fishydreams

You should never pass up the opportunity to put on a pair of wellies and stand in a puddle. If you don´t believe me just ask a kid, any kid. They may not be able to explain what makes it so much fun to be simply splashing around. They just know that it is. Kids are wise that way. For me there is something about being partially immersed in a muddy liquid while your feet are warm and dry that is very satisfying, Christ knows why.

There are no shortages of puddle here at the moment. It has been raining hard for three days. This is good rain too – just the kind we need. It will begin to lay a green felt carpet over the campo that will thicken over the next days, and the rivulets and streams will collect it and deliver it to Guadalhorce and the Río Grande.

It occurred to me this afternoon that, despite the fishing being off, it might be nice to take a walk by the river even as the rain was thumping down. The water would be high and coloured and the bolstered flows would be busily reconfiguring the river; gauging the bed, crumbling the banks and picking fine sediment up in one place and depositing it in another.

I like this. When the river settles again after being flushed in this way it is a different river in fine detail and, as a fly fisherman, I will need to look at it with fresh eyes.

One thing that struck me today, beyond the expected broadening of the river and the increased rate of flow, and that was the different sound of a river in spate. In the summer the river flows quietly for the most part and is often silent, but today it was if it was all parts of the river were talking at the same time.

By the look of things the rain is not done yet and so it looks like fishing will be out for a little while. But that is fine with me. When the rivers are fishable again the fishing should be good and the rivers, in subtle ways, will be new ones.

This is the Guadalhorce in flood.

This is the Río Grande. For much of the summer it is dry or has very reduced flows.