Well – winter in the mountains is finally getting here now that it’s February – but glad the rain is coming, even if it means power outages, debris flows… Don’t’ know if that’s better than power outages and fires. But the rain is very much needed.
Hope all of you are getting some time to spend practicing your casting, fly-tying at some of our Zoom based fly-tying classes and it has been really nice to see more and more of you attending the general meetings via Zoom. If any of you are having any trouble using Zoom – please reach out to me or Scott Kitayama. It’s really quite easy to use and we’re having fun. There is a “Zoom” tab on the website where you can join all of the monthly activities – Club Meeting, Fly-Tying Class and the Board Meeting.
If you have never been to Pyramid Lake, but you’ve heard about it from our members for the last 30 years, I can tell you from experience, it is a terrific place to handily land average five-pound Lahanton Cutthroat and Pilot Peak Rainbows. This place has a mystery and beauty all its own and this month, Joe Contaldi is going to tell you all about it. Joe also spends a lot of time guiding Crowley Lake and many other hot streams on the Eastern Side of the Sierra. Don’t miss this one. And Jeff Goyert has been coming up with some GREAT raffle prizes and some nice door prizes. This month is equally as good. with a nod to Pyramid. Check out the website.
While we haven’t had much rain, I’ve been having a great time learning how to cast my Spey rod, down in the estuary by the Boardwalk. I’m finally getting the hang of the Snap-T, Single and Double Spey, Perry Poke, thanks to Rich Rubin’s tutelage, and this weekend started practicing the snake roll. To think I couldn’t tell one from the other six months ago. Really fun learning something new in fly-fishing.
As vaccinations are taking place and we begin to get a handle on the Covid situation in California, we do look forward to getting together at the Grange and other places in 2021, but we just don’t know when that will happen. But we are fishing together minding social distance and other Covid precautions. We are supporting our Conservation goals and the High-School Scholarship goal. The fly-tying classes have been well attended on Zoom, and we’ve had some really nice casting practice sessions at Jade Street park on Saturdays thanks to Steve Rudzinski and the others who help out.
As a members, you are welcome to attend the board meetings simply as a “guest”, or if you have an idea you want to share for the club – we’d be happy to have you and put it on the “agenda”. Board meetings are almost as fun as the club meetings. Try one. We are looking for members to join in some of the board positions too. Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary, President – yes, President – and other capacities. Having something to share with the club and participate in the fun and future success is how we all came to be involved. It’s easy, fun and rewarding.
And if you do the whole social media thing, look us up on Facebook. We share a lot of pictures and information about things we’re doing and places we’re going… I also want to let you know if you don’t do Facebook – our new Social Media/Communications Chair, Jerry McKeon, got us moving into that part of the 21st Century with our Instagram account! santacruzflyfishing.
As we add new people onto the Board, some will come off. Pat and John Steele gave me the opportunity to brag about them again after a simple well thought note that said they were retiring from their “at-large” positions on the board.
in 1977 when SCFF was a group of anglers of all types, but mostly fly-angling, a bunch of people got together as a means of promoting the sport and also to support the local fly shops in Santa Cruz – yes there were a few – but most notably, Ernie’s Casting Pond. No cell phones, no internet, but we had mail and we had Pat and John Steele. As some of you know, our monthly newsletter was an Award Winning pub, noted by the Federation of Fly Fishers International. Some of our members, including Pat Steele, put that news letter together, printed it and mailed it to your membership – for 29 years. John – well, he’s made, bought, stored and donated more fly fishing goodies, and beautiful prizes to the club, especially our annual dinner and fundraiser – for the same number of years. And these were just their active years.
John and Pat have been family to me. Even when I disappeared from the club for several years, raising my children, building a house and trying to pay the bills, I was always reminded by Mona to check in on the “fly club” as she always called it. Pat was the best editor a “kid” could ever have, and she has encouraged me more times about more things, not just fly-fishing, than I would ever have expected. John and Pat hosted board meetings at their home, took care of all the raffle prizes for each years fundraiser, and then built a web-site and maintained that after 1996, when the internet literally first came of age.
John and Pat have plans to continue traveling somewhere every single month on fly-fishing adventures, as they were doing before Covid.
A thousand thanks from all of us John and Pat.
– Fish On my friends. Tom
Posted on January 26th, 2021
