Trip Report - 21 June 98

Trip Report
Club Mouche, France
Sunday, 21 June

During a work related social event after work on Friday, my boss's, boss's, boss's wife stated that she wished I could have taken her 18 year old fly fishing son fishing before he left Germany and reported to West Point for the start of his first year. Conflicting schedules had prevented me from doing it earlier, and he was scheduled to leave the following Thursday, and I was leaving for a week long conference in Belgium on Sunday after meeting a VIP at the Frankfurt Airport at 0840 in the same morning. After considering the options available and consequences of some of my proposed actions, I figured out a way to make it all work out.

It goes something like this....BBB's wife takes care of the VIP (old family friend anyway). I pick up 18 year old fly fisher at 0500, make the three hour drive to Club Mouche, fly fish for most of the day, leave Club Mouche not later than 1600, drive to Metz, France, place 18 year old fly fisher on train to Heidelberg, GE not later than 1730, drive to Namur, Belgium, and arrive prior to 1900 hours in order to make it to the first social event of the conference. Sounded pretty good at mid-night Friday. Only real concern was getting a pre-paid train ticket for BBB's son. Did that the next morning (Saturday), and that's where the fun began.

I called BBB's wife to let them know I had set up everything with Victor (Club Mouche), had the train ticket in hand and everything was set. When she told me BBB wanted to talk to me, I thought "trouble" with a capital T. Actually, he wanted to come along to watch his son catch much trout with the brand new Orvis rod and reel he got for graduating high school about a week before. I told him to pack his bags and be ready to leave home around 0500, and then bought him a train ticket too.

I picked them both up at 0458 the next morning and we arrived at Club Mouche safe and sound at 0805 Sunday morning. The big first pond was drained, the sky was clear, and the temperature was 67 degrees and climbing. It actually got up to about 88 degrees before the day was half over. At that point I was thinking it may not be a very productive day. Boy was I wrong!

The kid had "fish on" using a #14 Renegade that I recommended based on the ton of flying bugs visible as we approached the back ponds. He had a second on in no time. I had a brown sedge (#14) tied on by then and started to land a few too. Fish must have been hungry! Only down sides during the first two hours were that neither of the two cameras I brought were working properly (my fault), and I lost the sedge on a monster trout. I switched to a brown bodied elk hair caddis (#14) and continued to catch fish.

After about two hours, BBB was ready to fish too. He's not normally a fly fisher, but was willing to step up to the plate. I let him use my "old faithful" while I coached him in some basics of getting the fly on the water. Have you ever seen an "egg beater" in action? Before long he was able to make short 15 to 20 foot casts with some effect. He actually had about 6 or 7 solid strikes and one monster hooked within 30 minutes. The monster got away when he grabbed the reel and prevented the fish from running. Meanwhile I switched to my bamboo rod and some new emergers that I had tied over the last few weeks. Wanted to see if I could entice a few bites. The #14 Pheasant Tails, Princes, and a purple monstrosity worked too!!

Once BBB lost the caddis, I tied on an Adams and moved him to tough pond where his son was catching trout after trout on the same. BBB got several more strikes, and lost the Adams on a "fish on" before lunch. I let him use a #12 Royal Wolf while I worked up the left back with a Panama (French dry fly). He got a few looks but no takers with it. I got one then lost the Panama on a subsequent long release. I thought I would play around with a Yellow Humpty just for the fun of it. Strike! Then again and again. Incredible! Eight different flies working at the same time. By the way all the fish up to this point were Rainbows (18 - 26 inches).

After lunch the fishing slowed down. I switched BBB and me to the infamous Ugly Fly while the son went out for a nap (he's a dry fly purist). I caught about four Rainbows before I figured it was about time to wrap it up and get them to the train station. As I was reeling the line, I heard BBB yell "I got one!"

I dropped everything and sprinted the 20 yards to make sure we landed this one. He had a little one on the line and when I looked close I could tell it wasn't a Rainbow. I netted the 12 inch Brown and took a great picture (I hope) of the two of them with a borrowed camera. Hope she sends the photos.

After that it gets pretty boring. They made the train and I made the social event in Belgium with no problem. What a great day!

Back to Trips