Ep 80: Living the Trout Bum Life, with Nick Hill
In 2018, I traveled to Japan with a group of friends to ski the famous Hokkaido powder. One member of the group, Nick Hill, fell in love with Japan and decided to move there. Not long after, he became a trout bum, and he’s been immersing himself in Japan’s amazing fishing opportunities ever since. This is a pretty relaxed episode where we catch up on what he’s been up to, what it’s like being a trout bum in a foreign country, and some fun stories along the way.
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Katie
You're listening to the Fish Untamed Podcast, your home for fly fishing the backcountry. this is episode 80 with Nick Hill on living the trout bum life. Hey everybody, just wanted to hop in quickly and make a quick announcement before the show. We are rapidly approaching flyathlon season, and for those who aren't familiar with the flyathlon, it is a super fun race that happens a couple times each year, and it's based around running, fishing, and drinking beer, which are three of my favorite things. And if you'd like to hear more about the race, you can listen to episode one of the Fish Untamed podcast, where I interviewed Andrew Todd, the founder of the Flyathlon. But in addition to being a really fun weekend with a lot of fun people, the Flyathlon is also a fundraiser to raise money for native cutthroat trout conservation. So if you have a couple extra dollars that you would be interested in donating to a great cause to support native cutthroat trout, go ahead and head over to my website, fishuntamed.com. and you'll find a menu at the top called Flyathlon Fundraiser. That link should take you to the fundraiser and you can donate there. And any amount is greatly appreciated. This would be a great way to support the show and also support a wonderful cause for native trout. That's all I've got for you and we can get on with the show. Cheers. I couldn't wait.
Nick
Cheers.
Katie
What are you drinking?
Nick
An IPA.
Katie
All right, I've got a coffee.
Nick
Kirkland. I got Kirkland Signature. That's how I can get some IPA out here.
Katie
I didn't know Kirkland had IPAs.
Nick
It's made by some brewery in California and then sold under the Kirkland name internationally. It's only available in the warm months. Anyway.
Katie
Well, cool. Yeah, it's been a long time since we've caught up. And last time I saw you, I feel like you were still kind of getting the hang of fly fishing. So I'm really excited to hear, you know, what you've been up to since then. So you know how I started them all off. I'd like to hear how you got your start. And normally with my friends, that's not as much of a question, but I actually don't know how you got into fly fishing. So I'd love to hear that.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. So I guess just to go back to the beginning, I was born in Ohio and grew up on a farm and grew up with a lot of bass and bluegill fishing. If I'm more honest, bluegill and then bass fishing as far as order of success. But yeah, started out bluegill fishing, bass fishing in college, did a little bit of fishing. And then when I moved out west, moving out west equals you have to learn how to fly fish for trout. It's the only option. Right. It's the only option. So yeah, I moved out West. My friends were going out on camping trips and whatnot. And, they would always be like, oh yeah, we're fly fishing. And so it was like, well, if I, if I don't learn how to do this, then I'm going to get left behind on all these camping trips. So, I went out and bought like a cheap outfit kit and got some flies and, yeah, got into some some little fish and started picking up on it and then I got kind of I moved around the west as far as living in Utah and living in California and sometimes I'd fish more than other times and then we went on a trip so we went on a trip together to Japan and And that was my introduction. Yeah, that was my introduction to Niseko, which is where I live now. And yeah, that kind of rerouted me. And when around the pandemic, like the beginning of the pandemic, we were out ski touring. I had kind of similar to when you interviewed Rick Wallace from coming out to Japan to pack the fly rod, didn't know if I'd actually get to use it or not. There was a guy I worked with from Oregon who tied flies and was like, yeah, come out, we'll fish. And that never came to fruition. So go on this hut trip and I strapped my fly rod onto the side of my pack. And I'm like, you know what, the entire hike is along a river. Like maybe this is an excuse to take a break. So I ended up fishing a little bit on the way home and we get back into service and we find out the pandemic's full fledged. Next thing you know, I've got a family emergency, have to go back to the States and I'm stuck in the States, stuck, quote unquote, in the States. And then that's when fly fishing just became religious just every day.
Katie
I feel like that's the first time I fished with you.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I guess on one hand, I could say I've fished for several years prior, but how much? Not on the same scale at all.
Katie
Right. It's like the people who come out and ski once a year on a weekend trip, and they're like, I've been skiing for 40 years. And it's like, well, you've got the same number of days in those years as some people get in a season. So it's like, you have to take that away from you, but it's not really the same thing as someone who goes out all the time.
Nick
I was the vacation skier of fly fishermen. And now I am the ski bum, aka a trout bum.
Katie
Well, that's pretty cool. And I'm really curious. I think I'm actually most curious to hear what it's like to become, what you've made of this in Japan. I have no idea how that process would go down. So I think that's maybe where I'd like to start, is you moved to Japan after your inspiring ski trip there. And now you're working in fly fishing in Japan. And I have no idea how that process works. So walk me through how you got from I took a fly rod on a ski tour to what you're doing now.
Nick
Yeah. So I came back to the States and I had a corporate job. was a hotel manager and and did that for a long time did that for like a decade of my life so hospitality hospitality has always been there as far as like just showing people around an area living in mountain towns like living in a vacation essentially for someone else all the time That aspect has been there. As far as the fishing part, I came back and couldn't get back to Japan, needed to focus myself on something else. My partner's brother had a fly rod that I could borrow. I had some flies in a fly box at her house, at her parents' house. and so I just went out to their horse pond and that everyone was like there's no fish in there like there's no fish in this pond and I was like I'm gonna go find out and I start hooking up on bass and I'm like you're all wrong there's there's bass in these ponds so yeah I just started fishing like crazy and then we we ended up going to so we're waiting to find out what's going to happen. We're kind of in limbo. So like Japan, I was able to get to the United States. However, I wasn't allowed to go back to Japan because they locked their border to everyone, like residents, non-residents, everyone. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Yeah. So there is a lot of people that were locked out for a while that for whatever reason, they had to leave Japan, go home for an emergency or whatever. And then they were stuck out of the country for a long time. So I was one of them. And it was weird. I felt like being a refugee, but in your own country. So you're not a refugee. You know, like all my belongings are in Japan. And I've got this two pieces of luggage and a fly rod. And that's pretty much it. I think the first time that, so when we came up and fished with you, it was like, What was in the car is what Bree and I had to our name in the United States. Like it was very different. Then we ended up, she got accepted into Teton Science School and we moved up to Grand Teton National Park. And next thing you know, I'm getting to fish the Snake River and the Grovant all the time. I've got some great people around me and influencing me. I've got to give a shout out to my buddy, Nick Fiorini, who's a guide out there in Wyoming. And he was like, dude, chase it. Like, go for it. Just go for it. Like, if this is what you love, just like go all in. So, yeah, kind of got back to Japan and had the ability. Okay, there's a year of time. And then I'm able to get back into Japan. And we get back here and I'm just like, all right, I'm going to just go all in on like putting like tying flies for not only myself, but for friends. If anybody wants to know about fishing in the area, taking them out, guiding them, things like that. So just kind of starting up. And I've spent countless days on the water and every day is like another learning day out here. It's definitely challenging in a sense of like everything you know from the States, now put it in a different language and then still know like how to find that information. Like, like, like the most, I guess, like to me, I was like, oh, go get a hatch chart. Like go to the shop and see what flies are working. Like, no, because you, you can't talk to the people all the way or, or you pick up the book and it's not in English. The bug names aren't in English. So like the Japanese, the Japanese bugs don't have Latin names. They have Japanese names. So you can't, you can't like look up the Latin name. Right, right. You have to figure out, okay, this is a Drake Mayfly, but what kind? Oh, it's a Monca Getto. Oh, okay. A Monca Getto. That is a Drake Mayfly. Right.
Katie
I feel like you need the equivalent of, like when we were there, and we're obviously struggling with the same thing, you need the picture menus, where you just point to the picture, and to actually talk to the waiter at all, you just point to what you want, and that's what you get.
Nick
You are 100% correct. Let me just go over to my desk here. Here is my version of a picture menu.
Katie
Right. That's what you need. Like you don't actually have to know what the thing's called. You just have to know what it looks like and whether you have something that looks like that. So at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter that you know the names of those.
Nick
Right. Right. Yeah. So that's what I started doing was I just started going around and turning all the rocks. Right. Like turning all the rocks. And if I saw like if I saw a certain type of bug, go home, tie something that looks like that bug and tie something else that looks like that bug and just keep going through the process of like tying it in different stages. And then, then they start hatching and it's like, okay, now I get to tie them a different way. And, and along that you do, it is nice because if you know the name, you can look up Monkagetto fly pattern, and then you'll be able to find Japanese, like the Japanese take on how to tie that bug. But it is unique and fun because I'm not from here. I don't fish the same style as them. So we can look at the same bug and tie it two completely different ways. Yeah, it's a lot of fun to go down those holes of like, I've got a jar with a little bug in it, and I'm going to try to figure out how to make it this evening.
Katie
Right. I definitely want to go down this rabbit hole of fly tying. But before I get there, I wanted to ask you, when you were stuck in the US for a year, and I assume you didn't know that you weren't coming back. So was your stuff just in an apartment and what happened to it when you weren't there for a year? I mean, you obviously, I assume, weren't still paying rent on an apartment you weren't living in for a year. Am I wrong about that?
Nick
No, I wasn't paying rent. I did have to pay taxes when I got back, but I didn't have to pay rent.
Katie
So is your stuff able to just stay there?
Nick
Yeah. So I had some really good friends that I had made out here. And yeah, they were like, I mean, like brothers and sisters to me and just like, we got you. Like, we'll help you. We'll get you taken care of.
Katie
Got it.
Nick
When I realized I wasn't going to make it back for winter, they packaged all my winter stuff that I needed and shipped it over to the States. for me. And then the rest of it stored it at their houses for me as well. So when we came back, we had to ship some stuff because we had it shipped back already. So then we had to ship it back to Japan, as well as having just several pieces of luggage.
Katie
So are these Japanese friends or are most of the people you've connected with English? Well, I guess Japanese and English speaking aren't mutually exclusive, but are your friends like American or have you made friends with like the locals?
Nick
So my friends, my friends, Juan and Delphi are Argentinian and they helped me out with a lot of stuff. They had actually, they've, they've done, they've never summered from like Argentina to Tahoe several times over. And then they did Japan for a winter and that winter became like two and a half years. Wow. Yeah. So they, They came over in 2020, in the 1920 winter season, and got stuck here for like three winters. And then they just got back to Patagonia here recently. And then my other friends, Will and Mykono, Will's Australian and Mykono's Japanese. And yeah, they have a great little cabin out here in this Echo. They put some of my stuff up in the loft and were just legends.
Katie
That's good that you at least had a little bit of time there to make some good connections before the pandemic hit. I feel like it probably would have been even more stressful had it happened a month after showing up, before you really have any good friends.
Nick
Oh, yeah. No, I had been here two winters. Even though I'm here the whole year, it's a ski town, so everyone's like, I've been here two winters.
Katie
Yeah, and summers and falls and springs.
Nick
Right, exactly, exactly. So I had been here two winters and then the pandemic got me pushed over into the States for a year. But I mean, I landed in Jackson Hole, so I have no complaints.
Katie
Okay, question about winter. Have you transitioned into becoming like a I just fish all year round just as hard? Or are you like me where I kind of like I will fish in the winter, but I mostly put the rod away for pulling the skis out in the winter. And I'd say winter takes up like a quarter of my year. And I don't really I don't really fish a lot during that. Are you are you now fishing year round just as hard or do you still kind of like favor the snowboard in the winter?
Nick
I have to say snowboarding is my is the first love.
Katie
Right. Yeah.
Nick
It's not the true first love. I was fishing as a little kid before I was snowboarding, but snowboarding has been the past 20 years of my life. And many, I'd say almost most of my close friendships have at least some root system that is based out of skiing and snowboarding in it. But I have been spending a lot of time in the winter fishing as well. I'd say especially this past winter. it's we can we can kind of go into seasons here in a bit but the winter time here it's nice for me I guess the way to put it is like if you've seen Eric Jackson's alignment he put I think he puts it best in the snowboard film where he's like going out and like snowboarding and snowboarding and snowboarding, then it's like, man, my body is taking a beating. And like, I want to go just stand in the river and be calm for a moment and have that like surge of energy if I get a fish, but otherwise, like, pretty calming. It's the yin and yang, right?
Katie
Right. So did you I don't know if you saw that film, and it's two different versions. I mean, I know I'm thinking of the right film. And I'm pretty sure I saw it once at like a ski film festival and I saw it once at a the fly fishing film festival or film tour and it was two different edits of it and the fishing one the one the one that they put on at the the fishing tour was probably like three quarters fishing and a quarter snowboarding and then the one like the ski film festival was the opposite where it's like mostly him snowboarding with like a little clip of him fishing and it was like fun to see that they had you know a lot more footage from both but they edited them to fit whatever audience they were giving it to. And I was like, I love both of these. I'll watch this twice in different versions.
Nick
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, when that came out, I was like, oh, this is okay. This is what I want. Yeah, this is what I'm about right here. All right. Like I said, going out splitboarding with a fly rod on the side of the pack.
Katie
Well, honestly, that's kind of why I like doing a really hard hike and then fishing at the end. I don't like to just relax all the time, but I also can't push myself all the time. So working your body to get somewhere and then being able to get to the top and sit down with a beer and fish, it's like the perfect dichotomy of working hard and then chilling at the end to just enjoy it and savor it. And that's kind of what I felt like he was getting at, which I also really liked.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. This season, we went on a hut trip that was, we went up to the Mouiné hut. And when we went up there, there's no rivers around there where we were at. And so I brought the vice with me instead. I like brought the vice with me and in the evenings, I'd just tie some flies.
Katie
Okay, so this brings us back to fly tying, which I'd like to get into. Because you, I can almost guarantee, are a much better fly tier than I am. I am still very new to it and kind of like dabbling when I can. And it sounds like you have like really immersed yourself in that side. So I want to hear how you got into that and like, where are you at right now in your fly tying journey, if you will? And then like, what, how is fly tying, how is it unique to Japan? Like, is there a difference between fly tying in Japan and like US patterns? Like what have you, what have you experienced?
Nick
Yeah, yeah. So as far as how I got into it, I have to give my mother some credit here because she bought me when I said I was interested in, I was going to go fly fishing in Utah. She got me a fly tying vise for Christmas that year because she just like looked up like fly fishing gifts and it was like, get him a vice. So she got me a vice and I never used it until I think like in, in 2020 actually was when I like first was like, you know what, I'm going to learn how to do this. And I sat down, of course, went straight to the woolly bugger. Cause I was, I was like sick of paying for them. So I was like, I'm going to get this vice and I'm going to like learn how to tie woolly buggers because I'm sick of losing them to all these baths. So I'm like tying woolly buggers. And I filled a box like pretty quick, just full of woolly buggers. And then was like, oh, OK, well, what else do I want to tie? Like what other bug do I need? What else is going to catch fish? And I just started going whichever direction would catch fish. at first I'm sitting and I think I had I think I had a fishing license to like seven different states while I was stuck in the in the U.S. so I was like fishing like Texas and then fishing Ohio and then going through Colorado and then checking out why and then I moved to Wyoming and was living there which inevitably pushes you to go up and fish in Idaho and go out and fish in Montana And so I'm just kind of like bopping around everywhere. And every time I'd go, it's like I'd go into the fly shop like, what's working? And they're like, oh, here's this. I'm like, okay, well, I had a guy in the fly shop tell me the rule of three. Have you heard this?
Katie
For fly tying, is that like you have to tie at least three? You take at least three, so you've got one to use, one to lose, and one to give away or something like that?
Nick
That's it. Yeah.
Katie
Okay. I think I've heard it in the context of tying. You always tie three, so you've got one to lose, one to use, and one to give away.
Nick
Yeah. That's what they told me in the shop. They were like, you should get everything in threes. I'd be like, all right. I would do that and then lose two and then be like, oh, now I can't let go of this one and I can't fix it because it's the model. It's my model. I can't lose my model.
Katie
I've heard that same thing and I'm like, I can't, three is not enough. I'm going to lose three and then go buy more. That's my numerical system.
Nick
Yeah. They just started being like, here, buy three. And then also this 20 pack of hooks, you'll need discolored dubbing and you're going to need some deer hair. Here you go. And yeah, I just started going in, living in Jackson there or outside of Jackson, I would go into JD's, JD High Country Outfitters. And I would go into the Orvis shop there in Jackson and go into both those places and just kind of be like, what's working? How do I tie it? And I would just get lessons from some of these great tires out there in Wyoming. And they would just be like, oh yeah, here, come over here, 15 minutes, just give me a demo on how to tie the fly and then send me packing with the materials I need so that inevitably I come back into the shop next week and go, here's what I got it looking like. What's next? And they're like, oh, those are already done this week. So now you need to tie this bug. So it just kept going and kept going. And it's funny because when I got to winter fishing this year, I was like, oh, midges.
Katie
What's the problem? That's the easiest thing to tie them all.
Nick
Oh, it is. But the size 20 hooks, I'm just, I would, I would much rather tie. I think I'd rather sit down and take the time to tie like a good looking articulated streamer than to just tie like a dozen little zebra midges.
Katie
Oh, that's funny. I guess I haven't gotten as far as you have in fly tying, but like, you know, if I need midges, I'm like, oh, good. I can like whip up a couple of those without trying like it's a relief to me
Nick
I think I've got like sausage fingers so it's just it doesn't work I get I get to like the 20 hook and I'm just like how do I put this on the vice like my fingers are blocking it like I would use magnets and just like magnetize the hook and then put it to the vice and then clip the vice onto it and be like okay I'm on I got it and then when I'm done drop it cup. Don't try to like grab it out. You'll lose it. Yeah. I definitely dropped a lot on the floor that I am like, well, the vacuum will find it someday. Oh, no, no, no, no. That's when you take the magnet on your net and you just swing it over everywhere around your feet until it picks up the hook and then you're safe to move. Otherwise you get a hook in the foot.
Katie
As far as like flies in Japan have you found I guess this is not really as much fly tying as it is just hatches like what are they what are the insects like compared to those in the U.S. and then I guess coming back to fly tying do they have different tying styles for those insects
Nick
yeah yes so they do they do and it's it's cool to go see like all so the nearest fly shop to us here in Niseko is about two hours away. There was one close in our town, but the doors have been closed. So, it's about a two, two and a half hour drive to get down to Sapporo. And down in Sapporo, there's a couple of good shops that I go to. And I'll go down there and look at their flies and they've got some really cool patterns. They're a little different than some of the stuff that we see, just kind of approach on materials. And then there's like, I don't really tenkara fish, but there's like a whole world of tenkara flies. I mean, there's not, they normally use one fly only pretty much, but you know, they've got their patterns that I'm like, yeah.
Katie
That's kind of what I was wondering. Like, I wasn't sure if other, if their regular, like quote unquote non-tenkara flies were kind of tied in the same style or if tenkara if that tenkara shape is is very unique to tenkara fishing which it shouldn't be I mean it shouldn't what's what's on the end of your line shouldn't really relate to what rod you're using but um
Nick
I know that tenkara flies are specific yeah yeah I'll use tenkara for like if someone's a beginner I I just took out my landlord's kid he wanted to introduce him to fishing and so I was like yeah absolutely let's get him out there so we got him a little tenkara rod and I just made him some like basic tenkara flies it's funny though because like I watched like a tenkara recipe on it on YouTube and and was like okay like this guy is like tenkara fly tenkara fly and car fly it looked like a soft tackle to me it kind of looks like a soft tackle that got reversed like yeah facing the wrong way yeah and I i think in general I don't think the fish are getting that picky to it as far as like if the if the feathers curling up one way versus the other I i don't see that being a something that's going to stop a hyper little trout from eating another bug
Katie
Right. I feel like the fish throwing up its little pinky being like, no, that's not fancy enough in my taste.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. I've also seen some interesting little smaller streamer patterns. I think they're more, it could be just because I'm not near, I've been in landlocked states and so, or not fishing near the coast area. and here there's some bait fish that that will come in from the sea and so there's like some different bait fish that they're working with and so some of the streamer patterns are a little different because of that as far as dry flies I saw a spider pattern recently which I thought was interesting like doesn't seem like I just haven't seen like like in the states it's never been something like oh you'll need a spider pattern today
Katie
I distinctly remember when I first started guiding we had like a communal big fly bin that you know the guides could pull flies from and I was just starting out and so I i was like oh I'm gonna trust you guys to tell me like what flies work around here and so I took like some from the box and there was this one called a tarantula that was just this little it looked like a tiny tarantula like a big fat spider and I was like oh you know we obviously use these so I like put a bunch in my box and I don't know if I've ever used one
Nick
Yeah. Today, ironically, I saw a spider fall on the water and was struggling on the surface. And I'm just like, this is it. This is when you use that fly.
Katie
Did it get eaten? It's the perfect example.
Nick
No, it didn't.
Katie
Well, then I don't think you need to use that fly.
Nick
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't worry. I'm not tying spiders. But yeah, that was, I saw some of the different patterns like that. Deer hair, like deer hair cicada patterns were pretty popular or are pretty popular. I had a guy in the fly shop. I came in and had my Kelly Gallup hat on and he like came up to me and he's like, oh, I got to show you this. and he had like a boogeyman, like an articulated boogeyman fly. And I'm like, oh, okay, nice. I didn't see that coming out here in Japan, but they were really excited to show me like, oh, check out. We've been like modeling our flies from what we see in the States. So yeah, I think I've tried to watch some Japanese fly tires on YouTube because I don't really need to listen. I can learn language just by watching them tie and being like, oh, I think he's saying do this because he's doing this action. But typically I end up kind of diverting to the patterns I know work. And yeah, there's a lot of classic patterns. You're not going to go wrong with a pheasant tail nymph. You can fish a pheasant tail nymph any time of the year, pretty much, and a fish will eat it if it's in its face.
Katie
I think that's something I've come to terms with. There was a time where I was like, I need to understand and someday be able to tie basically every pattern that I could possibly ever need and carry every single pattern in my box. And I've kind of come to terms with the fact that 90% of the time I'm using one of about six to seven flies. And if I carried nothing but those six to seven flies for the rest of my life, I probably wouldn't catch that many fewer fish than I am right now. And I just had to become comfortable with that, that you don't have to go all out. And it's like if I have a box full of peasant tails, hare's ears, parachute atoms, BWOs, and a woolly bugger, and maybe a copper john and a midge, that's like 90% of what I'm going to fish in Colorado. And I'm not going to have to go outside that.
Nick
And you could fish those here too.
Katie
Yeah. I mean, I think the other beauty of those is they work, like, I'm guessing basically worldwide for trout. Like, trout are trout and they eat various, like, universal things.
Nick
Exactly. Exactly. It's there's there's a lot of challenges living here. Understanding what the trout is going to eat isn't as hard as I make it on myself sometimes. A lot of times it's just, I mean, there are times you have to get a little picky and be sure to use a certain color or getting the size right of something is very important. But yeah, like you said, I don't need to know the name of the specific type of mayfly that I'm dealing with, just kind of the size and color.
Katie
Right, for sure. Speaking of challenges, you mentioned that you want to talk about the challenges you faced becoming a guide in a foreign country, especially a foreign country that I didn't realize how little English is spoken in Japan until I went. I assumed that being a first world country that interacts with the US a lot, that a lot of people would speak English. And that just was not the case. So what has that been like, dealing with a very strong language barrier?
Nick
yeah yeah it's it it's definitely challenging I practice Japanese I I'm I'm doing pretty good on duolingo I've got quite the oh we got to be friends on duolingo oh yeah yeah I'm I've got like a 500 someday streak going oh wow and yeah I I'm I'm faithful to it but it doesn't teach me many fishing words so I go I i guess just kind of to back up it it's challenging in that you got to learn everything it becomes harder like going to water and being like can I fish here I like what's the what's the rules like in the states I would load up onyx and it would tell me public or private what kind of land everything I knew like what the rules were based on what it loaded up on my map and here you don't really have that so it's more like am I allowed to go down this farmer's road like can I just be fishing in the river here and honestly it's not it's more accessible than you think here you are able to get into the water a lot easier but sometimes the other things too is like there will be times of the year where you're not allowed to catch salmon for example so they'll have signs up and the signs completely in Japanese and so I'm sitting there with google translate like reading the sign and changing it or they really like you might remember they really love mascots so you'll go up to like a parking spot next to the river and there will be a sign with like a mascot dragon coming out of the water and like grabbing a kid by the ankle while he's playing baseball too close to the river and it's like what what is going on here and and the sign then you translate the sign and it's like sometimes the dam gets turned on with little warning and children shouldn't play by the water unattended it's dangerous
Katie
I think the u.s needs more of this. I'd like to see instead of like dam, caution like dam could be open at any time like I'd like to see a dragon you know snatch you up a child and saying this could happen to you just pulling them in
Nick
like for the adult there's written words that's like here's a logical explanation of what can happen. And for the kid, it's like a terrifying cartoon of someone that was playing and got in trouble. And so as the adult who's going out fishing, which arguably could be playing, it's like, what do I do here? Do I need to worry about this thing in the water? But yeah, it's interesting. You have a lot of language barrier challenges with signage around the river. So it's, you start learning what is, what's good, what's not good. Some of the lakes around here have seasons and they have zones that you can't fish in as well. So one time I went to the lake one time, didn't know any better and was just like cast in, like nobody's at this campground, the whole thing's closed for COVID still. And so I'm just like, oh, I got the place to myself. This is so nice. And then a woman comes like screaming through the woods and she's like, police, police. What? No, no, no, no. I'm sorry. Line in, line in. Just gathered all my things, went to my car and like drove away and was like, oh, oh, oh man, I am, I'm not trying to break any laws here. I don't know what I did. And so then you go home and you're like googling the lake and like trying to find any kind of regulation and it's like oh that beach is closed to fishing even though the campgrounds closed to the public okay didn't know that now I do mark that on my list here you know language barrier or not you never want someone running at you yelling police
Katie
no that's universally a bad sign
Nick
no at first she was yelling in Japanese and then she saw like she saw me and was like just police police. I know that word
Katie
so is it more because I know you said you want to talk about seasons and I wasn't sure if that was because of the you know different fishing conditions or like it kind of sounds like are closures more season-based than they are private land-based or like how do you know if you can fish somewhere just based on like private land?
Nick
So as far as private land goes, most of it is around where around here in Niseko. There's if you're near Harafu, like when when we came on our trip out here to go skiing, we were staying around Harafu resort area or we were staying or like visiting over in Kiroro Resort Area or Rusutsu Resort Area. So around the resort areas, it's a little different because you have a lot of people that buy vacation homes and a lot different type of private property, I guess. Different like demographic of people buying property. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that land you don't necessarily want to be trouncing around on. But then where I live, I live out in Niseko town and I'm surrounded by farmland. So if I go, I'll drive, there will be farmer access roads that follow some of the rivers. They just go right along the river so that the farmer can access their different crops. Also, so that the electric company can access different dams that they have on there or the farmers can access dams that they have on there. and so I'm able to drive on those spots and just I just make sure to pull off so that anyone can get around my car and park and I've never had problems with with going out fishing that way so it's just kind of a respect thing like if somebody comes out to you like one time I had a farmer come out to talk to me and I just fished the spot no nothing like no fish snags everywhere and I was like, yep, take this off my list of spots to go to. And I'm coming back to the car, removing the pin off my map and everything. And this farmer rolls up and he's like trying to talk to me. And I told him in Japanese, like, I can't speak very much Japanese. I'm sorry. I'm fishing today. And he just kind of like chuckled back at me and just shook his head like, like you're not gonna, He said something and then just laughed and shook his head and got back in his truck. And he pulled out one way and I pull out the other way.
Katie
Was it like a, oh honey, there's no fish in here type chuckle?
Nick
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It definitely felt like that. Like, oh, yeah, have fun. You could fish here anytime, man. But yeah, for the most part, I've never really had anyone come out and say anything to me. Normally, I'm normally I'm picking up trash on the way out. So they're like, hey, there's the foreign guy that's like the spot for us.
Katie
That's good. I feel like I noticed that a little bit moving out west and not that there aren't stream laws in every state, but I couldn't tell you what the stream laws were in Pennsylvania growing up. Because there was kind of this ethos of like river life, like people would float. And so people would get out on the bank, you know, you didn't always like really check, you know, as long as there wasn't a house right there on shore, you weren't like, oh, is this land public or private? Like you just get out as long as there's not someone's yard right there. And in Colorado, that is not okay. Like you, you really need to check because people care a lot more about somebody coming up on their land. And I don't know, I don't know what that is apart from just a culture thing. Like there's not the same river culture out here. It's a different river culture than it was back east, which was more like, you know, lazy river float with a cooler. And, you know, you can see like 100 boats go past in a day of people just relaxing and enjoying the river. And out here, that's not the case. And it's weird how laws versus local culture. Like if the farmer is cool with you, if all the farmers are cool with you being there, then you don't really need to check whether it's, you know, able to be accessed. Yeah.
Nick
I would jump in there and say that is at least the case for here in Hokkaido. It might be a little bit different in Honshu or just in other parts of Japan. I did get to go and do a little fishing down in Honshu this spring. And when I was down there, the farmers, like we went on the little rice paddy road to get to the river and parked down there. And nobody came down or talked to us or anything. And I mean, I could see everyone's back porch. So it didn't seem like something that they cared about that we were down there fishing at all. It was just, if anything, now those rivers you had to have a daily license for. So if anything, it probably would have been someone coming to check and make sure your ticket's good.
Katie
So tell me, tell me about the seasons then, since you wanted to bring that up. Yeah. You know, how does the fishing evolve throughout the year?
Nick
So I kind of starting, I'll just start when the snow starts. So in December, we start getting a lot of snow, like December through March, a ton of snow going out fishing. It's definitely like if you go out for an hour and a half, like you did good. That's a good day on a cold river. It's a good time. For me, it's good because all the plants are down and you're able to see like the contour of the land and you're able to see like, you can just see so much more. There's everything, everything's matted down. You can, especially in the spring, like towards like March, you can walk across the snow pretty easy in waders. And so I'm able to walk out to places that normally might take 30, 45 minutes to walk out to. I'm able to like straight line to them from the road in like 10 minutes. So that just really opens up a lot as far as like scouting and also just like getting to where the fish are actually holding at a reasonable time for fishing. And then March. So March through May, we have I didn't write down the average snowfall that we get here, but it's some of the deepest snowfall counts in the world as far as like northern Japan's snow is pretty famous as far as how deep it gets. So March through May, it starts melting off and our runoff can get pretty intense here for a little while. We get, so there's a lot of dams And, and you're able to, you can fish sections of river, basically like the tail waters of, of the different dams, you'll be able to fish them. And then like one day you'll, you'll come and it's just like, Nope, they opened it up for the year. Like it's done chalk that one off for like a month or three weeks. Um, because it just, it blows out so, so much. It just looks like a completely different river they actually run whitewater rafting tours like I was fishing it one day like guiding a guy fishing on on it one day and then the next day they were doing whitewater tours on it and we were waiting so it's like oh okay that that changed quick when they flipped the gate open there so yeah the runoff gets pretty deep and then you start seeing bugs coming up around April, May. You start seeing bugs coming up, some of the first mayfly hatches. And then you watch this transition. It's crazy. I don't know how to explain it without seeing it. This transition from a place that has some of the deepest snow in the world to being a jungle, just a deep jungle. So that's why I'm like, Oh, when all the plants are down, you can see things because the jungle will grow so tall. Like one of the places that I'm thinking on is right now, I went out there a couple of days ago and it was the plants that are completely down on the ground in the winter are 15 feet overhead right now. Like all of a sudden they are beyond being a problem for a back cast. And then we have other plants that come up and they're the size of an umbrella, like one leaf is the size of an umbrella. I've literally just gone under them if it's really raining. I've just gone underneath of their canopies and it's dry underneath them because they're so big. So you see this jungle just come out of the ground and everything just starts getting so big and so jungly so fast and the bugs do it too like the bugs it's like oh we've got like midge hatch midge hatch oh look a couple mayflies came up and then boom drakes like just giant huge mayflies caddises there's a type of caddis I've got it written down somewhere here the the haginga caddis is it's like a this huge caddis fly that comes up it's it competes with drake as far as size. And so you get these huge caddises, these huge mayflies. And then that's kind of the prime, comes into the prime fishing season for a lot of people that just only fly fishing, like the prime fly fishing season, that's going to be May through July. There's just, there's tons of bugs. There's a lot of jungle, but there's a lot of fish. They're pretty active and everything. And then you, then you get into July and August and it's, it's hot. The river is getting low. You've probably had, who knows how many fish be harvested. And it, it gets tough. It's, it gets to be tough, tough sledding there in August. And then September kind of turns around and it's like it's summer's coming to an end. Everything knows it. The fish are like, we need to fatten up before we can't anymore. And so the bite is like back on. So I'd say there's a little bit of a lull there when it gets really hot in summer. I think Rick mentioned it's kind of a sharp, sharp summer in Hokkaido. And yeah, it's like there's at least like a three-week time frame where it's rough going out to the river because it's just so hot. You pretty much, you have to go out in the morning and the sun rises here at like four in the morning. So you got to go out on the water at like four in the morning and then you got to stay up almost equally late to try to get those two pockets of like reasonable time. because the rest of the day, it's a nice walk on a river.
Katie
Yeah, I feel like that's kind of common. I mean, it sounds like it's more pronounced there just because of how hot it gets and how early the day starts. But I feel like a lot of people would identify with August being just a tough time to go out. The world just seems like it's trying to escape the heat of the day. Everything is just trying to make it through that hot part of the day. No one really wants to be out there doing anything.
Nick
Yeah, yeah, it's definitely like, and it's not like you want to, here in Hokkaido, it's rare form to have air conditioning because it's a cooler temperature area. And so the three weeks, you don't want to be sitting inside. It's not like in the winter when it's like, oh man, it's really rough out there. You can sit inside and tie flies. No, you don't want to sit inside and tie flies. you probably still want to go and walk in the river because it's cool. But if you fall in, you're like, oh, no, I fell in. I'm swimming. What do you know?
Katie
And then from fall to winter, does it just – you said the snow picks up in December then? And so from then through December?
Nick
Yeah, it starts picking up and you start getting snow. I had, I think my biggest, the biggest, I think the biggest rainbow I got in, in, in like 2021 would have been in December, like third week of December. So I actually went snowboarding during the day and then went and, and, went fishing in the second half of the day and got rewarded for it. Um, and, but yeah, then, then it's kind of, it gets pretty tough. it gets tough too because of just how deep the snow is so getting to the river is getting down into the river is is an experience yeah a lot of like sledding down I'm sure hills of snow and just like I hope this is real underneath me and not just a shelf of snow like I'm on a cornice here
Katie
oh yeah that's that's a big thing here too like especially the spring where things start melting out I had one of those the other day I was like I think I'm crossing over a stream that I can't see, but I'm not sure.
Nick
Yeah. Maybe, maybe there's water here. Yeah. So then we, we have like, we get a lot of like, like some of the bigger jungle plants start dying off. Um, and then we get a lot of like autumn leaves. The autumn leaves are beautiful. Um, and so you have like that's when you get like the really scenic backdrop pictures of like, oh, there we are fly fishing in the perfect autumn colors. So we get that for a little bit. It's funny because I'll post pictures through the year and sometimes it looks like I'm in an absolute jungle. And other times it's like, oh, you're like somewhere out west. Like it just looks like normal fall foliage out there. But it's like, no, there's bamboo at the bottom of the tree.
Katie
Pick out what in this photo doesn't make sense.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. Something in here doesn't make sense.
Katie
So what's next for you then? What are your plans?
Nick
Yeah. I kind of... So we touched on it a little bit. I got out here and was... I didn't want to drive two and a half hours to the fly shop every time I needed flies and was tying like a madman anyway. And so I started just tying more than I needed. And then that led to me giving some friends flies and then having people contact me to be like, hey, I need to buy some flies. Do you have any flies available? And that kind of grew into like, hey, you sell the flies. You know how to fish the flies. Do you want to take me out to the water and show me like how to fish them and show me these spots that you're going to? And, and yeah, I guess that's kind of how it slid into becoming guiding for me. So pretty exciting. That's what I've been putting a lot of my focus in is just tying a bunch of flies, getting an inventory loaded up and getting people out on the water when I can. So we have, as far as where Japan's at right now and its next stages. So Japan has had the borders locked to everyone else for since March 2020. And they are just now they're getting ready to they just opened up to like organized tour groups. So the only way you come to Japan right now is on an organized tour group. You can't leave the tour group. You have to like do everything to agenda. And if anything goes wrong, everyone gets shipped back to the United States or wherever they came from. Yes, it's baby steps right now.
Katie
Yeah, I thought you were past that.
Nick
Not as much as we'd like here. I think a lot of people, obviously, I don't have my pulse on as much of the Japanese side of it. But I think a lot of people here are kind of like, okay, the rest of the world is resuming. Japan is in an insane amount of debt from, one, subsidizing the pandemic, but also not having the borders open to any foreign dollars coming in. So they're working on getting opened, and we're optimistic. I know a lot of the ski resorts are selling rooms and they're booking hotels and booking vacations for winter. So optimistic that the borders will open up more on a normal scale here soon. But yeah, in the meantime, I've been working with a lot of other. So gaijin is foreigner in Japanese. So I've been working with a lot of other gaijins. So a lot of other foreigners that are here in Japan, as well as working with some military. So my brother's in the army and recommended to me, he's like, you should start contacting these military guys because they can't leave the country either. And they are bored out of their mind, I imagine. So I was able to link up with some soldiers and help them get out and get kind of away from everything and be out on the water. But yeah, so excited for the borders to open up because that means more people can start showing up. And I love showing people Hokkaido. I think when we when we came here, it's so funny to have you of anyone asking me, because when we came here, it was new to both of us. And it was like, oh, wow. Yeah. And then now I feel like it's like, yeah, still here.
Katie
The rest of the group left and you're still stuck there.
Nick
I remember like the third day of that trip, I was like, I'm moving here. And everyone's like, you're on a vacation high, calm down. And sure enough, by that next winter, I was out here. And now I think I've had three winners now, three, four winners now, three. So it's been a fun experience.
Katie
We definitely want to make it back to Japan. But I'm a little torn because when we went there to ski, the snow was fantastic by anyone else's standards. But by Japanese standards, it wasn't that great. For Colorado, it would have been great. But for Japan, we were like, wow, we were told we'd have five feet, not three feet. Like that kind of thing. And so I'm torn between when I come back, do I want to come back in the winter again and try for like that ultimate Japanese skiing experience or do I want to come back in the summer and like see it during another season? Cause the only downside to being there in the winter, for skiing was that like skiing was the only thing we really did. I mean, we, we toured around like Tokyo and stuff. Um, but the only activity we did was skiing and I'm like, there's so many other things that we could do there in the summer, but I'm like, I still have this kind of like unfilled need to like experience a true like Japanese winter like with all the snow and so I'm like I don't know what to do like I don't know when we should go back maybe maybe one of each but I definitely want to try fishing there
Nick
I keep I keep telling myself like what you experienced this past year is not ever going to happen again and that's that's okay because we had closed borders. So you had to yourself. Yeah. Like no, there was no tourism. If there was tourists, it was like, oh man, like 10 minute lift line. The Tokyo crowd is crazy this weekend. And I'm sure there's people listening that are just like, this is not entertaining anymore. This guy isn't fair. But yeah, we just had a bit of a blessing in a way of just having like no crowd and got to have the deep days and just ride until your legs are shot and call it a day or go fish. But yeah, I guess one thing I did want to loop it back into fishing real quick and say one thing that's really nice here in Hokkaido is we do have a lot of species to target and to come after. I know you talked a little bit with Rick about some of them as far as like we have like the yamame and the white spotted char. the ito as far as native species we've got rainbow trout we have brown trout salmon is a tough one salmon has a lot of weird regulations and you can get in a lot of trouble if you don't know how to explain to someone that you are not salmon fishing yeah I've heard the the horror stories of foreigners spending a day in jail because they didn't know if they had a salmon or a trout and the police didn't know if they had a salmon or a trout. They kept them at the jail all day until someone comes in to be like, that's a trout.
Katie
All right. Well, if you can't identify the trout, you can't arrest someone for it. I feel like that's the rule.
Nick
But yeah, then we have carp, of course. I mean, they're everywhere, right? And then there's sea fishing as well. I know I've looked at, I believe you can fish permit down in Okinawa.
Katie
Oh, really?
Nick
So I've kind of like, I've been like, oh, do a little salt fishing down in Okinawa.
Katie
We're actually talking about doing a saltwater trip for our honeymoon, because we'd like to dive and fish. So we're like looking for spots that can handle both of those. Kind of in the same way, like snowboarding and fishing, like diving is also really exhausting. I don't know if you've gone scuba diving, but it's...
Nick
Just went scuba diving for the first time. Like two weeks ago, not even. And there was much to learn. Like equalizing was a challenge for me and I thought my head was in a vise.
Katie
Yeah.
Nick
But now I know what to expect. So when I go back, I'm like, oh, type two fun. I want to do it again. But in the moment, I was like, this is terrible.
Katie
It is overwhelming. Yeah, it's definitely like a new sensation. And Mike's never gotten to do it. And diving used to be a big part of my life that I obviously don't do much in Colorado. So I'm like, man, we've been wanting to go diving for so long. But I've also never gotten saltwater fly fishing. So I'd really like to check both of those boxes off the list. go diving with him and then relax in the evening with a little like flats fishing and you know mix mix those two activities and throughout the trip so I didn't know japan had much like I didn't know there were permit in japan
Nick
yeah they've got I mean again there's there's going to be a different name for it so I was like going around I'm like and of all the fish you can't type permit into a Google search. Fishing permit. And Google's like, oh, you meant to fish. I've got the permit for you. And so I just started showing pictures of permit to Japanese people until someone finally was like, oh, no, no, no. This is the name that you need to look for. And then I found it. I mean, same thing. A rainbow trout is a Nijimasu. So I'll tell someone like, oh, rainbow trout. And they might look at me with a question and then I'll say nijimatsu and they're like oh got it got it
Katie
nice nice that made me think of one like quick little tangent just like googling you know fishing permit japan and you're like you're obviously gonna be getting like Japanese fishing licenses are you I'm familiar with the concept of like the fastest known time in like trail running or biking?
Nick
I've heard of this
Katie
okay so it's basically like for whatever given trail whoever's run at the fastest and has logged it on their gps like they get the fastest known time for that route. Well, there's a new thing called fastest known fish, where you like run a trail, catch a fish on the way. And whoever like does that trail the fastest and catches a fish on it gets the fastest known fish might be up your alley if you're interested in that. But I was, I was googling because I was like, Oh, I want to get back to that web page. So I can read about this again. I typed in fastest known fish, which is like sailfish. And I was like, no, no, no,
Nick
That's not what I meant.
Katie
I wasn't looking for the fastest fish in the world. Right. And I could not get Google to understand, like, no, I want fastest known fish, the event.
Nick
Yeah. So if someone is wanting to come out to fish in Hokkaido and they're looking for a fishing permit, not fishing for permit, there are some lakes and some rivers here. to be aware of having a license and everything. So before there's a bunch of people or a few people wanting to be like, oh, I'm going to come to Hokkaido and just fish anywhere because Nick said it's fine. There are some lakes and some rivers that do require licenses. One of my favorite spots to go to is Lake Akan and the Akan River. And there ran as a catch and release program there by the, the local tribe, the Ayanu tribe, and they have, the river's awesome to fish. Um, but they will come around and they will check your permit every day. Um, like we, we, I'd go fishing and the same guy would find me like three different times throughout the day. And he just drives around and anytime he sees a car pulled over, he just like parks his car and just starts walking until he finds whoever's car that is, and then checks your fishing permit and then goes back to his car and tells you to be scared of the bears.
Katie
Does he check you every time he sees you or does he, has he gotten to know you and is like, ah, no, I know this guy.
Nick
No, it's funny because we, I, I, I'm, I'm not afraid to go and fish like in like park one place and fish that place the whole day. But I will also have days where I'm like, I'm going to go to these different pins and like, I'm going to fish this spot for two hours and I'm going to move to this spot and then I'm moving this spot this guy like I moved three times and he he came and found me all three times and it's like I'm in the same car it's got the same fish sticker on the back of it like you have checked me and I feel bad because I'm like out there like like the one time we were way out there and he like walked in the rain all the way to find me and comes just like can I see your permit? No. Yeah. You've seen it twice today. Like two hours ago, you saw it and me, how many people look like me out here? But yeah, it's, it's, it is nice going to those places though, because, not all of our rivers here are regulated. And, that is one thing I do miss about the States was, we had the wildlife management was a lot better. And so So some of those fish populations are much better off for it or could be better off if we learn to take better care there. Because, yeah, I was at one river down in Sapporo and I saw Izekiah, which is kind of like a Japanese version of a tapas bar, maybe. Tapas bar.
Katie
That could come out wrong if the audio isn't very clear.
Nick
Right, right. So this couple came out from this Izakaya truck, came out with rods, and fished a hole completely empty. Just bucketed every single fish and then just took off and left. I walked away at 15 fish. I was like, I've had enough. I've just watched you pull 15 fish out of this hole and put them in a bucket and leave. There's a police guy walking around the park, and there's no problem with it. I'm just watching jaw in the river. I'm getting sick. I have to leave. This is terrible. You're about to chalk a sign on the sidewalk that says, special tonight, rainbow trout. Couldn't believe it. So, yeah, it is nice to go to those places where you have to pay for your ticket or just know the places where the fish are not being harvested like that. But I've I've used that's another thing I've used some of my time for was my partner. She is a middle school teacher here at the International School. And so she we had an opportunity to take her class out to the river one day. And we showed them bugs. We showed them like, here's, we showed them the river in an area that didn't have dams. We showed them the river right above a dam. We showed them the river right below a dam. We looked at bugs in all three places. We, you know, gave them a chance to look at it and be like, oh, like, I can see this and like, this is happening. They, when we were there, there was a mayfly hatch that was crazy. They all got to see little nymphs coming up to the surface, popping out and flying away. And they were just like, this is crazy. And then caddis are permanently booger bugs in my mind now, because I was telling them how they make their rock casing, like using essentially snot. And so they all started calling them booger bugs.
Katie
So I think you need to make a fly and name it that.
Nick
yeah yeah I think I do like just make a the booger bug special
Katie
I was gonna say I forgot it's a caddis caddis only but I was like if there were a mayfly it would have to be a bwo like something kind of green and yeah squirmy
Nick
yeah but yeah they're not building the same cases so it's that nice green pupa color to it
Katie
cool where can where can people find you if they want to watch your videos or find you on instagram or any of those spots or if they want to come fish with you?
Nick
Yeah. Yeah. So probably Instagram is the easiest way to track me down. My Instagram handle is underscore Nick Hill and then an underscore kind of looks like my name written on a line. So underscore Nick Hill underscore. If they go to my Instagram, DMing me is probably the easiest way to reach out to me and get a hold of me. Just being abroad, my phone number is going to be much different. And my American friends find it challenging to contact a Japanese number. So I imagine that a general audience member would also find it challenging. So hop on Instagram, shoot me a DM, and I can get in contact with you there. You can also find a link to my YouTube channel there. I do some YouTube videos and show the fishing out here. I show going out on snowboard trips, splitboard trips, just kind of all kinds of adventures around around Hokkaido. Nick Hill, there's probably thousands of them on YouTube. So maybe search Nick Hill fly fishing or Nick Hill fly co. And then you're going to find yourself at my channel. But yeah, that's, that would be a good spot to go to. And yeah, I think that's, that's probably the best way to get ahold of me is just reach out to me on Instagram and, and I'll get back to you there and we might move over to WhatsApp or something like that, but that'll get the wheels going. And yeah, doing, if, if there's been people that have come through and they just want to buy flies while they're here, there's been people that want to come through and like a lot of the military guys, they're on a boat with 5,000 other guys. They don't want to spend time with someone else. So they'll hit you up and be like, hey, can I get some flies? And you drive me to the trailhead, tell me what to do and leave. It's like, oh, OK, yeah, I can do that. So and then, yeah, just doing half days and full days of wade trips as well.
Katie
Sweet. Well, next, if and when Mike and I make it back out there, whether whether we're coming out to ski or to fish, we'll have to hit you up and and have you take us out now that you're the local.
Nick
Yeah, yeah. If you come out to ski, I might still take you out for a day of fishing.
Katie
Yeah, I might demand that at this point. Now that I've done a full ski trip, I think if I come back, I want to add at least one more activity in there.
Nick
I remember on our trip, you were, at that time, you were like, I think I'm going to sneak away for fishing. And all of us were like, she's crazy. Where? Everything's covered in snow. But now I know the where.
Katie
Well, that's the hard part is like that's happened on other trips, too, where I'm like, I'd really like to sneak away and fish. But when you're just visiting somewhere like that and aren't on a dedicated fishing trip, figuring out how to go about it is such an overwhelming thing to do for like a day that it often doesn't really happen. I did the same thing when I was in New Zealand and it didn't go very well. Like I had no idea where to go or who to contact to get gear or what it was. It was difficult.
Nick
Yeah, I imagine that's quite overwhelming. But yeah, I mean, now's the time to take a trip because our borders have been closed, our economies crashed, and the dollar, although it might not feel like it's worth much when you're in the States and you're paying the gas prices there, it's worth a lot more over here right now.
Katie
That's good to know because, yeah, it's a little disheartening right now to fill up the tank.
Nick
Yeah, this past season has been the first time that gas has actually been more expensive because we pay in the liter and by the yen. So normally gas prices are always like at least a dollar more a gallon equivalent for me here. And it just hit the tipping point of it's like actually better. Although the yen is not worth much. So I guess if I factor that in, we're probably paying just as much.
Katie
well it sounds like the the only responsible thing to do is to travel to japan right now then
Nick
yeah yeah as soon as they get that border open hit me up and and plan a trip so take advantage of the the exchange rate while you can
Katie
all right sounds good well Nick I will let you get going but actually hang around for just a couple minutes I want to go grab Mike because I know he wants to say hi to you but this is a ton of fun and hopefully we just fish together sooner than later.
Nick
Oh, I hope so.
Katie
Alright 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.
Note:
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