endurance- the plight of the wade fisherman

Have you ever just looked at a spot and knew you had to fish it?

It could have been a quick glance over a shoulder driving 70 down a country road. Even sitting on your computer scouring over Google satellite images, some places you just know there are fish. More often then not, these places may not be easy for the wade fisherman to reach. A lot of the best pools in a river don’t reside in public parks or within walking distance from bridge easements. The harder it is to reach, the more I just have to fish it.

But how you might say?

Some spots are just impossible to reach, others are highly unlikely, and some just take a tad bit of finesse. Now by no means would I ever suggest anyone should trespass for a fish, I gave up sneaking into private lakes and ponds in my youth. But, answer honestly and I bet a good number of you have done it before. I focus mostly on the spots that take some "finesse" cause impossible and unlikely usually come with some sort of fines.

Rapids dropping into some nice dark water always looks so appealing. Just below that a few nice turns with some more dark water on the outside bend, even better. This stretch of the Milwaukee River was just calling my name. Unfortunately, it sat sandwiched in between an upscale residential area on one side and private agriculture area on the other. The populated side was well spread out private homes in a pretty well to do neighborhood. No street side parking here and even worse the homes back up to some thick forest before reaching the river. The agriculture side was the back of a huge farm field and the closest road wasn’t close at all. You most likely could enter from the main road but parking is non-existent with no shoulder and steep embankments on both sides.  In the more rural setting, public places don’t grow on trees. Even if you do find parking, the wade upstream is far and on private property in Wisconsin you must keep your feet wet.

The real question would be, how far are you willing to walk to get there?

I don’t know about you, because distance isn’t relative but the perception of distance is. Its all risk vs. reward, pain vs. gain, but you'll know you've bought in when the benefit outweighs cost. People all get there at different points. I’m pretty sure its not all that important how far I actually walked, or the amount of time it took. So what, I crawled through the foulest smelling waist high backwater muck in just a swimsuit. Leeches and ticks, who cares.

What does matter is that I made it!

A lot of people ask why I drive so far or go through so much effort to catch fish? Can’t you catch em' right down the road? I don’t think they understand me. Getting there has always and forever will be half the fun.

Oh yeah, as for that pool, it kicked some serious ass!

the pool in question, sexy right?

plenty of fish to share, but sadly i had to catch them all myself