Greetings from Nickerson State Park, here in beautiful Cape Cod, Massachusetts! Today we wrapped up the first portion of our trip in the Berkshires fishing the Housatonic River for Northern Pike and several different species of bass. Our boys had a great time wading two different sections of the river and floating another, all while learning the basics of fly fishing for warm water fish species. We even took a little time to take a hike in Kent State Park to a waterfall! After our drive this morning from the Berkshires to Cape Cod, we pulled into camp, made some yummy pasta, and watched the sunset while fishing the many kettle ponds here in Nickerson. We are all looking forward to several days of fishing the Cape for the wild and hard-fighting Striped Bass that call the saltwater home.
Our time on the Housatonic was successful. Our time wading the Housatonic yielded dozens and dozens of bass species, including Largemouth, Smallmouth, and Rock bass. The boys had a great time laying the hammer over and over again on these fish! The relative ease of hooking these fish combined with their hard-fighting nature made for great practice, allowing the group to really elevate their abilities in preparation for the slightly harder task that awaits us tomorrow, and in the rest of the near future, with the Striped bass. Our float was a little more challenging. Fishing out of a canoe is already hard enough to learn on its own, but high flows on the Housatonic made fishing difficult. We decided to power through the float and just wade fish below Great Falls dam, which again produced many bass as well as a few surprise trout.
As we get ready to eat dinner (if we can ever get the kids back from the kettle ponds next to our campsite), we look forward to our time on the striper flats. The group is getting along well, and we greatly appreciate their maturity and generally helpful nature. It’s been a blast getting to know them, and we look forward to their progression even more as anglers with this upcoming challenge.
We will keep you posted following our stint here on the Cape!
Tight lines until then,
Shane, Hunt, Jacob, and the crew
