The Blue Ridge Special
Hey everyone, I hope your summer is as hot and humid as it’s supposed to be. Trout fishing at this time of year here isn’t all that great with low water levels and high water temps along with high air temps. It’s a great time to go find warm water fishing for large mouth and small mouth bass and farm pond fishing as well as scout trout streams for when the temps are better. I’ll go do some scouting next week up in the higher elevation trout streams then find a smallie or two on my way home. I haven’t been fishing much but will take a rod out daily to cast and dream and that’s just as good in some ways. I’m also planning a road trip with my son Graeme later this month. He’s 16 now and is a very good driver so the ride out to Texas and back will be an adventure with shared driving duties. I’m getting more excited by the day.
I wanted to say thank you to everyone who’s preordered one (or more!) of my new reissued P series rods. The response has been great and I deeply appreciate it. I have a couple 70p’s left and a handful of the 64p and 75p’s remain. If you’re on the fence or have any questions, feel free to reach out to me to ask any questions you have. Thank you!
A while back y’all may have seen a special rod pop up in my Store. It’s a 3 piece 6’8” 3wt Blue Ridge Special. I was selling it for a friend and wanted to buy it from him, but the timing wasn’t right. Thankfully it never sold. I built this rod in 2018 just before I went to the Catskills Rodmaker Gathering with my good friend, rod building hero, fly fishing expert, and overall badass Kazutomo Ijuin. It was one of the first 68’s I made that I designed for fishing my favorite Blue Ridge Mountain Brook trout streams. I intended to keep it but, as usual, I sold it to someone who wanted it more than I did at the time. He said something to the effect of ‘this is a very good fry rod!’ At the Catskills Gathering, we were casting a bunch of rods with some other friends out near the parking area and while he was casting it, Joan Wulff walked by and he handed it to her after she expressed interest in casting it. She spent a few minutes with it and agreed with him saying ‘I like this one!’ I introduced myself to her and she thanked me for letting her cast it. I was floored and humbled.
Six years later and after it’s passed through a few different hands, my friend and I worked out a deal where I’d build him a new 70p fly rod in trade for this 68. I’m so glad to have this rod that has so many stories to tell back with me. I’ll get to continue its story.
