April Showers

Instead of a single specific topic, I thought I'd share a few short updates on my life that probably won't ever make it into a full article.  Here's the quick rundown: (1)Tarpon Fishing in the Florida Keys, (2) Progress (or lack of) on my backpacking teepee, (3) Teaching my daughter how to tie flies, (4) My bum knees, (5) Memorial Day weekend camping, (6) Going west, young man

Let's dive in, shall we?

Tarpon Fishing in the Florida Keys

My wife and I recently went to Key West, FL with another couple (and without our kids) for a long weekend.  While there my buddy and I had the opportunity to get out for a morning of tarpon fishing on the flats with Captain Dale Bishop.  It was a great experience, a great guide, excellent equipment, and my first time casting an 11-wt fly rod into the wind on the flats, hunting for these giant, prehistoric fish.  We saw a few fish but in the end we didn't catch any.  Had we been successful I'd no doubt be writing a full blog article with pictures and videos of me wrestling these 100 pound fish to the boat.  Instead I can only promise that I'll do that again in the future.

My Backpacking Teepee

I've been making slow progress on this thing as spring has sprung and my evening priorities have shifted from my basement to my back yard.  However, I did get the zippers installed, the noseeum doors sewn, and I'm starting to put the final stitches in to get the main body finished.  After that I'll have to add guy-out points, a noseeum border along the bottom edge, and a loop at the top in case I ever want to suspend it from a tree or something above instead of with a pole from inside.  The good news is that I'm taking plenty of photos and will blog about it when it's ready.

Teaching my Daughter to Tie Flies

Shortly after I finished building my workbench, I set up my fly tying station.  I haven't spent much time at the vice, but that strange contraption caught the attention of my 7½ year old daughter.  When your little girl asks you about fly fishing, you teach her.  So we've tied a few very simple flies together (a bizarre colored wooly bugger for which she picked the color scheme, and a little foam beetle that should be a panfish killer), and now I'm pumped to get her out to a little farm pond or something to catch a few bluegill on her masterpieces.

My Bum Knees

What started out as a triathlon-focused blog has quickly turned into a backpacking & outdoors blog, thanks in large part to my knees.  They're messed up at the moment, and I'm not able to train like I normally would.  I'm still running a little when I can, and now that the sun is out a little earlier I'll start riding my bike to work (about 20 hilly miles each way, so a decent workout actually), but I really don't have any races planned, because I know I won't be able to compete at a level that will make me happy.  Hopefully we'll get them fixed up.

Memorial Day Weekend Camping

Like every other red blooded American, I'm headed out to do some camping over the upcoming long weekend.  This trip is with my best friends in the world.  Several of us have done this for well over 20 years straight, and we consider it pretty much untouchable in our lives. 

The chosen location this year will be a little different than what we normally choose, but no matter what we do it's always great to see everyone and catch up.

Going West

Ok, so I probably will write a full blog (or series, even) on this one, but it's a long way off and I'm too excited to wait to talk about it.  A skeleton crew version of the group that I go camping with are headed to Colorado in September to do some backcountry camping, alpine lake fishing, and 14er climbing.  Super stoked, and of course I'm planning with excessive detail and contingencies, including assembling topo maps.

That's it for now.

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