A couple of extra do’s and don’ts
That’s just one of the questions on the immigration paperwork that tourists to the USA have to cope with. Still, they let Ginger in, and if they let him in I was bound to get in. Ginger, you see, has emigrated to the Colonies. Having married Mary, his lovely American wife 20 odd years ago he now has to pay for his sins by actually having to live in Mammon – rather than just being subjected to having it rammed down his throat via a TV set like the rest of us in the civilised world. He held it off for a while though, managing to avoid actually catching a plane until 5 months ago.To be honest, the USA is not at all bad these days. During the course of the last 20 years I have had cause to visit there on several occasions and on each visit it seems to have improved considerably. Nobody has tried to mug me for at least fifteen years and the NY city street bums actually say please and thank you as they suggest that you contribute to their favourite charity. It’s not what it was in this city. I don’t even feel threatened in New York anymore. Penn station used to be such an exhilarating adrenaline rush, now it’s well. Just a train station. Or perhaps, just perhaps, the word ‘Bazooka’ on my rod case persuades any lingering unsavories that I am better armed than they? Or have I just watched too many TV cop shows? Probably. New York these days feels about as dangerous as Eastbourne or Frinton perhaps on a wet Wednesday afternoon. The Manhattan skyline fell behind my Empire Line train and the people became ever more friendly. By the time we were an hour into our journey (it’s a beautiful ride all the way up the banks of the Hudson River) my fellow passengers were sharing their lunch with me. When I disembarked at Albany a couple of hours later I half meant it when I told them I was ‘missing you already’. I got off the train, turned around and there he was. Captain Tequila himself. Ginger. I won’t go into great detail about the man except to mention that he is a carp angler. A very successful one too. My mission was to show him that there is more to life than adding to his list of captured 40lb goldfish and in my quest, I was to drag him to (apparently, according to Mary) the edge of the civilised world, the Canadian border, in an attempt to prove it.They say that a journey is only as good as good as one’s travelling companions. In that case Ginger had a great trip and to be honest, mine wasn’t so bad either. His machismo machine of choice these days is a black pick-up truck which cruises very comfortably at 80mph and turns the heads of jealous young men everywhere, especially those on the I90 westbound wearing police uniforms. This is perhaps one reason why we arrived a little later than planned at our destination. Another is that I was navigating, choosing the more scenic routes, what Ginger calls “getting lost”. But eventually we made it to the small town of Hamburg, near Buffalo where we headed straight for the Northeast Outdoors office of TV angling show presenter Jim Hanley. I first met Jim last year at the NEC show. The NY state stand had been the major attraction for me and Jim had fired my imagination with his boasts. “Come to my house at the right time of year – I can take you out and you will catch trophy lake trout, trophy steelhead, trophy salmon, trophy carp and maybe even a trophy bass. And in the afternoon…”. Behind his twinking eyes I could see that he actually meant it! I mentally reserved a seat aboard a plane there and then. To be fair to Jim, we did not arrive at the best time of year as mid October is already past the best time of the season for most fish in this area. Neither was it a good time for Jim generally. He had just suffered a major hard-disk crash as we arrived and so was unable to guide us himself. Instead he got on the phone and made sure that our journey would be well rewarded, fixing us up to go out the next morning on the Niagara River with a local angling guide. Having half an afternoon to kill, we set off in search of a local spot recommended by our host. This was on a nearby creek where, Jim said, the steelhead and salmon were running. We found the spot without too much trouble, but so had half the other anglers in the state! The creek was low, no more than a few inches deep for most of its length and the fish were bunched up in the deeper water beneath the bridge. I guessed they were waiting for a rainfall to allow them to escape to the higher reaches. In the meantime, the hole under the bridge looked like fish soup. Looking down from the road bridge we could see a number of fish all reacting to the anglers on both banks who were casting to them. Some of the anglers were casting plastic bass-type lures, others were trotting worms down beneath the garish float contraptions known locally as ‘bobbers’, one brave soul was casting a fly, but all were achieving the same result – they were just spooking the fish. If a lure went over their heads the fish would bolt to the side. If a worm drifted down, even if it bumped a fish on the nose, it would be ignored. A dry-fly was a piece of fluff, no more and no less. Those fish were not having any of it! We watched the locals fail for a while, then joined them in their failure, Ginger with a bass lure and I with a fly rod. We both had an instance of a follow-up but no takes.We walked back to the truck after an hour of this nonsense and both asked each other at the same time what the hell we thought we were doing! We were trying to copy the Americans when we already knew that those methods would not work. What we needed was a British approach that we were familiar and comfortable with. We’d be back. I’ll tell you more about that next month.As dawn broke the next morning we met up with guide Jim Taylor at a boat ramp on the Niagara river just a couple of miles downstream from the famous Falls. The Niagara river, you may be forgiven for not knowing, connects Lake Eire and Lk Ontario. It was all quite overwhelming and interesting being shown the local methods. We drifted salmon egg baits down the whirling torrent and were gently ridiculed by Jim for our inept handling of his tackle. You see, Americans don’t just drive on the wrong side of the road, they also have their reel handles on the wrong side of their rods. It’s true! (More on this later). We started out fishing beneath a high cliff in 12 ft of water at a location known as the Artpark. Above us on the cliff perched a scaffolding construction which was, apparently, the art in the park. I thought it was a lifeboat launching device. A few hours and a lot of good natured bantering later, Ginger and I had both put a double figure lake trout in the boat, with considerable help from Jim Taylor as we could not recognise the bites for what they were. I was to realise why a few days later when we were back standing on that creek bridge. The Lake Trout were a brand new species for us both. These fish were once responsible for a huge commercial fishing industry on the Gt Lakes but the old devils of pollution, overfishing and imported parasites (sea lamprey especially) all forced closure. Now the ‘Lakers’ are back and the sport fishing industry is taking full advantage of it. The fish we caught, between ten and thirteen pounds, were average for the Niagara river but in the lakes they have been known to grow to around 100lb. A big one though is generally regarded to be in the 40lb region and these fish are generally taken by trolling in deep water.Then, upstream at a zillion mph to the Devils Hole. (I love these sportfishing boats!) I had been told of this spot just the previous week by John Cooper. It seems that John had fished here for carp back in 1995 and with help from a couple of others, had emptied the place. Yet a more unlikely carp pool you have never seen in your life. Salmon, trout etc yes, but hardly the type of water one would associate with gentle cypry! But this is America and unlikely things happen all the time. What a foaming cauldron of fish this place is – I can’t wait to get back there. My palms are itching as I type. We were on just one of several boats fishing the Hole, and every bank swim was taken, at least they were on the US bank. The far bank is Canadian and was almost empty for some inexplicable reason. Our guide Jim had taken a day off work to take us fishing, a real busman’s holiday. He was great fun and a smart and intelligent conversationalist. A great guy. But he still has his reel handles on the wrong side!No, I can’t wait. It’s one of my favourite rants you see. Right. Now, about this left handed nonsense. Have you ever watched how the Americans eat? Knife in the right hand, fork in the left. Hold the food steady with the fork whilst cutting it with the knife. Once it’s cut, put down the knife and switch the fork to the right hand. Then eat from the fork. This ridiculous waste of energy is mirrored in the manner in which they hold their rods. The rod has to be held in the weakest (left) hand whilst the reel handle is turned with the right hand. And they call us eccentric! I told them all the same thing: It should be bloody obvious to anybody that a right handed angler should hold the rod in the right hand, the only exception being in big game angling where the strongest arm is needed for the reel and where a harness is employed to hold the rod. But just try and point it out to them.”Would you like some cheese with that whine???” Doh! I gave up, temporarily. Regrouping my forces until the next tea-party.I questioned everyone I met as to why they all do this and am still waiting on a complete and sensible answer. Some anglers tried to defend it until I pointed out (smugly) that fly-fishers, of which the US has an abundance, do it right, they hold the rods in the right hand. Probably the best answer I got was from Jim Hanley. “Because that’s the way we have always done it, and it works!”. As Jim has won just a few (!!) more tournaments that I have using this tackle I found it difficult to question his logic.A few days later Jim found a hole in his busy TV schedule to take us out onto Lake Erie in search of another new species, Smallmouth Bass. These fish are found in the northern United States and up into Canada, whereas the largemouth variety are considered more of a southern quarry. As you probably know, it’s the cult fish of the USA and major big-money competitions and tournaments are held for it each year. It’s an interesting fish for sure and fights very hard for its size, but from the British perspective… Why? When all around are bigger, more challenging, equally hard fighting sport fish, why pick bass as the main quarry? This baffles Brits as much as their quest for carp baffles the Americans! Still. When in Rome and all that…We almost followed Jim’s detailed directions and took the scenic route to his house, Ginger cursing me all the way. Jim’s house was hard to miss (though we did the first time) due to the amazing boat sitting in his drive. Now, a lot of boats are desirable but this one was… well. Sexy. Ginger, who lives for such things, had an order in for one before the day was out. And if you have $35K handy I suggest you do the same!With over 200 hp pushing it didn’t take long to get out to the fish holding areas. Only one other boat on the lake was fishing, it was amazing. We had the lake to ourselves. Lake Erie this is, not the Serpentine! Jim demonstrated the difficult task of orchestrating a drift over the fish holding drop-offs. These have to be conducted at just the right speed or you can forget getting takes. We fished with small 2 inch livebaits, similar to our roach, and crawdads, a type of crayfish. Ginger didn’t, he prefers not to livebait and so fished lures. Balancing the GPS, fish-finder, general handling of the boat and especially the foot controls for the bow mounted electric trolling motor is quite hard enough. Doing it at the same time as teaching a pair of Limeys to use US tackle, bait-casting multipliers and short rods and all, well… Jim did a pristine job considering the disadvantage he started under!The weather was fantastic and the fishing was fun. We caught fish, discussed the oxymoron of American Politics and argued about left handed reels until the sun set. Another great day.As we packed up, Jim ‘tossed me a curved ball’ as they say.”Just a thought. If you want to reel in with the left hand, why don’t you fish with the reel under the rod?” Oh. I never thought of that.————-Next Month: More of the same! Muskies, Steelheads and other pretty colours.————-More details: Jim Hanleys website is at:www.northeastoutdoors.com email: gofish@webt.com Talking Phone Book Hot Line Report is 716 844 1111 ext. 4142 Jim’s business line for charters etc. is 716 312 0418 A copy of a map of the areas we fished is available to view on line at www.erie.govOur Guide on the Niagara River:Jim TaylorEmail: Hawgzcharters@yahoo.comTel: (716)765-9226————
A couple of extra do’s and don’ts
Tackle: Take tackle that you will be comfortable using. Not too much of it as it is all very inexpensive in the states and you’ll want to bring stuff back with you. You should take your own float-fishing tackle if that’s how you like to fish as no shops sell it here.Take US dollars and credit cards. Cash bills other than US$ are unacceptable even by many major banks. Personally I would even avoid Travellers Cheques
Take empty bags and full wallets. The value for money in the USA is second to none.