It’s 4:15 AM and I know the alarm clock is buzzing off the headboard but for some reason I just can’t hear it. (It might have been the fact that I was up until 3:00 AM packing for this fly fishig trip) I keep sleeping and until the Brittany Spaniel, “Sam” jumps from his bed and pounces to the door. On his way he barks a few times and I awake. I roll over and look into the living room to see my Brother, standing by the door saying hello to Sam. I look back down at the clock and it is 5:30. “Wow,” I think. I wake up the brother-in-law “Ray” and off we go. The 3 amigos and a couple of cups of coffee. We hit I-95 at 6:10 AM and arrive at camp at 10:00’ish but the site is taken and this was to be expected as it was a Saturday. I got out of the Jeep and talked to the group of strangers. Lucky for us they will be leaving on Sunday but they also told me that the fishing was slow. So off we go again. we set up a temporary camp down the road. We decided to skip fishing the first night and just relax. The next morning we move into the now vacant campsite and at the same time the rest of the group is pulling into camp. The tarps are strung and the tents are pitched. Now it is time to do what we have been dreaming about. “Hit the drink” The first night we fished at camp although we had a few fish rising no one could hook any. The water temp was warm and the action on top was slow. The pond temp was 68 and Day one was a complete flop with no fish caught. Day 2 was nothing to brag about with water temps at 67 and only 7 brook trout in hand. The fly box definitely got a work out this day trying everything from Klinks and Red-Buts to Streamers. I met a couple of other guys on the pond that day one of whom (pat-m) was very familiar with The Flies And Fins web site. It looked like Pat was rigged with a sinking line and had OK luck. I don’t know the other gentleman’s name but he was kind enough to show me what he was using for a fly. That night I did my best to replicate the fly he was using. The next day (day 3 of fishing) we hit a new pond that I had scouted the first night in camp. On the first night It looked very promising as the fish were boiling all over the pond. Again the water temp was high at 68 degrees. The fish were rising, not like they had been on the first night but little was hatching. We managed to pick up a few but again nothing to brag about. Day 4 of fishing and back to the pond I met Pat on and with the water temps up at 67 I did not think much would be happing on top so I tied on the Streamer pattern I got from Pats friend. I had a few hits but I decided to change to a red-but “top water” I managed to pick one up on the way to the island We had a small hatch on the back side of the island but I had never seen a fly like this before. I tried my best to find the most similar fly in my box. I rifled through the flies and the sizes but could not come up with anything that was working well. Although I had a hit on almost everything I tried they were not taking them just rolling on the fly. I finally put a size 14 Royal Caddis on and BAM I picked up a few. Fishing was still slow compared to previous years of landing 30 – 60 trout per night but over all I expected it with the weather we were having. I think I ended the night at 9 on hand. Day 5 of fishing was not good as this was a new body of water I had never fished before. I had hiked into it 2 years before and saw a couple of nice fish rising. Again with water temps at the 70 mark there was not much activity on top. The fishing was slow and the fish were small, averaging 7” in length. Day 6 of fishing and lucky me I get to bring my brother into town so he can make it home for a birthday party. So the 3 amigos are off Brother-in-law “RAY”, brother and myself. After dropping off my brother Ray and I go back into the woods. This is Ray’s first year of fly fishing and with only a couple of good hours fly fishing and just starting to pick it up he wants to dig out his snoopy rod (spinning rod) and fish a stream. I give in, so we stop at a nice looking stream. He grabs his “snoopy rod” and worms I grab my fly rod. Keep in mind this is “Ray’s” first real fishing trip. I walk down the bank and get to the water edge. (Things are looking good I think to myself) As I feel the water for the temp I see Ray has a nice brookie. He is standing on top of the culvert I quickly go over as this is one of the first Brookies he has caught and I want to help with the release. After this I pick up one at the end of the rip “nice little 7”. Size 20 elk hair….Ray gets one more after mine is released. I help with the release and get right back to fishing I pick up another nice little 7”. Ray yells down stream to me and says he is going to put the waters on and walk down. I agree but at the same time want to get back to camp because the other 3 guys in the group are going to hit a pond that has produced some very large fish in the past. I was excited to fish it again and have been dreaming of it for a year. Being Rays first time on a fishing trip and a beginner at fly-fishing he was not catching anything on the ponds. This was very discouraging for him. I again gave in as I didn’t want his first fishing trip to be a fishless one. We both geared up and start walking down stream Ray with the Snoopy rod and myself with a fly-rod. Buy the time we get 50 yards down stream I have picked up 3 more brookies all about 7”. Ray comments on how easy it is for me to release my fish compared to the fish he caught on the Snoopy Rod. At this time he is starting to pay more attention to what I am doing then fishing himself. He was amazed as to how I could point out a fish and catch that fish I just pointed out. But the Snoopy rod would not pick them up. After I picked up one more and we are another 50 yards down stream he says he is going back to the Jeep so he can get the fly rod. Before he can get back to me I have picked up a couple more and I filled him in on the action. I tied a yellow caddis on for him and sent him down stream ahead of me explaining how a fish will hold in the water and pointing out some key aspects about rivers and streams. He was picking it up quick. Before I know it he was looking ahead of himself and saying to me I bet we could get one right down there. As we walked down stream he picked up fish left and right we even got a couple of nicer fish. I was impressed with the size of the fish we were hooking in that stream and the action was nonstop to-boot. The water temp on the stream was 54 and we had a small Caddis hatch. The other 3 guys in the group did the short hike into the pond I had wanted to fish. They reported to me that the water temp was 78 and no one got a fish. So thanks to the rookie my day of fishing was phenomenal. “Thank Ray,” if it wasn’t for you I would have been floating in a pool of bath water and accomplishing nothing but good times with a few friends. That night the other guys were very interested as to how we spent are day. After we informed them of the stream we had walked and the tremendous action they wanted to hit a larger stream in the early morning hours of the next day. Day 7 of fishing. We wake early with the thought of fishing the same stream but the others in the group wanted to do the same. That would put 5 of us on that one stream. I don’t like to over fish and area and thought it would be best if Ray and myself find a new run of water. Ray and I lead the others in the direction of the stream we had fished the night before and off we go to a new location. After looking over the map for a few minutes we picked our spot. I was expecting Ray to start off with the Snoopy Rod but he did not even look at it. The first thing out of his mouth was will you tie a new fly on for me. Off goes the beat up Yellow caddis from the day before and I tied on a Red-But for him. Ray was geared up and on his way to the water before I could tie my boots. At first look down the stream I was having 2nd thoughts. With Ray already in the water and casting I had no choice but to attempt fishing it. It looked like it was going to be a little muddy and deep but I was wrong. The stream ranged from 5 feet wide to 20 feet wide and was covered in alder trees. It had good shaded holes and some under cut banks that the big ones were hiding in. The deepest spot was about 5 feet deep. We started the day off great and it only got better. The caddis hatch that morning was so large you could shake them off the Alder branches and watch them fly down stream. One good shake of a branch would drop about 35 caddis flies around size 14. This was one of the largest Caddis hatches I have seen, excluding the west branch of the penobscot. The water temp was around 55. I did not drop my thermometer this day as the fishing was so good I did not want to waste the time. I was impressed with how fast Ray picked up casting as we are wading down a stream that even the most experienced fly fisher would have trouble on. Between both of us that day we caught close to 70 brook trout with the smallest being 6.5” and the largest 12” the average size fish on this stream was around 8.5”. We stopped fishing at 11:30 AM and headed back to the Jeep. I don’t do that much stream fishing but I was impressed with the size of the Brookies in the streams that week and the fight the little guys gave. WOW, that 12” brookie that I caught along with a couple of 10” brookies took off like a rocket. Once again I owe a great day in the water to no other then Rookie Ray.