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To paraphrase Thomas Wolfe “you can never go home again”. Pat and I recently traveled back to New England to visit my old home town of Alstead, New Hampshire and do a little fishing in the storied waters of the Catskills “the birthplace of American fly fishing”.
American Museum of Fly Fishing
The town of Alstead is still as quiet as ever even though the population has doubled in the last fifty years (from 600 people to 1200), Most of the buildings that I remember in the town are gone or in disrepair. However, my old home, the town library, and the swimming pool are still there. I suspect that a lot of the buildings were lost during a huge flood 10 years ago; many were replaced with grass by an extension of the town park. I did find the place below the dam at the town pool where I caught my first trout on a fly and Crane Brook, where I caught my first trout ever (on bait), still flows through the meadow I remember.
On our way to the Catskills, we visited Manchester, Vermont; the home of Orvis and the American Museum of Fly Fishing. If you are ever in Manchester visit the museum as the exhibits are wonderful and the fly plates are great!
Pat and a Delaware rainbow
We arrived in Roscoe, New York, late on a gray day with rain threatening, so we checked into our room at the Baxter House B & B and went to visit the Catskill Fly Fishing Center. This is another great museum! They have Harry Darbee’s fly tying setup with his original vise and materials along with another setup with the Dette’s ( Walt and Winnie) vises and tools. Many of the great Catskill fly tyers have displays and fly plates in the museum.
We had a float trip planed on the East Branch of the Delaware the following morning. The weather was cool and again threatened rain (and it did come), so we dressed appropriately and took off. The fishing wasn’t spectacular but we did get a few nice rainbows and one nice brown. Evidently the fish and hatches in the Catskills like sun rather than cool weather. The weather we fished in was similar to the weather we would expect our olives to hatch. We did see a few olives and a few isonychia duns but there were no big hatches.
Fall colors
We did some fishing during the following two days in the Beaverkill and the Willowemoc without a great deal of success. One morning we stopped by the old Dette’s home which is still a fly shop. The pictures show a old time fly shop with everything in disarray but still findable. This is the oldest fly shop in the United States. The weather turned really stormy and we finally left early to drive back to the airport. All in all a great trip!