Somewhere around the middle of December I lost steam on a "2011: The Year In Pictures" post, the problems being I didn't have any time, and once I did, I realized I had damn few good pictures from 2011 (in the image department, it was nowhere near
as good as 2009).
Still, perspective adds a layer of meaning to even mediocre photographs, so I plowed ahead, and this is what I got.
The Year's Real Story
For us, 2011 revolved around the record snowpack, which topped out at 170% of normal, and was bolstered by a
lot of late snow:
The winter fly fishing wasn't stellar, though it seemed to hang on far into spring; temperatures in "spring" were about 15 degrees cooler than normal, so despite all the snow, we never had a giant runoff event. Instead, the water was just... high. For a very long time. In fact, everything was a good month behind "normal."
The Small Stream Thang
The last couple years have been all about small streams; I often found myself driving past closer, bigger trout in search of a more distant, smaller trout, and in truth I can't wholly explain the attraction.
Neither am I ready to stop:
The Maine Thang
We made it Maine again in the summer of 2011; the place has a solid, built-to-last permanence about I simply haven't seen out west, and there are times you can catch a smallmouth bass every cast,
Industry People, Places && Gear
The Orvis folks proved they had a sense of humor after I made sport of them in a blog post:
Later, I crafted a revolutionary new IFTD show format that would allow manufacturers to sell their gear via the power of interpretive dance, but the industry -- inexplicably -- failed to listen. They're the poorer for it.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyTifrKB-y0[/youtube]
It was also The Year Of The Interview: I neatly questioned a couple writers and a photographer, including John Gierach, falconer Rebecca O'Connor, biologist Anders Halverson, and even uber-fly-fishing photographer Val Atkinson.
I even revealed a Forbidden Love:
And also dealt with a bear who tried to peel up my garage door (and was largely successful):
Let's Hope For More in 2012
I admit to shooting far fewer pictures on my 2011 trips than in prior years -- a symptom of someone who wasn't fishing enough, and didn't want to give up as much of his fishing time to taking pictures.
Of course, there's a pretty good reason I didn't fish as much:
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2012 is going to be interesting; we're making two round trips to Ethiopia, and once M2 (my clever code name for Little M's little sister) comes home, I suspect fishing time will be hard to come by.
It's what it is, though I have uncovered some interesting small streams not all that far from home, and there's still hope for a quick escape to another state.
I think every new year comes with a healthy set of expectations, most of which are just waiting to be dashed by weather, sickness, work and other surprises.
Still, I hope to see you on the river in 2012, Tom Chandler.