A reminder to those just tuning in. I’m in Eastern Czech Republic for the World Masters Fly Fishing Championships. The competition doesn’t start till mid next week but Team Manager Jerry Arnold and I came early to do some recon with local expert fishing guide David Chlumsky. Like figuring out any foreign water, there’s a lot of homework to be done. When the rest of Team USA rolls in on Friday hopefully we’ll have some good info and experience to share with them.
I’m especially glad to be early because my nymphing skills could use a tune up. I’m a dry fly angler at heart and its rare these days that I break out a nymph. Honestly, I haven’t fished a nymph since the last World’s Competition in South Africa in 2019. I’m more than capable, but yeah, brushing up on things for a World Championship is a good idea.
The good news is that our guide David is one of the top Czech anglers in the country. And Czech fly fishers in general are renown for “Czech” nymphing. Despite suffering a little jetlag yesterday, David got me up to speed with some great tips on how to keep my fly deep and how to better detect strikes. David even turned me on to a great leader design.
Today was all about applying things I learned yesterday. Instead of fishing side by side with David and Jerry I ran loose on my own. Although I had my struggles early, by the end of the day I’m feeling way more confident than when I got here.
Jerry, David and I fished hard all day. We just got back to our Pension and it’s time for dinner. The short report on our fishing today is that we caught a lot of fish. For me the day started slow with only a few but in the afternoon session on the middle section of the Morava River I did well. In fact, in the last hour I landed 15 fish – a nice mix of grayling and some gorgeous little native browns. Let’s say, “things clicked for me”.
I’m dozing off. Jetlag always gets me worst at the end of my second day. I should be back to normal tomorrow. But for now its time to put the computer away and get moving. Its 6 PM and Jerry is taking David and I out for dinner and a couple nice Czech Pilsners. And David is bringing his nymph boxes to show us some flies. I can’t miss that. More fishing tomorrow!
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