State

My mom and I left from our home in Nashville at 8:00 AM Sunday morning for our two day trip to Jackson Hole, Wyoming. We started out with my mom driving in my 1997 Toyota Land Cruiser. We started out North on our way into Kentucky, where we found ourselves driving through endless forest, something we were very used to being from Nashville. My mom and I switched driving probably every two to three hours...Or whenever we needed to stop for gas. We drove through the boring forest of Kentucky, into the open corn and crop fields of Illinois, through the endless green fields of Missouri, into the forest and occasional fields of Iowa, and across the open plains of Nebraska. We drove through six states in our first day of driving and not one of them were pretty or really interesting to look at. We drove a consistent thirteen hours in the first day where we spent the night in a very comfy Holiday Inn Hotel. That night, my mom and I devoured a large pizza with a ton of different things on it, a salmon fillet, some corn, and a baked potato. We were starved and after a full stomach and about thirty minutes of Wedding Crashers, we were lights out and snoring. At 7:00 this morning my alarm screamed at my mom and I to wake up, but we quickly turned it off and slept for an extra seven minutes (a lot of extra sleep...). I took a shower to help wake up and my mom and I quickly headed downstairs to get her coffee and check out. We were on the road by 7:30 and I was behind the wheel. Oh, I forgot to mention that last night, I gave my mom the best massage of her life to try and bribe her in believing in making it all the way to Jackson today. Well we were on the road again switching every two or three hours like our normal routine at slug speed because the wind on these open plains was unbelievable, I have never been in anything like it. The wind tossed our car around like a rag doll and with the pedal all the way to the floor, we could barely hit 60 mph. It was some difficult driving. But finally we crossed into Wyoming. We saw our first groups of Pronghorn Antelope and endless herds of cattle. My mom and I pressed on through rain, wind, 18 wheelers, and other obstacles because we knew of the beauty that was to come. Finally, we reached the pass through the mountains going into Jackson Hole, where we were in awe of the twelve foot (at least) high snow-pack on the side of the pass; not to mention the incredible views we had coming through the mountain. Then finally, after 25 hours and 1,630 miles of driving, we reached the outskirts of Moose, Wyoming (just outside the town of JH), where we continued to go eat at one of our favorite restaurants, Nora's...My mom ordered panfried Wallie and I ordered the Trout, we both inhaled our dinners and headed to our condo in Teton Village. Believe it or not, it was about 35 degrees and spitting snow. And since our condo is on the top floor of our complex, bringing my mom's 80lb suitcase up three flights of stairs was an awesome feeling :). Now we are both so unbelievably tired from the trip out here and we are going to crash big time to get ready for tomorrow of my first day at work in Snake River Angler. Be ready for another blog of tomorrow's fun!!