I had a great time this weekend with my friend Dave McNay. He flew in Thursday night, then after breakfast on Friday morning we took off to see if we could catch a few trout with our fly rods. Friday morning was cold and rainy...not what most people would consider good fishing weather. It didn't bother Dave and I a bit, and we layered up and had a great day of fishing. The weather kept most people inside and we had the streams to ourselves. Our first stop was Hickory creek in Neosho. I had only been there a couple times before, so I wasn't real familiar with where to fish. A guy from Neosho told us about the other part of the stream that was in a city park...so we headed there and finally found some fish. Dave found a sweet pocket where several trout were holding. We both caught fish out of it...the picture at the top is one of the fish I caught out of there. Dave landed 6 trout from Hickory, and I managed to bring two to hand. We were off to a good start!
From Hickory, we headed east to Granby - the oldest mining town in the Midwest evidently. In Granby, we grabbed some lunch at JJ's. It's pretty much the only place in Granby as far as I could tell. Over lunch we talked about some ideas Dave has for a children's book. He has some good ideas, and I'm excited about the prospect of doing some illustrations for it! Who knows where it ends up, but it will be fun!
Our next stop was Jolly Mill and Capps Creek - which is several miles east of Granby. Jolly Mill was great...Dave and I both landed several fish and were a little disappointed we didn't bring a cooler to keep some of the trout we caught. We braved the wind and rain the entire afternoon...which is pretty easy to do when you're hooking fish! The sunset was amazing as the clouds in the west were finally clearing and turned bright red as the sun dipped below them. At dark we packed up our gear, took off our waders, and went searching for some mexican food...which we finally found in Republic, MO.
After dinner we headed to Branson, resisted to temptaion to see Yakov, and found a campsite at Table Rock Lake. We were looking forward to the prospect of hooking into some large trout in Lake Taneycomo in the morning. At daybreak we got up, packed the tent and headed out - only to find that Taneycomo is blown out because of all the rain we've had in SW MO lately. It was unfishable. So, we found some breakfast at a place where a Monopoly tournament was starting and some old dude that looked EXACTLY like Santa Clause was eating with his friends who weren't even close to looking like elves.
After breakfast we took the scenic route to Roaring River State park. The weather was amazing on Saturday...warm and sunny. So there were a TON of people trying to catch trout at Roaring River. Neither Dave nor I was excited about the idea of elbowing in between two people to try and catch anything...so we left Roaring River without even getting out of the truck. Part of the joy of fishing is in the solitude...and Roaring River looked more stressful than anything else. We went back to what we knew - Capps Creek at Jolly Mill! There were several people fishing Capps when we got there, but nothing like Roaring River, so there was plenty of space to find your own stretch of water. Dave and I both caught several fish...and had a great time enjoying the weather and the fishing. I haven't had the chance to do anyhting like that in a while and it was great to be able to spend osme time with an old friend.
I am grateful to Jesus for Dave. I always have been. He was someone I looked up to in Youth Group growing up...even though the more we talk, the more we both come to see that we desperately needed saving form our religiosity! Christ has proven himself faithful to both of us and we are both blessed beyond measure with salvation, good church families, great wives and beautiful children. Thanks Dave for the great weekend fishing, talking, and praying together!
