Ep 72: The Backwoods of Maine, with Bob Romano
Bob Romano and his wife have owned a seasonal cabin in the Rangeley Lakes Region of western Maine for nearly 40 years. He is an author and has written novels, short stories, essays, and magazine articles about the people that gravitate to this region where the brook trout are as large as you’ll find north of Labrador, its rich sporting history, and the many fly fishing opportunities that can be found here. In this episode, we discuss the Rangeley Lakes Region and some notable folks from the area.
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Katie
You're listening to the Fish Untamed podcast, your home for fly fish in the backcountry. This is episode 72 with Bob Romano on the backwoods of Maine. Just to start off, I would love to get a background on you. How did you get into fishing or into the outdoors? What prompted that love for you?
Bob
I probably had been fishing since I was five years old with a Mets cap and high top sneakers, fishing for carp and sunfish and things like that. But sometime around my college years, I discovered a fly rod and just the beauty of casting a fly rod really, really caught me. And I've really been fishing ever since. I really progressed from literally using corn and worms, through using lures and spoons to then of course using flies.
Katie
Now, what got you hooked on the fly rod? Did someone introduce you to that? Did you see it in a movie or read about it? What got you introduced to it?
Bob
Yeah. Just about everything that I've done in my life. I've learned through trial and error on my own. I've never really had a teacher. Till I was older, I was an avid downhill skier and I never took a lesson. And kind of the same thing with fly fishing. I really didn't know anybody who fished. In fact, my father who was in the Navy during World War II and I was in college during the Vietnam War and he took fly fishing as an affront. He just thought it was something that hippies did because he fished with a spinning rod. And he actually literally took offense at it and thought I was more or less kind of being uppity. Just another thing that I was doing to revolt against the things that he thought were important. When after college and the war was winding down, we took a trip together to the Catskills and on the Beaverkill, was it the Beaver? I think it was, yeah, the Beaverkill River. And I had just started fly fishing at that point. And I really hadn't caught a trout at that point. And it was a Hendrickson hatch on. I didn't know what Hendrickson's were at the time, but I put on a big gray fly. And my father was worming in the same river. And up until then, he would catch fish and I would not. And that was the first day I started catching fish using that Hendrickson. Then they weren't looking up, they weren't looking down. They weren't interested in his worms. And I've got a picture of him that's actually hanging on my wall. He's long gone now, but I have a picture of him on the wall on that day on that river. And we kind of had a truce at that point. Over the years, we became good friends after that. I think we both kind of understood each other's position.
Katie
Not just a hippie thing to do when you're out fishing him, I guess.
Bob
Yeah, sure.
Katie
I always like when that happens, because I do feel like there is kind of a mentality of, you know, I sacrifice numbers of fish at times to go fly fishing because I enjoy the act of doing it. But every so often, fly fishing really is the way to catch fish. Like that day, you're going to catch more fish with a fly rod than you will with a spin rod. And those days always feel really special, like you've tapped into something that no one else gets to participate in. So those are always really rewarding.
Bob
That's for sure. Yep.
Katie
So I assume you grew up kind of in this region, if you're talking about the Beaverkill River, at least in the Northeast. Were you born in Maine? Did you grow up in Maine? Or is that somewhere you moved later in life?
Bob
Yeah, so of all places, and maybe you could tell from my accent, I was born in the Bronx. So again, my dad would, mom and dad were city folks, but they moved over the Hudson River into New Jersey, which is suburbia. And that's really where I grew up. My wife grew up in the same area. And when we were dating, she had said to me, she spent all her summers on Conway Lake in New Hampshire. And by that point, I was older, I was late 20s, early 30s. And I was, you know, knee deep in the fly fishing. And I said, "Wow, you know, New Hampshire, well, let's go." And we spent some time up in New Hampshire. But although Conway is a great place, it was a little crowded. And we started looking north, and literally three miles north is the Rangeley region of Western Maine. And we spent, we weren't married yet, but we spent a couple of weeks at a sporting lodge. And we both just, we had never seen country like that in our lives. It's, parts of Western Maine are still the way they were in the late 1800s, early 1900s. Nothing much has changed. So we fell in love with that wild country. we married and a year later we bought a camp. And a camp is just a cottage cabin seasonal residence. So we bought our own camp on the lake where the lodge was located. And we've been going up there for the last 40 years. And so I don't live in the state, but I guess it's my adopted state because I spend most of the fishing season up there.
Katie
Oh, okay. So I was totally wrong. I thought you lived up there, But that's such a great setup. And I feel like that must be kind of unique in that region of the country. I know that once you kind of get up into Canada, things thin out a little bit more people-wise. But when I think of the Northeast US, I think of pretty developed, a lot of people crammed into a pretty small place. But it sounds like Western Maine is still kind of a little safe haven up there where you can get away from people.
Bob
It truly is. Route 16 is literally the only McAdam Road that you're gonna find from Arrow, New Hampshire to Rangeley, Maine. And that, it's about a one hour stretch of, it's basically just a two lane road, one lane in each direction, but it is McAdam. And that area from Arrow, New Hampshire, the New Hampshire border to Rangeley, that one hour stretch is the Rangeley Lakes region. and off of that road are just logging roads, either going north, the road goes pretty much west to east. And so you have these logging roads going either north or south and all the water that you'd be fishing are off of those roads. And Rangeley is this tiny little destination town. And along Route 16, there are many, many places where you cannot get a cell phone service. My camp does not have electricity other than our own generator. We don't have water. We use the generator to pump water up from the lake for us to use at the cabin. Our drinking water comes from a spring where we'll go with, we'll have maybe 10 milk containers, gallon containers, and we'll get our fresh water that way, it lasts a couple of days. Our lighting are gas lights, the old-fashioned gas lights. And our stove and refrigerator run off of propane. We have no TV. We have no landline. We don't have cell phone service. When we're up there, and we're up there for a minimum of two weeks and sometimes four weeks at a time, my wife will drive out at night. And about six miles down a logging road, you come around a bend. and right there you can get cell phone service. So she'll go out every other night to call a parent or a friend just to make sure, you know, that the world hasn't gone to hell in a handbasket one way or the other. The local people have nailed a sign on a tree at that bend that just says telephone booth. So before 9/11, and we're right, we're really right on the Canadian border. You can see the, we call them the Boundary Mountains. You can see the Boundary Mountains between Quebec and that part of Maine. So prior to 9/11, I believe there were three border guards because nothing's really happening up there. And after 9/11, we probably have 60 border guards. Nobody really knows what they're doing. They just seem to be driving around. And one night, you know, my wife is in the car and she's on the cell phone. Of course, it's nine, 10 o'clock at night. So it's totally dark and there are no lights anywhere. And most of these border patrol fellows are young. And so they pull up and they see the car there and they shine a light into the car. My wife doesn't take any nonsense. She rolled down the window and she's, "Get that light out of my eyes." And the young fellow says, "Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am. Is everything okay?" and she just points to the tree and he shines the light on the tree and says telephone booth. Oh, okay, that's right. And tries, thank you, tries on. But I mean, that's the area that we're fishing in. That's just what you're gonna find up there.
Katie
Yeah, I mean, we try to do it. So we're, I mean, obviously where we live, there's plenty of cell phone service, but I always prefer fishing in places that have, I don't wanna say no cell phone service because I always like kind of the safety of knowing that I could call for help if needed. But kind of like you're describing, it's nice to know where you can get service. Within walking distance, you can go get it if you need it. But for the most part, you don't have to worry about having it. You don't have the burden of having service the whole time. But if you need it, you can go find it.
Bob
My dad had a heart condition from his mid-50s. And so he always had that fear that something could happen and he needed to be near a doctor or a hospital or whatever. So he never made it up to my camp. He saw photographs of it and videos, but never did. And he would ask me that question, "What would happen, Bob, if you got sick or you broke a leg?" And I'd just say, "Dad, I would die."
Katie
Yeah, that's part of the risk.
Bob
Yeah, that's part of the deal. That's what makes it so special. There is a certain danger to it. And I don't know, that's something that appeals to me.
Katie
I mean, you could look at anything like that, right? I mean, you know what happens if you get in a car and die that day, but you know, you can't just put your life on hold just to make sure that nothing bad happens, especially when the rewards can be great for going out and experiencing that.
Bob
Especially when all those brook trout are just waiting to play tag with you, right?
Katie
We were just talking about how brook trout are one of my favorite fish to catch just because they're always ready to participate. You know, they don't get that picky. And I'm sure we'll get into this. Maybe your brook trout are a little bit different since they have such a size difference compared to ours here. But yeah, brook trout are just, they're so much fun and they're so feisty compared to other trout. They're just such a treat to catch. But maybe that's a good transition.
Bob
When you talk about, you know, this particular region of Maine still being fairly primitive and wild. I know we're gonna talk about my books later on, but the latest book, the one that just came out on December 15th, which is a collection of short stories, the theme really running through it is what compels folks like you and I to seek out those wild places and to seek out wild fish? And for each of us, it's not the same reason. And as I was writing the book, I realized that. You'd like to have this grandiose idea that we all do it for whatever, you know, X, Y, Z, whatever. But for each of us, I think we have our own special reasons why we seek out those wild fish in those wild places. And that's what I was trying to get at in this latest book. But go ahead, you were gonna talk about a transition, so.
Katie
I think this is just a great segue into the fishing in your area. we've talked about kind of the wilderness behind it which to me is is more than half the equation if I can go to a beautiful place I honestly couldn't really care less about how good the fishing is if I'm enjoying where I am but obviously people are going out of their way to go up and experience Western Maine they're they're interested in the fishing so I I would love to just hear I know you listed a couple things techniques and species and gear flies things like that I'd love to just hear your explanation of you know how a trip goes in Western Maine, what are you catching and how are you going about doing that?
Bob
Yeah. So, you know, we already touched on the wildness of the region. And the second really component is the wildness of the fish. So you're not fishing over stock fish. I mean, literally the entire region, if you catch a fish, it's going to be wild. And our primary species is the brook trout. And the brook trout are native to the region. They've been there since before the Abenaki's arrived. And they're the largest brook trout you'll find South of Labrador. So sure, we have our, you know, we have plenty of, of whatever, six inch, nine inch, 12 inch brook trout. A 14 inch brook trout is not a large trout. A 16 inch brook trout is not uncommon. but that would be considered a large fish. So, we can have a fish that could go 20 inches, 24 inches. And again, these are native brook trout. I don't know how that translates into pounds because I'm sure like you, I'm releasing my fish. So, I've never really weighed them. But we keep a log at our cabin and you don't get in the log unless it's a 16 inch fish. So we start there. So I guess back in the late 1800s, early 1900s and I should say the reason why these fish used to grow so large they used to be five and six pound brook trout. You're not going to find those anymore. But we had a species of fish called a blueback trout. And they're fairly extinct now. But the blueback trout really were what the brook trout were feeding on. And as those bluebacks started to become extinct, the local people did two things. One, they brought in smelt, which is now our bait fish. And two, they brought in landlocked salmon. So that, and the landlocked salmon went wild. They did stock them back in the early 1900s, but we don't stock them any longer in this particular region of Maine. They are stocked in other areas of Maine. and the landlocked salmon have gone wild. So those are our two game fish. We're not really fishing over bass or pickerel or much of anything else. It's really the brook trout, which are native and the salmon, which are wild, but not native to the region. The landlocked salmon are a lot of fun to catch because they're just kind of the jokers of the water. They love to dance on their tails. More often than not, your fly will go in one direction and they'll flop over in the other. They have a real knack for throwing the hook. And it's a real circus when you catch one because they literally will dance on their tails. Brook trout are just the opposite. Once you've hooked them, they're gonna go deep and they're gonna fight you subsurface all the way. And I tell you, those large brook trout, they're really a thrill. I haven't found brook trout that large, really. You know, certainly not in New York or New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, anywhere here on the East Coast. As far as techniques are concerned, you know, when you're fishing for brown trout, and even large brown trout, They're really very dainty fish, you know, they're gonna come up to the surface or just sip that fly. You may not even know they're there. They're very particular. You know, you have to have just the right fly. I mean, I guess that's where a match to hatch came in. So they're particular, they're dainty and they're fussy. You know, you have to have a perfect drift, right? If there's any drag on your fly, they're just gonna kind of laugh at you. They're not gonna take it. Well, fishing in Maine, or at least in the Rangeley Lakes region is quite different. Our fish, well, number one, we don't have sustained hatches. So, you know, a Hendrix sin hatch in the Catskills might last for two weeks. And it's almost, you can set your watch, you know, it's gonna maybe start at what, I don't know, two in the afternoon and go to four or five. And it'd be one afternoon after the other. sulfur hatches, same thing, you know, it'll, it'll, day after day after day, the timing might be a little bit later each day. In the Range of Lakes region, you may have a hatch and you're lucky if it goes on for an hour and it, you know, it might cover, it might cover, I don't know, you know, 100 yards on the river and a fella or gal, you know, fishing downstream from that isn't going to see a Hendrickson. So again, very sporadic and that means that the trout have to, can't be that particular. They cannot be that fussy. If they see something to eat, they really have to take it. The other thing is that most of our rivers, and we can get into the actual rivers themselves as we go on here, but most of our rivers are really fast running, very heavy water, significant rapids. My home water up there is the McGalloway River. And when I give programs on the McGalloway, I will tell folks, you know, there used to be a movie, and it was called No Country for Old Men. Well, the McGalloway River is no river for old men. And I can say that because I'm one of those old men. Now. I remember days when I could, I could get to that particular pool where I knew there were fish and I didn't need a waiting staff. Then there were days, years after that, when I could still get to the pool but I needed a waiting staff. Now I just look at that pool longingly and I know unless they're going to have a helicopter I'm not getting to that pool because my legs are going to rebel. So that's the type of water that you could be fishing in and again because of that the brook trout don't have time to take that fly off the water. So because of the water and the lack of hatches, they really are opportunistic and they really have to hit and run. And that's just by a brook trout's nature. Besides everything else, they're just a tough fish. They're a pugnacious fish. And so they're going to nail whatever is flying over them. So for all those reasons, a technique that, and by the way, people that live in the region, we call them people from away. If you're a vacationer there, a local will say, "Oh, that fella's from away." So when people from away fish the region, again, they're using the traditional techniques of a perfect drift, no drag, trying to match the hatch. And I have found, even with a dry fly, especially with a wet fly, you just need movement. You need a twitch, a little pull on your line. If you just give a little bit of movement, it just triggers these fish something awful. And that's something that just people, again, from away, sports coming there for a few days or a week, just be able to keep that in mind because that'll take a heck of a lot of fish. The other thing is most of our fishing, quite honestly, is subsurface. We don't have ice out until sometimes the end of the second week of May. So April, first week of May, second week of May, our lakes are all iced over. Just around the third week of May, the ice is-- or maybe the latter half of that second week, the ice is breaking up. And as soon as the ice breaks up, the smelt, those are our bait fish, they leave the lakes on their own spawning run. And now they're in the rivers. And that's when the big fish, hungry after a long winter, they're going to follow the smelt up the rivers. And that's a real opportunity to catch a trophy fish. And that's really those last two weeks of May. So any dry fly action during that time. It's all subsurface. You can literally leave your dry flies home. So the guys that are fishing in a traditional manner, they're all using streamers. And the classic streamer for that time of year is called a black ghost. Later on, if we talk a little bit about the history of the region, I'll get into, you know, where that streamer came from. But a black ghost has a white shoulder. And at that time of year, the fish are triggering on the smelt. And so any streamer with a white shoulder or predominantly white body is going to take fish. A lot of the younger guys are nymphing. And honestly, you can't go wrong. I mean, whether you're using European style nymphing or our style, you're going to catch a lot of fish that time of year on nymphs. I, over the years, have really grown accustomed to fishing with wet flies. And if there was one wet fly that I had to use, and if that was the only fly I could use all season long and this is the only secret I'm gonna give up in this podcast. It's a gold ribbed hares ear wet fly. And that fly goes back, I think to England, maybe the 1800s, I'm really not sure. But it's a gold ribbed hares ear wet fly, not the nymph. It's got a fixed wing. And I can't tell you why, but the brook trout and the landlocked salmon, they just go crazy over that particular fly. And when there is dry fly action, you can fish it in the surface film. But again, those last two weeks of May, you're going to fish it deeper. And again, you want to fish it with action. You want to be letting it drift and then twitch it, drift. You may want to just move it along. Just try different types of action until you hit the right one. And then it should really, really work for you. The second time those big fish are in the river is in September because that's when they're spawning. So the two best times are those last two weeks of May and near the end of September. Now in between, certainly you could still catch fish, but then it's getting a little bit harder. You have caddis all summer long and you have to figure out what caddis pattern to use. Now and then you do have some mayfly action, not a heck of a lot. Flying ants is another great pattern in Western Maine and they can come on any time of the year but again you might have a hatch for a half hour 45 minutes and then they're gone. So you kind of need to be prepared if it happens you want to have that those ant patterns there. Yep.
Katie
Wow that that is a ton of great info and I have a lot of questions based on what you said. I actually guess a couple comments to one about the brook trout. What what is considered a trophy fish? Because I heard you use the phrase trophy fish. But you seem to imply that 16 inches is about where it's like this is a respectable fish. What what is considered a trophy brook trout in your area?
Bob
Well, let's start with that 16 inch fish is 16. Any any sport that that's going to catch a 16-inch brook trout, it's going to go home very happy. They're going to consider that a trophy. But I think that the folks there that are fishing hard, that know the water, 18 inches and on up. Again, I would see guys that I know and that fish regularly, again, 16-inch fish put a smile on their face, but they're not going to get all that excited about it. I might, but I don't know if they would. But yeah, I think you're getting into 18 inches. Yeah, you're talking about a fish that would take your breath away. And that would be true for the salmon as well.
Katie
Oh, okay. I would have pictured the salmon significantly larger, but that's good to know.
Bob
Yeah, so these are not Atlantic salmon, right?
Katie
Oh, right. These are the landlocked. Yeah, okay.
Bob
Yeah, these are the landlocked. So yeah, so they're much smaller. They're basically very comparable to the brook trout.
Katie
Are these kokanee?
Bob
Nope, nope. No, these are, I mean, our description of them are landlocked salmon, and they have that kind of silver and black side to them, almost like a chrome body that is silver with kind of almost a black, I don't know, maybe zebra sort of markings on them.
Katie
Oh, OK, because I thought maybe something that you sent over had mentioned kokanee salmon there, and I had been surprised to hear that they were in that area, because I think of Kokanee salmon as being more of a West Coast thing. But maybe I misread.
Bob
Yeah, I think they are.
Katie
Okay.
Bob
Yeah.
Katie
Secondly, just some comments. I like that you mentioned that the brook trout, you said have that limited feeding window, which is why they're so voracious in the times that they are feeding. But then you also mentioned that that's just in the nature of brook trout, and I appreciated that because that's how I think of them too. You know, we've got brook trout out here, obviously not native, but they, we have, we have prolific catches and the brook trout are still always very, very eager. Like we talked about earlier, they're always ready to play ball. And that's something I like about them. So it's good to hear that they are that way where you are too, because I kind of pictured, you know, these larger fish, I don't, I picture smaller fish as being a little bit more voracious than the larger ones who kind of seem to pick their battles. You know, is it, is it worth expending energy to go over here to sip this fly? or should I wait for something larger to come past? And it's nice to hear that the brook trout, where you are, even at their larger size, are still eager and willing to play.
Bob
Yeah, well, I'll tell you this story. So a few years back, and we're getting near the end of May, and four or five of us are on the river, and again, we're fishing subsurface, and that was working all week for us, catching fish all week. And so we hit this particular day, and we're just not catching fish. And I'm going from one streamer to another streamer, putting a wet fly on, trying to nip, nothing's working. And I realized kind of out of the corner of my eye, I see a splash. And I start looking, I see another splash. And I said, "What's going on here? Why am I seeing these splashes?" And again, brook trout, they're not gonna sip a fly. If they're gonna nail it, that's what you're gonna see. And so, all right, well, let me put a 14 Adams on, pretty just a fly that, with a searching pattern, if you will. And I put it on and sure enough, I can see a fish comes up, noses the fly, but doesn't take it. And after a while I go from a 14 to a 16 to an 18 and every drift, fish are coming up but they're not taking the fly. And I said, this is just unusual. And we don't have many small patterns in the region that we would be using. So I'm going through my kit and at the very bottom of the kit, not even in a fly box, just laying there is a 20 zebra emerger. And I said, "You gotta be kidding." But I put it on and don't you know, they start hitting it. And again, I mean, they're just coming up and nailing it. And so maybe after my six or seven fish, my buddy comes down, because he's seeing this, you know, and he looks at me and he says, you know, what are you doing? What are you catching them on? And I just smile and I say, well, number 10 black ghost. I figured you got to work for it. You know, I'm not gonna give away something like that.
Katie
You want to know how to do it, not to be given the answer.
Bob
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so you really have to look for those splashes. And again, that's, That's the kind of the modus operandi of a brook trout, that if they want something, they're going to take it. They're not going to be shy. And that's true for the bigger fish as well. Yeah.
Katie
Another thing that you mentioned that I was curious about was the fact that you mentioned ... I'm sure that based on this story and the fact that you said that they're really taking nymphs earlier and later in the season, like late spring, early fall. I'm assuming they're taking dry flies kind of throughout the summer, but I honestly don't remember the last time I caught a brook trout on a nymph, apart from maybe a dry dropper, like where I'm throwing both and one of them happens to take the dropper. But of all the fish I fish for, I nymph probably half the time or more, because it's effective. But with brook trout, I very, very heavily associate them with dry fly fishing. Whereas rainbows and browns, I probably catch more on droppers than I do on dries, or just on straight nymph rigs. So it's interesting to hear that your brook trout, you are using a dedicated nymph because it's not something that I even associate with that species at all.
Bob
Yeah, and the bigger rivers, that really is the way to go. For two reasons, I think. One, in the bigger rivers, those large fish are going to stay at the bottom. They're not going to come up very often. Again, because we don't have those prolific hatches that you do that would otherwise bring them to the top. Now, again, I'm talking about the larger rivers and I'm talking about big fish. And to be honest, one issue with fishing the bigger rivers is that they're gonna be other anglers there. They're gonna be other fishermen that are gonna wanna catch that trophy fish. And more often than not, I prefer to get into the back country where there are no fishermen and there we're fishing headwaters. And that's probably what you're more familiar with. So there, a 10 inch brook trout in a sense, and not a trophy, but that's a big fish, a 10 inch brook trout when you're fishing the headwaters. And that's kind of the classic brook trout fishing that you're talking about. So if I'm fishing, and I do more of that now than anything else. And when I am fishing those smaller streams, I will literally have a Sucrete's tin in my chest pocket with about six flies only because if I break one off, I wanna have an extra one. But really I just need two flies. I need my favorite dry fly going upstream and my favorite wet fly going downstream. And that's about it. I used to just use a Royal Wolf. And at some point I said, this just isn't fair. I should at least try. And so now my favorite dry fly is that it's a pheasant tail, but with a parachute wing. So if you think about a pheasant tail nymph, it's kind of that body, but it's got a parachute wing and a calf tail post. So it's really easy to see. And these little streams up there, again, you're fishing a lot of plunge pools, riffles, and so there's a lot of that type of broken water, and the parachute wing keeps it floating just right. Those little streams, on a good day, a trout will flash at literally every cast. You're not gonna catch a fish in every cast, but you'll see a fish on every cast, and it could be a 30 or 40 or 50 fish day if your legs hold out. And you'll never see another angler. These streams, I don't know, what, maybe 10 feet wide, 15 feet wide, and they'll just go on and on and on. Some of them just keep going right past the border into Canada. And that's really heaven's gate, those type of streams. I just love them. And I love the little fish that are in there too. They're so spunky. I've had fish where sometimes the fly is almost bigger than the fish. And you look at this little guy, maybe he's the size of my pinky, and he jumps six inches out of the water to get that fly. And you've got to give him a lot of credit.
Katie
Yeah, and that's definitely what you just described there is what I experienced. Because we don't have that option of the larger fish in the larger rivers. Here, our larger rivers do not have brook trout. They've got rainbows and browns, and if you're lucky, cut throats. Some cut throats might make their way down in. But even the cutthroats are generally spilling down in, I feel like, from the more headwater streams. And the cutthroat is surely our gem here. Our cutthroat is your brook trout. But we do have brook trout. And that would be my second choice of a fish to catch in those. Because like I said before, I prioritize getting away and getting to a beautiful location and just enjoying myself in that way more than catching a giant fish. And so I more often find myself in these remote backcountry streams that have tiny brook trout. And it sounds like what you have there, that does mimic what we have here. It's just that we don't have that option of going to a big river and catching a big brook trout, because that doesn't exist here. If you go to a big river, you're catching rainbows and browns.
Bob
Yeah, the other advantage of fishing those small streams and really, you're going to see a lot more wildlife along the stream. We have moose, which are fairly common. Sometimes when I'm publicizing my books, I'll say something like, you know, the moose outnumber the anglers, which really isn't true, but we do have a fair population of moose. And I see them almost every trip. I remember a time a couple of years back where, you know, I'm working my way up this little brook and there's a tree that had fallen over the stream, literally from one bank to the other. And I look up and a black bear crosses the log and three triplets right behind her, three cubs, go right across the stream on that log. And that's the type of thing that you're gonna see in that area. I have people from here when I give a program and I might tell that story and they'll literally get spooked and say, well, you don't wanna fish where they're bare and moose. And I said, you know, they're far more afraid of us than we are of them. I have never had a problem with an animal. I've had a problem with a two-legged animal up there, you know, called man, right? But I've never had a problem with any of the animals. And they're so abundant. You know, we see otter and fox and grouse up in Maine, they call them partridge, of course deer, But just about any animal that you could think of in North America, you're going to find in the Maine backwoods. Again, that's one of the charms of the area.
Katie
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's one of the treats of being out there, is you get to experience that. And seeing things like bears and moose, which we have here too, and I don't see very often well, we don't see bears very often. We see moose fairly often. But being scared is always the last thing on my mind when I see one. it's like oh there's a bear.
Bob
Yeah, it's kind of exciting right?
Katie
Yeah.
Bob
You feel privileged actually.
Katie
Yeah, I mean not a lot of people get to experience that and you get to do that. But I think this is a good another transition here to kind of the sporting history because I know we've kind of touched on the how to catch a fish, what the fishing is like, but more interesting to me and I know you said the same as well is the rich history of this area. Being in Colorado, I'm used to a lot of people around here fly fish, but I don't feel like there's the same depth of history as there is in the Northeast, where fly fishing has been around a lot longer, as far as I'm aware. I just want to hear some highlights. I know you listed a bunch of things on the sheet that I sent you. In particular, I really, really want to hear about the ode to White-Nosed Pete. That was the most exciting thing that I saw there. But whatever you find interesting, I would love to hear just what you really find great about this region of the country.
Bob
Yeah. You know, usually when I give a program on the region, and I've got actually 100 photographs, so in a program for, say, a TU chapter, I'll have the slideshow with all the photographs, and I'll be talking about the same things that you and I are speaking about. But I usually begin the program by saying, you know, there's so many wonderful places to fish in the country, and many of them have trophy fish. Some of them have wild country, but this region of Maine, it's really a trifecta. You have that wild country, you have native and wild fish, but then you have this sporting history to go along with it. And especially as a writer. And so, you know, when I realized that there was this sporting history, I just, you know, gobbled it up. I mean, I wanted to know everything. So it really dates back to shortly after the Civil War when again, these five pounds, six pound brook trout were discovered and folks from New York and Massachusetts and Connecticut started to gravitate toward the region. On my lake, and there's about six lakes in this Rangeley Lakes region, although most of us are fishing the rivers, but on my lake, which is the most Western lake, up until the late 1800s, other than the Abenaki, there really, there weren't many people that even had hiked into the area. And it's known as the, there's a lake called a Parmigini, Lake Parmigini. And actually it was named after a native American chief's daughter. It means, I think, smiling waters or beautiful waters. And it's called the Parmigini Track. So in the late 1800s, Johnny Danford and Fred Baker, two 20 year olds, decide they're gonna spend the winter up on the Parmatrini track and they're going to hunt and they're going to trap. Sure enough, they do it. They wrote a book and you can go on Amazon and I think maybe for 20 bucks you get a soft cover and it literally will tell you their story of spending a winter up there. Johnny Danford decides now he's going to create a lodge, a sporting lodge. He tries to build it it on a piece of land and the landowners basically, there's a fight between him and other sporting lodges and he just can't buy any land. He gets involved in a lawsuit. So what does he do? He literally builds a barge, brings it out to the middle of Lake Parmigiani and creates a lodge that just floats on the lake and just goes from wherever he wants to go. I know that just, you know, when I heard that story, I said, "Well, that's really something." And that's where I'm fishing. I'm fishing up in this Parmatuni track. So, I mean, there are times when, you know, I'll look over my shoulder and I can swear Johnny Danford is standing there, you know, just kind of smiling at me. In the 1920s, if you were a writer, or you were an artist, or you were a poet, the place to be was Paris, France. So Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Picasso, you name it, that's where they hung out. Well, in the 1920s and 30s, the place to be was a place called Upper Dam, which is literally in the heart of this Rangeley Lakes region. And Upper Dam, up until about five years ago was a wooden dam constructed in the 1800s. They've rebuilt it now and it held back the waters of Mooselook-McGontick Lake from the waters of Richardson Lake. And so about a quarter, a little bit less than a quarter of a mile, the water coming out of that dam is fish like a river. And they're all cottages up at Upper Dam that go back to the 1920s. So one of the fellas that was there was a guy named Shang Wheeler. And Shang was a character and he would like to tell stories. And he came up with this story about a white-nosed peat. Some people call him pincushion peat. So a white-nosed peat allegedly was a brook trout of mythic proportions that lived under Upper Dam. and the way Native Americans counted coo, that's what White-Nosed Pete would do with any angler that dared to try to catch him. And so he's White-Nosed because he's so old that his, you know, nose and face, I guess, has gone white. And he's Pincushion because he's got every fly of every angler who tried to catch him sticking in his in his jaw. And Shang was one of the most famous amateur decoy builders. And so what does he do? Of course, he builds a mount of white noses, you know, draw and face with all the flies stuck in it. And he's out there fishing one day with a fellow by the name of Joe Bates. And Joe Bates, later on, is known as Colonel Joseph Bates, fought in World War II. And he ends up writing three books about brook trout fishing and streamers and becomes pretty famous in the area. But at the time, Joe was a young man right before World War II when he's fishing with Shang. And sure enough, he hooks into a monster brook trout and he turns to to Shang and he says, "This has got to be White-Nosed Pete." And Shang says, "Well, maybe it is, you know, let's see." And well, right at the last minute, of course, the brook trout broke off and Joe lost his fly and he figured it had to be. So now fast forward maybe five or six years, whatever, and Joe is in the war and he's fighting in the Pacific. And he sends a card back to Shang Will or a letter and he says, "Shang, if I ever get out of this living hell, I'm coming back and I'll be damned, but I'm going to catch, you know, white-nosed Pete. And I thought this was a dirty trick to play on somebody who's fighting in the war, but Shang sends him back a photograph of the mount that he's now made with all those flies in it. And he says, well, Joe, I beat you to it. And so, you know, when Joe comes back from the war, I guess, you know, he tells him it was all a joke. But that's basically the story of White Nose Pete. Now, years later, everybody's looking for the mount that Shang had created. It kind of got lost. Nobody knew where it was. And I don't know, maybe five or six years ago, it showed up. And now it is in the little town of Aquasic outside of Rangeley, Maine. There is the Rangeley, Maine Sporting Museum. And you can see the mount of White Nose Pete that was created by Shang Wheeler. And that's just one of hundreds of stories that come out of this region. And the nickname for the region is called the Land of Fishing Legends. And if you go to the local fly shop, of course, there's a big sign up there that says Land of Fishing Legends. And I guess Shang and Joe were one of those legends. Another one, I'll tell you two more. So we were talking before about the Light Ghost Streamer. And out West, I don't know if folks would really know about that streamer. They could certainly Google it and the pattern will come up. It's a pretty easy pattern actually to tie. But there was a fellow by the name of Herbert Welsh and Herb lived in the area. And he could cast 100 feet without a rod, literally just using his hands and a reel. So he was a great caster, he was a great guide, He was an entrepreneur, he had his own fly fishing shop. He was a taxidermist, he was an artist, and he came up with this pattern. So it was really quite a character being able to do all those things, kind of a Renaissance man of fly fishing. So the black ghost became a very famous pattern. About the same time, there was a couple by the name of Wallace and Carrie Stevens. Again, they had their cottage at Upper Dam. Wallace was the premier guide. And at the time, a lot of folks fished from boats and there was a boat called a Rangeley boat. And it was built specifically for the area. And prior to World War II, it had a pointed bow and a pointed stern. And sometime around World War II, outboard engines were created. And they say that literally within days of the first outboard engine coming to the Rangeley area, every guide in the area had cut off the stern of their boats and then made them flat in order to accommodate an engine 'cause they were really tired of having to row those big boats. And the story goes that the kids in the area, there's not a hell heck of a lot to do there. And if they weren't fishing, They found great sport in putting sugar in these outboard engines and then just sitting back and listening to the words that were coming out of the guide's mouth as they kept pulling the cord. If you ever look at a picture of Wallace Stevens, you'll never find him smiling. I just have the feeling that these kids were playing that trick on Wallace more often than not. But everybody back then knew Wallace. Nobody knew his wife, Carrie. I think it was Carrie's father who was a haberdasher. And so Carrie always had available to her feathers and fur and tinsel and things like that. And so she started to create these streamers. She didn't have a vice. She would do it in her hands actually. And one day she's fishing up under upper dam And she entered a contest, I think, for Field and Stream. Or somehow the Field and Stream magazine discovered. And she caught a five-pound or six-pound brook trout. And they did a story of her in Field and Stream. And from that day on, everybody wanted to buy her streamers. And her most famous streamer is a gray ghost. So you've got a black ghost by Herb, and you've got the gray ghost by Carrie. And that fish she caught, that six-pound trout, was not caught on a gray ghost. I think everybody thinks it was, but my understanding is it was a different streamer that she used. It's also my understanding that she liked to fish with worms, but it just happened to be that day that she used a streamer, and lucky for her. And so for years on, she became famous for her streamers. Another person that was there at the same time people, Flyrod Crosby. So Flyrod Crosby was the first registered Maine guide and happened to be a woman. So, you know, we really have a lot of bells of the woods in our area. We have, we've got Carrie Stevens, we have Flyrod Crosby, and the third woman is Louise Dickinson Rich. So Louise's story is near and dear to my heart. My wife and I, my wife is six years younger than me. And so, yeah, I kind of, you know, I saw a good thing and I grabbed onto it. And I was lucky that she stayed with me all these years. So Louise is out with a bunch of her friends picnicking in the woods by the rapid river. And I'm trying to think of his name now. Ralph, which, who was a woodsman. He literally made his living in the woods. He had a cabin, that's where he lived. And he sees these young women, and he sees Louise, and he says to himself, "I'm going to marry that woman." And she, you know, after picnicking, I guess they go back to the big city, which is probably a town like Errol that only had 300 people living there. And Ralph follows her back and woos her. And, you know, your listeners will have to look up the word "woo," but marries her and brings her back to the woods, brings her back to the Rapid River. And they're living there. He was much older than she was, and they're living there. And he had this rambling sort of cabin that had holes in it. And there were mice going in and out. And I guess in the summertime, the roof would leak. And after her first winter, she said, "Ralph, if I'm going to stay with you, you're going to have to build me a cabin so that it has some degree of warmth in the winter. And he did. He built a one-room cabin just down from the bigger cabin, and they would spend the summer cabin, they spent the summers in the big cabin and the winters in this little cabin. So, and I should say that the story has a happy ending for her, but not so much for Rick, not so much for Ralph, because he was older. They spent 13 years on the Rapid River. He then passed away, but Louise lived to a ripe old age, really literally into her 80s, all during this time writing books. And her first book is called We Took to the Woods. Again, you can get it on eBay probably for five bucks, I wouldn't be surprised. Yeah, We Took to the Woods. And if you're going to get it, make sure you get the one with the black and white photographs. And wonderful story about living in the great North Woods during the 30s and 40s and she was a real just a wonderful writer and real influence on my writing. It was one of the reasons why I began writing about the region. Many years after they're gone, a fella bought the property with both of these cabins and he would rent out the winter house. And my wife and I, and at the time my young daughter Emily, we had the opportunity to spend a long weekend in Louise's winter house. And I remember about midnight we heard a scratching at the door and I got up and you know looked there was nothing. I went back to bed we heard a scratching again. This happened about three times, couldn't find anything. I just said to my wife I think it was the ghost of kayak, you know, Louise's dog that's coming back to see who's in their cabin. But, you know, those are the type of interesting people that, you know, from the 1800s right on to, you know, past World War II, that fished in the area. And you really get the feeling that, you know, you're walking in their shoes. You can literally fish the pool where Carrie Stevens caught that six pound trout. And you can use the very streamer that she used. There's a pool on the upper McGalloway where I fish called Little Boy Falls. And it's where President Eisenhower fished back in the 1950s. And it is literally down a very narrow trail through a spruce forest. It's a portage trail that the Abenaki used to use. And you come down and there's this beautiful, very large pool with a little waterfall coming into it, and where you would least expect it, screwed into a large boulder, is a brass plaque that the Republican women of Maine have put there to commemorate Ike's fishing the pool. And again, you can fish in that very pool where President Eisenhower fished. One story I heard, I don't I don't know if it's really true, is that the first day he fished, he didn't catch many fish. And when he went back to the lodge that night, you know, he was grousing a little bit. And so the guides went out at night behind his back and they stocked so many brook trout, he could have walked across their shoulders to get to the other side. And the next day he had a great, you know, a great, great afternoon and everybody was happy. Again, another story, you know, from that region. So yeah, it's that history that really gets to me, that I feel that I'm part of that history. You could be part of that history. It's just a matter of taking up a fly rod and spending some time there. There are these traditional main sporting lodges, and there are quite a few, but the three that I'm familiar with, there is Bozbok Mountain Camps that provides access to the McGalloway River system. There is Grants Camps that provides access to the Kennebago River system. And there is Lakewood Camps that provides access to the Rapid River, the river I was just talking about where Louise Dickinson Rich had lived. And these sporting camps all date back to either the late 1800s or early 1900s. Some of them may have only had three owners over that entire stretch of time. And these are very traditional. You'll have a large room where you'll take your meals and maybe next to it will be a place to play cribbage or cards. And you're not gonna have a TV or anything like that. And then flanking that large building are gonna be these cabins. And again, these cabins are very rustic. It's usually a one room cabin with a single bed, desk, a chair, a toilet, and a wood stove, maybe a shower, yeah, and a wood stove. And again, those cabins have been around, you know, since late 1800s, early 1900s. And I would recommend your listeners that if they do, you know, plan a trip to the region, yeah, at least once you have to stay at one of those sporting lodges. You know, all the history is right there, it's seeping out out of those walls. It's just, I mean, I can go on and on, but it's just, you know, it's taken my heart away, I have to tell you.
Katie
Yeah, I think that's something that comes with time in, I mean, it's not even just fly fishing, it's anything. It's skiing, it's hunting, it's fishing, it's whatever you wanna dive into. But when you first get started, you just wanna learn how to do it and you wanna catch some fish and you're upset if you don't catch fish. And there comes a point where, you know, you've got enough fish that what becomes more interesting is learning about the local culture or the local history of a place. And you mentioned, like, I don't know if this story is true or not. But the way I view it is it doesn't really matter. It's part of the lore at this point. And whether it actually happened or not is almost like a side issue. That becomes part of the lure of the area is just the local legends and the fact that people think that Carrie caught that fish on the Great Ghost. Just things like this that come about, and it becomes part of the history of it, even if it's not true. And that's actually something I wanted to ask about your books. This might be a good way to kind of wrap up and talk about some of the books you've written. I saw when I was reading about you and your books, or at least the book you sent me, which I haven't gotten to read, but I kind of read the beginning of it, and your foreword, and it said like, this is entirely fictional. These are things from my imagination, but I've also changed the names of places. And I wanted to ask, is this a fictional book, or is this a true book that doesn't actually have any of the right information?
Bob
So the latest book, which is River Flowers, is a collection of short stories. So the stories themselves are fiction. But the places are not.
Katie
OK, OK, that makes sense.
Bob
Yeah, yeah. So if a character Again, if the character is fishing with a particular streamer, yeah, I mean, and whatever, you know, however they're fishing it, yeah, that would be accurate. But the characters themselves are either composites of folks that I know, or knew, or they're completely, you know, part of my imagination. And just to give you a quick example, so, and, you know, I'm going to give give away just one of the stories there. So there's a story there called the Goldberg. Well, there is a fly in Maine that New Englanders have taken it as their own fly, as their go-to fly. It is called a Hornberg. I don't know, again, out West, if you'd be familiar with it. But it's interesting in that the Hornberg was created by a warden in Wisconsin, having nothing, obviously, to do with the state of Maine. But at some point, remember that guy Joe Brooks that I said wrote two or three books and he thought he had caught white-nosed Pete. Well, in one of Joe's books, he's showing these different streamers to catch brook trout and he describes the Hornburg, tells its history, tells you how to tie it. And from that, people of Maine started using this fly. And it really is anybody in Maine, if you say Hornburg, their eyes light up, that's the fly that they use. So when I was just starting, and I think I may have mentioned early on in the program that while my wife, before we were married and I was fairly young and I was just starting out fly fishing, my wife and I stayed at Bozebuk Mountain Camps. So there we are at Bozebuk Mountain Camps and it's our next to last day. I hadn't caught many fish and Tom Rideout, who became a good friend of mine over the years at the time though he owned Bozbach, he walks over and asked me how we were doing. I said, "Well, you know, not all that great." And he hands me a Hornburg and he says, "Well, you got to use this fly. I guarantee, you know, you're going to catch fish, whatever." So now it's the last night that we're there, it's pouring rain. And my wife says to me, "Well, you know, let's go out." And I said, "You know, Trish, come on. It's a gale out there." "Well, my father says fishing in the rain, that's the best time to fish." I said, "Well, maybe in the rain, but not in a gale." But she insisted. So we went out to this particular spot and the wind was blowing so hard from my back that that Hornburg, and it's a big bushy fly, the Hornburg was literally just hitting the surface and bouncing up into the air, hitting the surface, bouncing up into the air. I couldn't get it to stay on the surface because the wind was blowing. And don't you know at the height of it being in the air, the biggest brook trout to this day that I have ever seen comes flying out, his tail clears the water and he grabs the Hornburg and he goes down. And I didn't have a net because I didn't think I was going to catch any fish. And just as he gets to my waiting boot, of course he turns, he breaks off the Hornburg and he's gone. Well, I go back the next morning, we're checking out and I'm beside myself. And I said to Tom, I tell him the story and I said, "You got to give me a a dozen of those flies. And he says, "What flies?" I said, "That fly you gave me yesterday." And he kind of chuckled. He says, "Bob, to be honest with you, I just give flies out to anybody and I always tell them they're going to catch fish. I don't remember what fly I gave you." And I'm trying to think of the name and I'm trying to think of the name. And the only name that came to my mind, I couldn't think of Hornburg. The only name that came to my mind was, I said, It's the Goldberg, right? And he looks at me, he says, that Jewish fly? That's what you want? So I took that true story. And from that, there is a story in this collection called the Goldberg. And it's not necessarily me. But it kind of used those facts to come up with an interesting story. So you don't know where stories necessarily are going to come from.
Katie
But once again, whether it's true or not doesn't really matter. It's all in the spirit of it, right? At that point.
Bob
I think so. Yep, yep. Now I'm just gonna tell you just one quick story if we have the time. So my first book, which is out of print, it's actually really tough to get. It's called "Shadows in the Stream." It went through four printings before going out of print. And it even had a 10 anniversary edition. But basically every chapter is a story different lake stream or pond in the region. And I know that a lot of fellas, a lot of fellas and gals use that book almost as a guide to, you know, where to go. So every now and then, like any fisherman, I complain about too many people coming up, you know, and fishing in my spots. So one day I'm going to this particular spot, very special spot whose name I'm not gonna tell you. And sure enough, I drive, you have to actually hike down a trail and you wouldn't even be able to find the trail. They're like spruce boughs over it. And then, but you would park your car and basically, you know, you wouldn't even know why you would park there. And you'd remove the boughs, you walk down the trail, about 10 minutes later, you get to this great spot. So I go there and sure enough, there's a SUV there with Massachusetts plates. And I said, "Oh boy, okay, well, I'm not gonna bother him." So I go back to my cabin, I have lunch, and then I go back again. This time, the fella is driving out, I'm driving in. So I roll down my window, he rolls down his window, and I said, "Bub, I just have to ask you this question. How in heck did you find that spot?" And he smiles at me and he grabs a book, and he shows me and he says, "I don't know, this guy from New Jersey wrote this book about Maine, and I'm just following it chapter by chapter, every spot that he talks about. So I just smiled, I drove back, I told my wife the story and she said, "Well, you've got two choices. "One is to stop writing books, "or the other is to stop grousing about people "following your direction." So that's a cautionary tale.
Katie
You know, at the end of the day though, that I get that you don't want people fishing your quote unquote sacred spots, but I feel like that's the kind of person who at least appreciates it. going through the journey with you reading your book and it's a little different than someone you know throwing that out on Google and you know a hundred people read it and I'll show up there. You know that I feel like that type of person is the type of person you're gonna get along with anyway.
Bob
I agree completely. You know I'm gonna tell you a secret and in my real life I'm an attorney. I'm a lawyer because out of college I wanted to be a writer but I had no life experience. I had really nothing to write about. And it was only years later, you know, learning the history of this region in Maine, having fly fished for many, many years, having some life experience that I then became a writer. So, you know, when a client calls me, my staff will, you know, confirm this for you. I might be on the phone for five minutes and then I'm off because I've got more important things to do. So I'm a little brusque with a client. But every now and then, I get a reader who somehow finds out my phone number at my office, or an angler for that matter, and will give me a call. And they might call, "Is this Bob Romano?" And he's the writer or the fisherman. And they just roll their eyes because they know that's gonna be a one-hour phone conversation. So that's where really my true love is. So I agree with you. There's no question. If you're going to go through the trouble of finding that spot, driving down a logging road, whatever it takes to get to it, you deserve to be able to fish it.
Katie
Right, and the hassle of, not that reading a good book is a hassle, but actually sitting down and taking the time to read through that versus just wanting a list of people's favorite fishing spots. There's just a different type of person there who's taking that approach. But why don't you, just to wrap up, why don't you tell me what books you have out? I know you just recently released a book that you sent me, The River Flowers. So take this time to plug whatever you want. I know you have written some articles as well. So whatever you want to share with people that you'd like people to check out.
Bob
Well, first of all, my website is ForgottenTrout.com. So if anybody is interested in my writing, they can go to the website. There's all sorts of reviews, a lot of information on the books. The books covers some excerpts from the books as well. My email address is magalloway@mac.com. So that is m-a-g-a-l-l-o-w-a-y, magalloway@mac.com. If anybody wants information on the region, when to go, what are the bugs like, the black flies, things like that, just shoot me an email and I really enjoy communicating with folks. as I can. I can give you local guides, I can give them the local fly shop, you name it, I'll be happy to provide it to them. Anybody wants an autograph book, again you can email me, I can tell you how to get an autograph book, which you know you're not going to obviously get on Amazon. The two books that are that are currently available is the new book that just came out December 15th and that is "River Flowers." And that, again, is a collection of short stories about wild trout, where they're located, and the people that gravitate toward them. The other book is "The River King," and "The River King" is a novel that is set in Rangeley. It's set in this Rangeley Lakes region. All the fishing in that book is accurate. They're fishing the same places that you'd be fishing if you spent, you know, some time there. And the rivers are properly named, the pools are properly named. So what's fictitious is the story and the characters. And the characters, you know, my other novels that are now out of print were written really from the viewpoint of somebody coming to the region and and not living there, but fishing there. So somebody like myself, for instance, the River King is written from the perspective of four 20-somethings living in the region. And like many parts of the country, the Rangely region is economically depressed. And about the only way to make a living is logging, which is very dangerous, or catering to sports, catering to folks that are coming there to fish or coming there to ski. So I wondered, you know, what would it be like to be 20 years old, have a really tough time making a living, probably not going to college, and you know, you love your lakes, rivers, and streams that are yours, and yet you see very wealthy people coming there and kind of, you know, using the one thing that you can claim as your own. So they've got this kind of conflict between, "Well, I got to be nice to these folks because that's how I'm going to make a living." But on the other hand, I'm kind of envious that I don't have the money that they have. I don't have the privileges that they have. So the four characters, one is Harry, and he's the fly fishing guide. The other fella is Gilroy, and Gilroy is quite a character. He also is a low level drug dealer, but quite honestly, he's my favorite in the book. There is Pity Boy, who is developmentally disabled, but his buddies take care of him. And then there's Thelma Louise. And Thelma Louise wants nothing more than to get the hell out of Rangeley and to make it big. And one month she wants to be the beautician to the stars, and the next month she wants to anything just to get out of the boredom, what she thinks is boredom, of this region. Meanwhile, her boyfriend Harry loves the region because he's an angler and he's a fly-fishing guide, and he can never leave the region. So there's a little conflict there as well. So these are four blue-collar kids, tough-edged kids. Hopefully by the end of the book, you fall in love with them. I'm not going to tell you whether they make it or not. You'll have to read the book to see. But those are the two books that are out now. That's the River King and River Flowers.
Katie
Oh man, you sent me River Flowers, the PDF, but I might have to get River King too 'cause it sounds like a really fun story.
Bob
You send me an email and I'll get you a PDF.
Katie
Sounds good,
Bob
Oh, you know what? I don't have a PDF of River King. I don't know, I guess the publisher has that. I don't know how I got the PDF on River Flowers, I don't think I have one for River King or I would have sent it to you. I'm going to look for it for you. I'll see if I can get it.
Katie
Well, Bob, this has been such a fun conversation. I'm so glad you reached out because in addition to just hearing about how to fish in different regions of the country, which I always enjoy listening to, I really like hearing these localized fishing cultures that no one would know about, if they hadn't talked to someone who had been there or been there themselves. just like this is what fishing is kind of evolved into I feel like at this point just being able to hear these unique cultures from people and like what really draws them to fishing so this has just been an absolute treat I'm so glad you reached out to me and expressed an interest in coming on.
Bob
Well Kate it was it was really wonderful for me and I appreciate you giving me an opportunity to speak to your listeners if you ever decide to you know take a you up in the Rangeley Lakes region.
Katie
You've got to be careful. Someone else offered that recently, and I took him up on it. So I might be hitting you up at some point.
Bob
There you go. Can I tell you one more really, really quick story?
Katie
Absolutely, yeah.
Bob
All right. So when I do my programs, you know, again, it's visual, and I have a map of the area, and I'm even showing people roughly where my camp is, right? And I'll usually, at the end of the, just like I did with you, at the end of the program, I'll say, "Hey, and if anybody gets up to the region and you drive by my camp, stop in. And my wife just goes ballistic, you know, she rolls her eyes and says, you know, you got to be out of your mind. People ask, look, who's really going to come to my camp? Who's going to make that trip? And who's really going to find it? Well, there's one, there's one spot in the region, and it's behind locked gates. So I can't get into it, unless I have the key. Bozebuck Mountain Camps has the key every now and then because I know the owner, you know, he lets me up there. Well, what happens? A fella shows up and he just shows up at my camp and you know, I walk out and I see this car and he says, "Hey," like he's like my best friend, "Hey, Bob, it's good to see you. So, you know, we're gonna go fishing, right?" And I'm looking at the guy and I almost said, "Well, who the hell are you?" You know, and he says, "Don't you remember me? I was at your program. You said whenever, you know, whenever I'm in the area to stop by. Well I'm here. Well I was about to kick the guy out and what does he do? He shows me the key and he says I got a key to the upper river. I thought you could show me around. I looked at my wife and I smiled. I said I'll be right there and I got a day to fish on the upper river.
Katie
Well there you go.
Bob
So there you go Kate.
Katie
Well I don't have the key but I might show up there and then I hope you have one that day.
Bob
That sounds good.
Katie
Well Bob I will let you get going. I know it's a couple hours ahead but once again thank Thank you so much for coming on. I will send you the audio of this once I get it edited, and I'm sure people are going to have a great time learning about a region of Maine they probably haven't thought too much about until now.
Bob
All the best. Bye-bye.
Katie
All right, guys, thanks for listening. Don't forget to head over to the website, fishuntamed.com, for all episodes and show notes, and also please subscribe on your favorite podcasting app. That'll get my episodes delivered straight to your phone. And also if you have not yet, please consider going over to Apple Podcasts and leaving a rating or review. That's very helpful for me and I'd greatly appreciate it. Other than that, thank you guys again for listening and I will be back in two weeks. Bye everybody.
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