In a galaxy far away, when I was in my 40s, I would fish with my son, my brother, and friends on the Big Piney River in east central Missouri. This was not a glam-intensive fishing experience with guides in $250 Orvis and Patagonia outfits and a 5-star lodge featuring rib eye steaks with red-wineContinue reading “Shore Lunch”
Category Archives: Wind Knots and Backlashes
learning at the feet of the sensei
Steve, the goateed one from Ohio, and I, the Old Road Peddler, waited on the Maximo Park boat ramp. We were tight, nervous – two guys inhaling their last smokes in a WWI trench, ready to go over the top. We had assembled our fly rods from the tip section down. Check. We had linedContinue reading “learning at the feet of the sensei”
Fathers and Sons
My father, Bill Craig, was the personification of Lt. Col Bull Meecham, crack jet pilot and man’s man, in Pat Conroy’s “The Great Santini.” The difference being that my father was an army infantryman and, having two stars on his shoulders, outranked Bull. My father preferred bourbon, loved attractive women, could dance, fish and shootContinue reading “Fathers and Sons”
The Trout Whisperer
Cashiers, North Carolina is where Floridians go in summer to escape from it all, then find themselves competing for a spaghetti squash at the Farmer’s Market on US 64 with a next-door neighbor from St. Petersburg. It is a place with more Land Rovers than Ford F-150s. Locals pronounce their burg’s name ”Cash – uhrs.”Continue reading “The Trout Whisperer”
A Tale of Blood and a Lost Shoe
The tug on my foot was firm, about the sensation you get when you lace up your shoes. Only in this case a young doc, in a doc smock, was lacing up the wound on the sole of my foot. I sat on a gurney in the BayCare “doc-in-a-box” facility on 4th St. N. IContinue reading “A Tale of Blood and a Lost Shoe”