It’s crazy, when my whole passion for fishing started, I wanted to go and catch more and bigger, and that’s how it was defined for me.
I still really love fishing now, but the things that get me excited are radically different than they used to be. Now I love the adventure and the challenge, and I love sharing them. I love exploring new places, and now it’s really not about the catching – often my favorite trips are the ones where I struggle the most.
I had an amazing trip to Oman a few years ago. I was helping a guy develop the permit fishery there, and we spent a week just camping and fishing and grinding. The weather was tough, the casting was tough, the seas were tough, and we weren’t finding the fish. It was a big struggle fest, but when all the dots started to connect – once you’ve put in the time, learned the tides, capitalized on the opportunities ¬– it turned into one of the most amazing trips I’ve ever had, despite or because of the fact that I can count the number of fish I caught on one hand.
It’s the difference of going to a stocked pond and wailing on stockers – they may be big and photograph well, but it just doesn’t do it for me.
We spent two weeks wandering around the desert looking for spots, and when it finally happened, it meant so much because you worked so hard for it. And those are the trips that I really love.
