The Tar Heel Outdoorsman

I finally returned to the mountains.  While I'm a flatlander, I do love the mountains, and the solitude and peacefulness and, of course, the trout they provide. When I drove up to Cashiers last April, it was the first time I'd made it to the North Carolina mountains in maybe three years.  Too long.  It'd been before I spent some time in Wyoming at A Bar A in 2016.  To make things worse, I hadn't even trout fished since I visited some friends back in Wyoming in 2017. April Both in April and September, I drove up with my girlfriend, Mary Ann, staying at her grandmother's cabin in Cashiers.  Of course, I dragged Mary Ann along fishing... driving to the "Tuck," and Panthertown.  The Tuck is heavily stocked but fished fairly hard as it winds along the road.  It's wide for a Carolina trout river, and its flows are affected by Duke Energy releases. The future calls for finding a friend with a drift boat or raft or hiring a guide to throw streamers...

We drove from Cashiers, turning right onto NC-281 off of US-64. Shortly, we pulled into Gorges State Park.  The parking lot to Rainbow Falls was packed... two park rangers were working parking duty... We kept driving, though, on the Chestnut Mountain Road.  And unlike the packed paved parking lot, the dirt mountain road was almost totally empty.  Besides one other car, we had the place to ourselves to explore.   The drive isn't a fast one.  It's a sit back and enjoy it one.  It's about 6 miles, one way, from where the pavement ends to the Horsepasture River.  It's a soak in the mountains and the rocks and the trees and the leaves rustling in the wind and the small streams gurgling past.   You'll need a vehicle with a little ground clearance, though you don't need anything too crazy.  You may want four wheel drive, though I don't think it's necessary, due to some loose rock and gravel.   You'll...

These guys have got it right.  Traveling the globe.  Fly-fishing.  Exploring.  Traveling.  Living the ultimate angling adventure.  If you haven't already, watch some of their episodes . Here's the most recent, from Brazil:

We're starting by backtracking. Not quite a year ago, a group of eight friends and I went on what would be an abnormal spring break for a many college kids.  One that didn't consist of crushing beers and getting sunburned on a warm beach. What we did was a 33 mile float down the Rio Grande, through the Boquillas Canyon in Big Bend National Park.  Flew into El Paso and rented cars.  Drove five hours to Terlingua, got to Far Flung Outdoor Center. It was dark when we got there, so we set up our tents in the parking lot.  In the chill of the next morning, we rented four canoes and hit the road.