Opening Daze: 2024

    A spring tradition
    with family and friends
    charges the batteries.

Opening Daze: 2023

“Warmest Opening Day Weekend yet.” 

It started as a simple, and quite inaccurate, weather prediction made by Tommy before our annual spring pilgrimage to the West Branch Farmington River a few years back. It was so cold, wet, and raw that particular weekend, that the botched forecast became lore amongst our crew, and the acronym WODWY has lived on in text messages leading up to the camping trip ever since.

The running joke finally turned reality this year. Warm was actually an understatement; it was straight up shorts-weather for the first two days of our outing. While 80s in April felt a bit out of place, no one dared complain with hard frosts and deluges of years past seared into memory. Of course, it couldn’t be beach conditions the entire stay, and what’s Opening Day Weekend without precipitation? It rained just enough at the finish line to necessitate drying out gear in the ensuing days.  

In between the warmth and the rain, we packed in another banner celebration of spring. We ate, we drank, hell, we even left camp twice to fish. Hendricksons were hatching, but the river's resident trout hadn’t yet decided to eat them. Even so, we were grateful for the unfussy, freshly-stocked rainbows that tightened our lines. All in all, WODWY was an awesome experience. One more good notch in the belt of tradition. 

Traditions Never Die

Though several months removed, the trip is still seared in memory and the smell of wood smoke clings to my gear. While a recap from our annual Opening Day celebration is long overdue, sifting through photos from that weekend brought me right back and had me itching for more.

Traditions never die, but they do evolve. Our trip is a hell of a lot less about fishing now than when it started decades ago. It's pretty evident that we spend way more time swapping stories and eating good food around the fire than we do making drifts for trout. I'm not bothered by that. I still love fly fishing and the Farmington River, but when the third weekend of April rolls around, and I get a little time off from work and dad duties, I'm taking it slow and soaking it all in. 

This evolution doesn't change the fact that, come hell or high water, we'll be back celebrating each spring for as long as we're physically able to. It's my favorite weekend of the year by far and something I look forward to introducing my own kids to when the time is right. If they love it half as much as we do, the future of this tradition is bright.