365 Days a Year of Insanity (Trout Fishing in Missouri)

365 Days of Insanity; Trout Fishing in Missouri (Part One)

Originally posted on December 2, 2010. Missouri's trout, be they pursued by anglers with fly rods, ultralight spinning combos, cane poles, old-fashioned crank phones, or sticks of dynamite has been an outdoor adventure enjoyed by Missourians for over 100 years. For liability reasons I should place a disclaimer that the last two forms of trout fishing are not only frowned upon in Missouri, but are also against the law according to Missouri Department of Conversation wildlife codes. 

By now it's probably apparent that this is not going to be a typical A River Runs Through It style post. Old timer fly fisherman have strong feelings about that movie, but to keep things family friendly, I'll omit those choice remarks. For anyone who's ever played bingo, just think of the reaction throughout the bingo hall after someone yells out bingo during the jackpot game. For this post, I'll keep this post serious in parts, but nowhere will I be discussing the beauty of shadow casting, nor will I keep things strictly to fly fishing only. I do hope to be informative here, as well as, hopefully dispel some myths about the pursuit of trout in the Ozarks. 

Before going on I should also note that I do not wish to offend any other fisherman. When I talk about a year's worth of insanity, I'm right in the boat with thousands of other insane anglers myself. And perhaps the best way to begin is with an insanity story involving myself.

The insanity started Saturday February 28, 2009. The weather was calling for the heaviest snowfall of the year and I was on the phone with my friend Tracy discussing whether or not we were going to make the trip to Montauk State Park for opening day of the trout parks. In general, I hate opening day due to the immense crowds, however, I rarely miss one. I believe it's so I will have something to complain about for a full year. Somewhere during the course of our conversation on the weather, the insanity started in. We had purchased our daily tags the weekend prior, so we had to take into consideration our initial investment into consideration. And then I had the brilliant idea that because Governor Jay Nixon was scheduled to sound the siren to start the season, that even if he didn't have the power to stop the inclement weather, that surely the highway department would have the roads clear from Jefferson City all the way to the state park. So with the insurance that all was good we decided to make the trip.

I don't know the exact moment where things went wrong. Perhaps it was when I decided to using my reasoning skills, but we found quickly that it isn't in a governor's ability to stop the weather, not does highway department have the ability to clear the roads magically. After the first 15 tries of getting out of the driveway, a little voice began to tell me that maybe it was best to stay home and in bed where it was warm. I chose to ignore that voice. I met Tracy a little after 3am. We briefly discussed what we were going to do. It was then I started to reason again. My newest theory was since the park was around an hour drive South, that they surely didn't receive nearly as much snow as we must have. I think somewhere in my flawed thinking I was mistaking Licking, Missouri for Tampa Bay Florida. So the journey began. On a highway with a 65mph speed limit, I believe my top speed was somewhere around 40, and that was probably about 30 mph too fast. We saw very few cars on the road between home and the park, though we did see over 15 off the road in that stretch. Despite the anxiety, I started a new line of thinking. Since we weren't seeing traffic on the road, we were no doubt going to have the park practically to ourselves, with thousands of trout, and just a handful of survivors to compete with. With just one final obstacle in our way, the giant hill that leads into the river valley, I knew if we could survive that, we'd have it made. My main concern was doing a Ozark version of the luge with a dodge intrepid for use as a sled. Well fortunately, there was no hillbilly Olympic events that day, but what waited at the bottom of the hill was a major surprise. Far more people than I could have ever imagined had run the gauntlet and managed to survive, so my theory of having the park almost to ourselves was quickly disproven. The previous photo from above as well as the one from below features fellow anglers who like myself and Tracy understand the importance of risking one's life for a worthy cause.

Not to be deterred, I decided to make the most of the situation. Regardless of the frigid cold and, the thick blanket of snow covering the river banks, and clearing sky was beautiful, and I knew that at the very least, I'd get in some really good captures. The fishing that morning was fair as well, so all seemed worth it. Somewhere around mid-morning, I decided to stop fishing and focus on photographing the event, and basically followed Tracy around from hole to hole like the one below.

Around the middle of the day, after my wonderfully reasons pulled us through the first part of the day, it was Tracy's turn to do some reasoning of his own. The week before when we had bought our tags, we had decided on doing a cookout. Of course we were also banking on a chilly day of say the middle 40's. In a crowd of people who apparently all suffered at least a touch of insanity, we decided to shoot for the grand prize of most insane fishermen of the day. Brushing off the snow covered grills, Tracy dumped in a liberal amount of charcoal, which we quickly found does not burn very well when wet, and proceeded to cook brats. So after surviving the trip, our next goal was to play Russian roulette with food borne illnesses, while people I'd say were nor clearly thinking that day, looked at us as if we were the only nuts in the park that day.

Having now survived the icy roads, and undercooked meat, I decided there was one last thing I wanted to do before heading home. The road through the park hugs the river, and there are many scenic spots to take some wonderful photos. I once again got into my thinking mode and quickly reasoned that since the major hill coming into the park had been cleared and spread with cinders, then the same should also hold true for the hill you take just as your leaving the general park area down stream. At the top of the hill I quickly found out my logic didn't hold true. Though not the luge run the bigger hill would have been, this one had a new factor that added a whole new level of excitement to it. The river was on the right side. Amusement park rides can be a real thrill, but for a truly fantastic rush, one should try out the sliding down hill out of control, just feet from flipping your car over the edge into the chilly waters below. As someone who doesn't swim, I wouldn't have been surprised had Tracy decided to choke me to death, but that would entail having to pry his fingers out of the holes he had put in my dashboard. Anyway, after sliding to the bottom of the hill, we were finally able to get turned around, and after several times of getting stuck in a bug ditch one time even losing a huge section of plastic that we hoped wasn't anything important we made it back over the hill. Well for tonight, this seems like a decent enough place to stop. I'll have more trout fishing stories coming, and I promise not all will be so crazy, though I have a real knack for getting myself into some crazy situations. Thanks for reading, and for all those fellow crazy trout anglers out there. BE CAREFUL.

© Tommy Burgess