Uncategorized

Time is a mirage. For it seems as if it was yesterday that the James Bond film Casino Royale (2006) was released. A success both artistically and commercially, it saved the Bond franchise from teetering over the edge after the preceding two entries, The World is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002), set the stage to either sink or swim. Now, us guys definitely received our money's worth, what with the Aston-Martin DBS and all the expertly choreographed Krav Maga-influenced fighting, etc. … [Read more...] about La chasse conduit à tout, et tout conduit à la chasse.

This short dispatch is biographical, despite the fact that I initially intended to write about sporting travel. Yet, a person with whom I'm acquainted recently commented that my mentality is very Jesuit and that it permeates voyageursfieldsport.com. In response, I stated something to the effect of disliking the order's current enthusiasm for theological liberalism, to which my interlocutor admitted he shared the same sentiment. Still, I was flattered. The Jesuits possess élan, suggesting they … [Read more...] about Jesuits and Me

The conclusion reached in Most Interesting Men, the previous dispatch, is that dangerous game hunting, by all measures, delivers exactly what I’m looking for in a line of work or, at a minimum, in a serious avocation. It is both action-oriented and risky. Yet, while that would be good for me in the main, it's possible that I'll suffer injury upon entering the fray, even if my goal always would be to emerge unscathed. For if you chase after lions, tigers, leopards, etc., then sooner or later one … [Read more...] about The Lion Sleeps Tonight

It's an endeavor undertaken by men stretching as far back as prehistory, and I surmise the motivation always has been three-part: to protect, to eliminate resource competition, and to prove one's valor. What I speak of is dangerous game hunting. It's a topic I broached in Run Amok, a dispatch written as a consequence of restlessness, a.k.a. ennui, my longstanding companion, churning away such that I desire tactical work but for which I'm too old for consideration. Yet, thanks be to the example … [Read more...] about Most Interesting Men

One morning several weeks ago, I arrived at a public fishing area in the southern Adirondacks only to discover that it was over-run by a large S.W.A.T. team in full tactical gear that had just stormed a residential property up the road. The parking lot was simply its staging ground from whence the assault launched. But as I watched the team put away their AR-15s and other ordnance, I reflexively mused how dull my line of work seemed and what I would give to have a job – one upholding truth, … [Read more...] about Run Amok

In Pre-Christmas Crackers (15 December 2025), I stated that I was retiring my Browning BAR Mk1 in favor of a Sig-Sauer Cross Fury and a custom Model 1917 Enfield rifle. Regarding the former, and as a consequence of attending The Stalking Show several weekends ago (See If life is to be played as a card game...), I've decided to put a Schmidt and Bender 3-20x50 PM II Ultra Short telescopic sight on it later this month. And regarding the latter, again as I stated in Pre-Christmas Crackers, it is … [Read more...] about Souvenir de…

Greetings from Staffordshire County Showground, Stafford, England, United Kingdom, which currently is the site of a deerstalking trade convention appropriately named The Stalking Show. After returning to Cambridge, New York last Saturday, April 4th to tidy-up my affairs, I departed from Boston-Logan Thursday evening for this two-day event – Saturday and Sunday, April 11th and 12th. While I'm here to talk business and attend a range of workshops and seminars, my primary objective is to … [Read more...] about If life is to be played as a card game…

I sometimes wonder if the content of voyageursfieldsport.com is being read and then subsequently if it resonates. What I'm driving at is that I've given Voyageurs Fieldsport an expansive persona with respect to hunting instead of making it strictly about shooting deer and landing trout. As such, I'm taking a gamble. You see, the value of the standard-issue, blast-and-cast approach is that it's easy to understand, guaranteeing that I'll successfully convey to the public what Voyageurs Fieldsport … [Read more...] about Fifteen Minutes of Fame

Now that August is upon us, I begin laying plans for the upcoming Autumn shoulder season in Maryland. I only hope the rain abates there. Although you really have to be careful what you ask for as a fly-fishing guide. The mid-Atlantic has been quite droughty the two previous calendar years as well as the Spring of this one, which isn't good for trout. Anyhow, it won't be long before I return. In truth, people often ask me how I manage dividing the year between New York and Maryland, and how … [Read more...] about Between New York and Maryland

or From May to November and Back Again As I stated in last year's Horizons post, for me, May begins "on a profoundly introspective, wistful note." It's compounded, though, by the fact that it's still too early for the rank-and-file public to think seriously about vacationing and thus about fly-fishing as a leisure activity, all of which makes business proportionally slow. In sum, shoulder seasons are for enthusiasts. Yet, May "ends like a roaring lion" thanks to Memorial Day weekend and … [Read more...] about A Fly-Fishing Guide’s Life and the Life Everlasting

But ladies, tell me you don't feel new and improved after your hour at the salon? Well, Ivey, my Brittany spaniel, got her first field-clip of the year this morning courtesy of Yours Truly. And I think somewhere in her pea-brain she knows that she's the better for it. All the while, I was trying to remember the man in Clover Hill (just north of Fort Detrick) my parents took our toy poodle, Mitzi, for her periodic clip and groom. This was in the 1980s – my formative years in Frederick, … [Read more...] about She Hates It

I've purchased my ticket to screen the film, Lefty: The Greatest of All Time, showing at the Weinberg Center on Thursday, March 27th.  Now, I expect to be guiding that very afternoon, but the event starts at 19:30 hours, which guarantees that I’ll get to the church on time.  Although I’ll probably have to skip cleaning-up and donning a jacket and tie, but I believe Lefty would understand. What matters here is to pay the honor due one's fly-angling predecessors of which … [Read more...] about Joe Brooks: Extraordinary Fly-Angler and a Great Man

It's International Gin and Tonic Day and, next to India, there’s no better place to celebrate it than in the United Kingdom.  The reason why is that gin and tonic, or G & T for short, is a British invention, created to keep their countrymen stationed ‘East of Suez’ safe from malaria.  Quinine does the trick, but it’s bitter.  So to help the medicine go down, officers of the British Presidency Army dissolved it in carbonated sugar water and then combined the … [Read more...] about October 19th – International Gin and Tonic Day

How's this for an all-purpose fly-rod? Yeah, I know I’m pushing it. Yet, the covered bridge reminds me of home plate when viewed end-on. And look, it’s also designed to handle a 3-weight – says so next to the inside edge. The problem, though, is that it gives the pitcher too much of an advantage. I swear you could drive a Ford F-350 through the strike zone. … [Read more...] about Batter-Up on the Batten Kill

Being an avid deerstalker, I note that late August is when our whitetail begin transitioning out of their gorgeous fox red summer coat into their dusky brown winter pélage. The lesson: Creatures change with the seasons. Of course, we humans are no different, which is something I see in my own life. For just as students are now returning to university, I chanced upon the featured photograph of my academic regalia, reminding me that I was once a professor. Those days, however, are gone and I no … [Read more...] about Orbis Non Sufficit

In the United Kingdom, August 12th, a.k.a. the ‘Glorious Twelfth,’ heralds the opening of red grouse season. Broadly though, it functions as Britain’s New Year’s Day of hunting even if the seasons for males of all six of the island’s endemic deer species, and all of its game fish, are already running mid-stride then. Personally, I see myself one day participating in the action as part of a beating line, but never as a Gun. It’s too expensive.Even so, the Glorious Twelfth gets me thinking about … [Read more...] about The Glorious Twelfth, 2024

Some of you recognize that the title is borrowed from Gordon Lightfoot’s The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald: a Great Lakes yarn. Anyhow, shown above is a photo of Ticonderoga, New York, from the Vermont side of Lake Champlain. I consider it a trial-sized Great Lake, but it’s where I was earlier this morning. Conventional anglers love this spot. Yet, I’m a fly-angler, which means I’m heading further north, crossing back into New York over Crown Point Bridge, and on up to where the Boquet … [Read more...] about “The lake,” it is said, “never gives up her dead…”

I just arrived back in Cambridge, New York, and beyond tired is the way I'm feeling at this point. It's what I bargained for, though, with jet lag plus a 10-hour drive on top of everything else. Although, I've no right to complain. For I'd do it all again despite the wicked travel hangover that, for me, usually follows a UK sporting holiday. The road trip north, however, wasn't entirely something just to get through. In fact, two events made the day. The first was stopping to visit Mike L … [Read more...] about Home Again

What you see above is the photograph from which the homepage image is extracted. It is my most unusual British souvenir to date – more unique than any set of antlers from a beast taken in the United Kingdom that I could ever bring back to the United States. Today, I drove to Glen Etive, and precisely to the location of the iconic scene in the Bond film Skyfall, wherein 007 and M are standing at the marches of James’ family’s eponymous estate. Yet, there before me were two Americans with a … [Read more...] about SKYFALL