Fishing, F3T, & Func Fish

This past Saturday was pretty damn fun.  It was the day the Fly Fishing Film Tour (F3T) came through the Philadelphia area, and I was to attend with a small posse of anglers, following an afternoon of fishing on Valley Creek, where I was supposed to play "guide."

Well, the posse never quite came together as planned, but Matt (aka Func Fish) & I decided to make the best of it.  Fishing would be first.

We arrived at Valley Creek around 1 or 1:30 PM.  It was a  bit chilly, but the sun was out so it was pretty tolerable weather.  I took Matt down to a spot I had done well with the prior week and gave him first shot at the water while I rigged up.

Bang.  First cast, trout on.  Maybe I'll earn that guide card after all...he claims it's his 4-LED powered "lucky" fly fishing cap.

From there the fishing was pretty average for Valley.  I caught 3 and lost three.  Here are pics of two.

This one was caught before, as evidenced by the jacked up lower jaw

Here's a random pic of Matt nymphing the covered bridge.

Matt didn't manage another trout, but did catch a pretty healthy sucker that was extremely "excitable," and by that I mean it decided to try to impregnate both his landing net and right hand upon capture.  Tasty.

We fished Valley until about 4:30 PM.  There was a bit of creek traffic, you know the random "dudes" you have to circumnavigate to get to the next fishing hole...but it wasn't too bad, and what I would consider a productive & fun mini-fishing trip.

After a quick side stop to re-fuel at Gino's Burgers & Fries...

this was a Gino's Giant & Fries

...we headed out to Media, PA, home of The Sporting Gentleman, the fly shop that was playing host to the F3T.

Let me first say that the folks at The Sporting Gentleman are top notch.  I never set foot in that place before, but everyone on the staff seemed very friendly, helpful, and accommodating, despite the fact that their small store was crammed full of like 150 people, all lined up for free pizza and craft beer from Pinocchio's Pizza & Beer Garden.

At a little before 7:00, the party moved a block down the street from the fly shop to D'Ignazio's Towne House, a nice restaurant/bar/banquet hall.  No, the F3T wasn't taking over some movie theater like I suppose they might out West, but it was a good location for our crowd...heck, have cold beer, will travel.

Once inside, Matt & I met Josh & John, some like-minded folks we had met on Twitter.  Does that sound creepy?  Dudes meeting dudes online? I guess I feel a little dirty now...  Anyway, they were good guys, the both of them...and fun to banter with while watching the movies.  (If you're reading this guys, good luck on your upcoming steelhead trip!)

Now as for the movies themselves?  I think I'll want to see the full versions of:

Riding High: A Season on the Fly (which has one of the coolest fishing dogs ever)


Geofish Belize 


And just because it got BY FAR the loudest reaction of the night, Doc of the Drakes.  


After that it was close to 11:00 PM, so we headed home and called it a day.  Exhausted, I got home in just enough time to turn my clock forward to lose an hour of sleep heading into Sunday.  One heck of a fly fishing day, it was definitely a worthwhile trade.