I received a call one afternoon from Alex Blackwell. It was a quick call, but it was highlighted by him telling me that we are going to be traveling to Georgia to chase trout on fly. I was immediately stoked. After a couple weeks of me bugging Blackwell to lock in some dates, I was on a plane headed to our destination. Once in Georgia, we connected with the Father of Renegade, Titch, and started fishing in the North part of the state.
When we first rolled up to the river, I didn’t know what to expect. I thought that you stumble across a trout every once in a while. That wasn’t the case. It was practically constant action.
Now, these fish were not he biggest, but I did catch a pretty big brook trout, and lost two solid rainbows. What I really didn’t understand was the fact that these fish were tiny compared to what Alex and I went off to do the following morning.
After like a 2 hour drive to one of the coolest rivers in the state, we met up with Matt Dorsey, a young guide from the area that really suited the Renegade lifestyle. We immediately hit it off and new we were gonna have a great day. Before we got in the river, Matt pulled out this massive net from his whip, and at that point, I knew i was going to tango with some monsters.
Once we hit the river, Matt and Blackwell gave the saltwater kid a few pointers and tips to try and break the ice with some fish. I understood the concepts of fly fishing the river, but had never put them to use before. I sued my first couple cast’s in the stream to get in some practice, and then BAM! Solid brown trout was tight fighting like crazy.
After snapping a few shots of the brown, the fish was released and on we went. We moved on to the next spot on the river where we saw a handful of massive fish sitting under some trees. After a bunch of failed roll cast, was finally able to do it right and land a stud rainbow trout. The stoke was unreal.
As the day went on, the fish just got bigger and bigger. Yes, I did miss a bunch, but I was definitely satisfied with my bag of fish for the first time fly fishing in a river! Matt was a great teacher on the water. He pointed out exactly where to be, and the times that I did my part as the angler, we succeeded. Can’t wait to get back out on the water with both of these guys!
Photography by Alex Blackwell
Written by Max Wagenberg
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