Oh happy day. Bad week at work, Thursday night I drive up to Hemlock
Acres to meet Clavemeister Tom for a weekend of fishing Penns. Took a
different route, watched a guy carving a stump with a chain saw. He was
making a bear. Stuck in traffic in a small town for 45 minutes as they
resurfaced the street.
Ended up at Penns clave central at about 5:30. Drank a beer. Waiting
for the imminent arrival of Tom. Hmmm, where is he. Check the phone.
Nope. Have another beer. Light a fire. Watch a black bear run through
the tenting area. Read. Have another beer. Make fire bigger. Read.
No light left. Need more wood. Start to pry up the deck. Open another
beer. Tom finally makes it at about 8:30.
We chat about things and decide to head out early for Spring Creek.
Fishing is slow. Tom does get 30 inches of fish. Unfortunately, that
was from 9 trout. I'm skunked. One little guy on a long range release.
See some beautiful fish rise to my fly (#18 tan caddis). I did find
out that these are genetically altered trout. PSU has ensured that
these guys won't hit unless you're wearing a Joe Paterno mask.
We decide to go into State College at about 12:30 to visit Fly
Fishermen's Paradise. Cruising through town, its Freshman Orientation
Week. Confused teenagers following Mom around. Mom's got a notebook,
Dad is carrying 248 lbs of school supplies. After an hour, we decide we
don't need directions (hell, we're men), but an address would help.
After a check of a phone book, we quickly find the store (that we passed
on the way into town an hour before) and drop some cash on tying
materials.
On the way back to Coburn, we stop for lunch. Clouds are ominous. Wind
is bending the trees like a tarpon on a two weight. After breaking our
fast, we hit the road. Windshield wipers sing "No Fish, No Fish, No
Fish." Sheets of water rise up from the road in homeric violence, the
sky blends perfectly with the shades of the wet slate hills. We pull
into Burkhalters grocery just to get off the road and wait for the
passing of the deluge.
When the storm drizzles out, we head to the cabin. Dry off, and tie
some flies. At about 5:30, we head out to Stan's pool. We kit up, but
every time we venture from under the trees, another storm passes over.
Back out, cast for 5 minutes, get off the water as the lightning pierces
the valley's heart. We continue in this vein for 2 hours. No fish,
new, stronger storm coming, time to call it a day.
Sally forth on Saturday morning. Hmm, still raining. At 11:00 the rain
lets up. Penns is now a Starbucks chocolate mocha, venti. Head to
Weikert Run. Promising. Fish in the pool at the bridge. We move
upstream and park. Tom goes downstream, I, in my ignorance, go up.
Encounter dense mountain laurel that gets me low crawling, right into a
biting gnat infested bog. These gnats have been cross-bred with the
local black bears. Not seen so many big, hairy blood-suckers since the
ex-wives and IRS agents for Bush convention.
Walk back down the road. Tom is at the bridge. He's gotten two rises
out of fish at the bridge pool. We give up, check out Cherry Run. Same
situation. No fish.
We're beaten. We head back and drown our sorrows in T-bones and
Delmonicos. Sunday, we go our separate ways, beaten, but not defeated.
We will be back.

--
Frank Reid
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