Posts Tagged ‘Fly fishing pole’
Do you Need the Emmrod Stream Master Fly Rod?
Tuesday, January 18th, 2011Chataqua Craft Fair 9-11 July 2010 In Chewelah
Wednesday, July 7th, 2010Quick update on Chewelah’s Chataqua Craft Fair.
Two days down, Sunday to go. It has been an interesting show. My main regret is not being able to actually enjoy the show! Selling Emmrod by myself in my booth pretty much nails my foot to the floor. If I can get up there a bit early today, I might run through the craft show.
There has been a regular stream of people moving up and down the street and it has been a friendly show. Sales are reflective of the current state of economic affairs, sadly. I will remind folks who read this today that I have a fine selection of daylilies. I really rather not carry them all home so, if you are interested in daylilies, come by and dicker with me today!
Hi folks. I will be setting up across from Zips during the Chewelah Chataqua Craft Fair this weekend. I will have a full array of Emmrod products as well as the Rhino Tarp Clip on hand so come by and learn about these great products. Bring the wife, I will have a great selection of Daylilies as well. The Daylilies come from my Garden in the Deer Park area. We grow about 250 kinds and I have about 80 kinds potted up and available for sale.
The Rhino Tarp Clips are the perfect product for all those camping tie down needs. Come see them in action!
Look for the Emmrod Packer, the Emmrod Mountaineer, the Emmrod Kayak King, the Emmrod Stream Master Fly Rod, The Emmrod Gulf Master I and II and the Rugged Flex pole designed for those big guys over 100 pounds. Catching minnows to monsters, little to lunker, Emmrod is the rod for you!
www.WhyBuyEmmrod.com, www.EmmrodFun.com, www.MyCompactFishing.com
Plans are also underway to attend the Sandpoint Idaho and Colfax Washington Fairs in August and September. Stay tuned for details.
Loon Lake, Stevens County Washington, a report
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010I am blessed to live in an area of Spokane County which is surrounded by lakes. I have finally started fishing them! I just listed a couple properties in Loon Lake. One of them has lake access through Morgan Park, a subdivision on the north side of the lake. You can check out a tour of that listing at www.MyCountryHomes.com. The point is, I am going to take advantage of that listing to do some shore fishing here in a month when the season opens!
In the meantime, here is some internet research on the lake.
Here is some information from the Washington State Department of Ecology:
LOON LAKE — STEVENS COUNTY: 1997
Size (acres) 1100
Maximum Depth (feet) 100
Mean Depth (feet) 46
Lake Volume (acre-feet) 50600
Drainage Area (square miles) 14.10
Altitude (feet) 2381
Shoreline Length (miles) 7.9
There is a lot of other generic information through which most folks will not enjoy plowing. For the severely masochistic, here is the link: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/eap/lakes/wq/docs/lkloost1.html
Shore Acres Resort has a great description of the fishing opportunities. Here it is in toto. Their link is at the end:
Fishing at Shore Acres Resort
Fishing season begins in April and ends in October. Loon Lake is considered one of the best fishery’s in the entire area.
Loon Lake is one of Eastern Washington’s largest lakes covering over 1100 acres. The water is crystal clear, coming from a natural spring, and reaches a depth of 140 feet. Elevation at Loon Lake is 2400 feet.
Fish species include Kokanee, Mackinaw, Small & Largemouth Bass, Rainbow Trout, Brown Trout & Eastern Brook Trout. In addition there are Perch, Crappie, Brown Bullhead Catfish and Pumpkinseed Sunfish.
Check the Fishing in Washington Regulation Pamphlet for rules on freshwater fishing and eastside lakes. Youth under 15 years of age do not need a license to fish. License requirements and fees are available from the Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife. Recreational fishing licenses can be purchased at All Seasons Grocery and Hardware in the town of Loon Lake.
Pontoon boat and aluminum fishing boats are available to rent. Reservations are recommended. Ask about hourly and weekly rates.
Boat launch and moorage are available if you’ll be bringing your own boat. Ask about weekly, monthly and seasonal boat slip rates. We also have boat fuel available.
We carry a variety of fishing tackle and live bait.
When you arrive, ask for a map of Loon Lake’s favorite fishing spots.
Here is their link: http://www.shoreacresresort.com/fishing.html
(Incidentally, I believe this resort and a huge piece of land is available for sale. If you are interested, please contact me as I am a licensed Realtor. (CompactFishing@gmail.com))
This lake has another resort at Granite Point. There is also a public dock near the NW corner of the lake. As with all other state access points, you need to buy a public parks parking sticker to park there.
The silvers are a great fish to catch here. Any of our rods using the Top Water Tip would be great for these soft biting fish.
Enjoy this great fishing experience! Only about 5 weeks to go. (Usually opens 31 April but check with the State.)
This blog is brought to you by Dave Atherton, Emmrod Compact Fishing System Distributor. Check with me for business opportunities involving Emmrod. View the Packer, Top Water Rod, The Mountaineer, the Kayak King, The gulf Master and the Gulf Master II at www.WhyBuyEmmrod.com or www.MyCompactFishing.com
Great Western Sportfishing Show Spokane Washington
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010Wow! What a weekend! Friday, Saturday and Sunday I set up and sold compact Emmrod Fishing poles at the Great Western Sportsfishing Show in the Spokane Convention Center. There was something for everyone there. I think I had to like the big fish tank set up next to me the most. There was something special about being able to actually see fish swiming, following lures and just enjoying life in a manner that made them visible to us. The tank was about 20 feet long, six feet wide and 8 feet tall. There were several small mouth bass, several large mouth bass, at least three really nice walleye, several huge triploid trout, a couple steelhead which really went after the hookless lures used to demonstrate fishing techniques, as well as several other trout. There were also a lot of smaller fish which I never identified.
There were several bait makers, numerous British Columbia, Washington, Alaska and Oregon outfitters pushing their locations for fishing trips. I had a great conversation with a gentleman who has a family business hosting tours to Hawaii, Panama, and Costa Rica. We had a lot of shared fishing experiences to share. He was proud of his son who had a grand slam day where he caught five different marlin–black marlin, blue marlin, silver marlin and a couple more which I do not recall. There was a nice family selling Kayaks in the Sandpoint Idaho area.
Of course, I was there selling my Emmrod compact fishing poles. It was an interesting show. I sold mostly Kayak Kings. I also sold the Packer and the Packrod, both spinning and casting models. The top water tip was also a good seller with three or four of those also hitting the spot. Bass Season is almost hear and a good rod tip for those top water lures really sparked a lot of interest.
Over the next couple of weeks, I am going to put together a few stories from the show so check back from time to time. I am looking forward to the upcoming Big Horn show at the Spokane County Fairgrounds in about ten days. That will be tough as it is a four day show. If you are there, look for me by the fishing pond.
Well, that is about it for tonight. Check out my Compact Fishing system with the unbreakable stainless steel rods at www.whybuyemmrod.com or www.mycompactfishing.com
What is the difference between Communism and Capitalism?
Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010You do not normally start a story with the punch line, but this time, we will. The answer is: In capitalism, as we all know, Man exploits Man. In Communism, it is the other way around. (AKA Man exploits Man.)
So, knowing how the joke ends, I want to explain the difference between a true believer and someone who found it the convenient path.
Whilst working on the POW/MIA investigations, I spent many hundreds of hours in circumstances where we had nothing to do but wait. Wait for a drive to be over, wait for this that or the other chairman or witness or guide to show up. Or, we spent many hours in dinners and parties or events involved with our work. For one who hates the sounds of silence, that means lots of talking. For a guy who loves to argue about politics, that means lots of arguing. Where better for an ardent capitalist to argue than in the Vietnam of the late 1980’s?
One of my favorite guys was Ngo Hoang. I have to tell you, I still have a lot of fondness for this old man who had lots and lots of history under his belt. At the time of this event, he would have been in his early sixties. We had worked together for about 18 months and knew each other well. We discussed this that and the other thing and were pretty free with each other in that few topics were off limits. After the fall of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, one of his jobs was to convert the captured French soldiers to the joys of communism. He was pretty successful from what I hear. As a Ministry of Foreign Affairs employee, his English was reasonably good and my marginal Vietnamese filled any holes he had.
We were enjoying a good-by, end of the investigation joint team meal in Saigon before returning to Thailand and he and I began a discussion on the differences between Capitalism and Communism. We discussed the stock market, the investment of the worker (time) vice the investment of the owner (time, money, capital) and the correctness of making a profit on the labor of others which he denied. We argued through the aperitif, the main course, and finally the desert. Finally, I posed the question above to him. At the point where I explained that capitalism involved Man exploiting Man, he said with conviction “YES, YES, YES!”
When I said in communism it is the other way around, he exploded “NO, NO, NO!!!” That was the only time I ever got him hot and he was hot! He took out a cigarette stuck it in his mouth and lit the filter. You see, Mr. Hoang was a believer. He understood the problems with the difference in the theory and the practice which we had discussed. Yet, he had spent his life promulgating this doctrine and struggled with the growing reality that it did not work.
Now we fast forward to another co-worker of this time frame. Mr. Dich. Mr. Dich had ridden the party as a convenience. He had served the party and the party had served him. I never saw the ideological love which I saw in Mr. Hoang. He HAD paid his dues. As a young man, he had participated in a brutal truly remarkable (from a soldier to a soldier) march from Hue to Dien Bien Phu to provide reinforcements to the Communists fighting the French leading up to the final fall of the outpost. He was wounded in this battle via grenade shrapnel in his leg. He showed me the damage from the wound which 40 plus years or so later was still ugly. He had participated as a party secretary at the Paris Peace Talks in 1972/1973 which resulted in the US withdrawal from Vietnam. My Friend Bill Bell indicates in his book that Mr. Dich may have been involved in assassinations at one point in his career. I do not find that hard to believe. Whereas Mr. Hoang was personable and debonair and a mixer, Mr. Dich was morose, and kept to himself far more. He was a bit grumpier than most of the people we worked with. Being a diplomat, I was able to get along with Mr. Dich fairly well.
On this particular trip, we were in the Ashau-Aloui valley. The north end of this valley was made famous by the movie Hamburger Hill. The terrain was brutal, the malaria which infested the area was a particularly vicious form of cerebreal Malari. The mountains were vertical. In short, the main benefit the area had was the multitude of fish ponds created by the B52 bombing of the area during the war. A couple memories of that trip were the horribly scarred face of the noseless man who was burned almost to death when he tried to open up an unexploded bomb to get the phospherous and to obtain the metal for recycling. He messed up and the bomb went off in a fizzling sort of way. I still can see his face.
I also remember coming down a stream bed where we scaled the walls at the edge of several 100 foot waterfalls. Mr. Dich followed me in the file and I put his feet in cracks and handed him vines all the way down. (Mr. Dich was about 60 at the time of that event and mountain climbing was not in his job description. He stayed in the hotel the next day and we went out without him.)
One evening, we were resting after the day’s work talking about the war–a discussion worth its own story–and I popped the Man VS Man story on him. I tried Vietnamese, I tried English. My team leader, Gary Smith, tried Spanish which they both spoke. He just did not get it. I think one of the team members spoke a bit of French which Mr. Dich spoke well. Still nothing. Later, as we moved towards Hanoi, we stopped for a lunch break. Mr. Dich was in a particularly grumpy mood and was sitting off by himself. I went over and sat down with him and tried to cheer him up. Finally I got out a paper and wrote out the joke. When I visually moved the front man to the back man place and vice versa, the lights came on! Mr. Dich, in his high pitched voice said in amazement, “The SAME, They’re the SAME!” He saw the light! He KNEW the truth! He reveled in it, he rolled in it and laughed out-loud.
For the next three days as we drove from central Vietnam to Hanoi, he sat in the back seat and every once in a while, he would start tapping his knee, smile and say, “The Same! They’re the Same!”
You see, Mr. Dich was pragmatic and moved with the flow. When communism was what worked, he was fine with it. As the country began moving to a more open economy, and these were the very early stages of that move, he could move with it. Mr. Hoang, on the other hand, was a true, orthodox believer and while I believe he saw the truth of the statement, found it brutally hard to bear.
In any case, both men were very interesting and I look back at my association with them with happiness. It was a good work and we as former enemies were able to work together to achieve some measure of success for our respective countries.
This blog is brought to you by the most advanced compact fishing system in the world, the Emmrod system. The Packer, the Kayak King, The stream Master Fly rod are just three of the many fine products this company has created. Check them out at www.MyCompactFishing.com or WWW.WhyBuyEmmrod.com
Swimming: Water Buffalo Wallow or Clean Crystal Clear Spring
Sunday, February 28th, 2010Swimming: Water Buffalo Wallow or Crystal Clear Spring
Growing up at Nasuli, Malaybalay, Bukidnon, Mindanao, Philippines, my friends and I had a beautiful, 30 foot deep, crystal clear swimming lake fed by several springs. we swam in it, bathed in it, our drinking water came from it, I fished it for minnows, eels and mud fish (snake head fish), and caught frogs along its banks.
Not far away, there were several water buffalo wallows. The water buffalo has no sweat glands. It is a beast of burden, ploughs, harrows and works very hard. To keep your water buffalos healthy, you have to give them cooling off time. They love a nice pond or slow moving river as much as the next guy, girl or fish. On the other hand, a little depression in the ground full of water works just as well.
They lie in these wallows for several hours getting rid of all that built up heat. They lie there contentedly chewing their cud daring you to end their respite early. In the meantime, they churn up the bottom of the pond and conduct all sorts of bodily functions in the water and move around creating a fine slurry of water, what they produce and the mud on the bottom.
We kids loved to emulate the water buffalo! We spent uncountable hours jumping in and out and swimming these wallows. We played in them until every fiber of our short pants, when we wore them, was completely surrounded by and infused with water buffalo wallow muck.
Our mothers screamed with frustration when we got home. “You have that beautiful clear swimming pool with crystal clean water and you go swim in that foul, disgusting muck filled with carabao (water buffalo) poop and who knows what else. What is the matter with you? You filthy little urchins!”
Some 40 and more years later, I have come to the conclusion the issue was the same spiritual battle we all fight. On one hand, God has so much for us that is good and wonderful. Yet, when offered the choice of His magnificence, you guessed right, off to the water buffalo wallows we go! He so understands my mother!
Oh for Grace to stay on the right track!
This blog is brought to you by www.WhyBuyEmmrod.com which you can also reach at www.MyCompactfishing.com . Check out all the great products that make up the worlds best Compact Fishing System. It is great for backpacking, Kayak Fishing, Canoe Fishing, shore fishing, trolling and can handle sunfish to sharks. There is also a great Fly Fishing Rod, the Stream Master Fly Fishing rod. Check it out!
Vietnam, June 1972
Friday, February 26th, 2010In Nov 1969, I won the lottery! It changed the course of my life. I would have pursued a living in horticulture. The lottery changed all of that. Yes, I won that all expenses paid, thankfully, round trip airline ticket. Which one, you might ask? The one to Vietnam, I would answer. Thirteen months later, I got down from the bus at Fort Puke, Diseaseville, if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute, Louseyana. (Fort Polk, Leesville, Louisiana.) Basic training, interrogation school, a year of Vietnamese language class and it was on that plane to Vietnam. July 1972, touchdown at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, Saigon, Vietnam.
In a sense, it was not all new. It was, after all, Asia! Hot! Humid! Dirty! Polluted! Busy! All that was typical with much of my life growing up in the Philippines. On the other hand, the people were smaller and thinner. The noise of war, a bit louder just outside the city limits but also constant in a muted way within the city, made a background soundtrack. Not obtrusive, not overwhelming, but, there. In town, the three wheeled cyclos both motorized and peddle driven vied for space with the taxis, the ugly duckling citroynes, the bicycles, the people, the overloaded motorcycles and push tricycle goods transporters. On top of it all the airhorns of a thousand duce and a half trucks blaring their right of way through the mass. This was offset by the strangeness of this new life. One of the earliest memories I had was my first shower at the Ton San Nhut airport repo depot where we were billeted until we received our assignment. The shower was a big half open building with an open shower bay. As I stood there washing off the grime and sweat of a long trip, I was shocked to see the laundry lady and her teen age daughter walk in, squat down two shower heads away and start to hand wash some clothes. Thankfully, I was highly lathered. I quickly finished my shower and got out of there. This was new and strange.
For what reason, I do not know, I was sitting in an administrative room a day or two later and in walks this tall thin man in civilian clothes. He asked the clerk if he had any 97 Deltas (An intelligence field clerk.) The clerk said, all he had was me. The civilian asked what my field was. “Interrogator, 96C,” I said. ”Can you type?” he asked. “Yes Sir, 65 words per minute.” “That’s close enough for me,” he said.
I worked for this unit for the next nine months. It was great! I shared a hotel room with two guys. Leon C. who worked with me and some other guy I never saw in the nine months we lived together. I guess he had a gal he actually lived with, but, he had to keep the room. I have to say, his part of the room was always neat!
Initially, we all worked in a large part of the ground floor of a hotel near our billet. But, shortly after I got there, we moved our office to General Westmoreland’s old quarters. It was a small house which was nice. We cooked many of our meals there and our small group of five or six men worked long and hard at our assigned duties.
Here are some snapshots of my 9 months there:
The hotel I lived in was just down the street from another hotel the Viet Cong had bombed. They had driven a vehicle packed with explosives up to the door and detonated it destroying the hotel and killing a number of people. Because of that, the front of our hotel was heavily sandbagged. I recall one 90 pound guard who would not let anyone stop including an American CIA operative who showed up on a motorcycle one night. The guard locked and loaded his shotgun, fired into the air and the guy parked down the road and walked back. He was pretty hot, identified himself and was able to move his motorcycle into the protected area. I felt he was pretty arrogant and thought the guard had done a great thing.
The guy who hired me was known for his wild driving. His nick name was Crash K—f. (I will protect the guilty). One day, Gary B. (God rest his soul.) who looked and comported himself somewhite like a French Painter described a harrowing ride with Crash from the office to Tan Son Nhut Airport. They left with about ten minutes to takeoff time. The drive was at least an 18 minute drive for most people. “Gary said, I couldn’t believe it! Sidewalks, ditches, the wrong side of the road, horn blaring all the way. Three chickens, two ducks and maybe a puppy dead. I had my eyes closed when I wasn’t screaming. I almost pooped my pants and am sure I peed them a bit. BUT we made it with two minutes to spare!” I bumped paths with Gary on and off for the next ten to twelve years and recall him fondly.
Bob Hope and the Miss America crew came through along with Ann Margaret as I recall. After about six months of seeing the relatively thin, short Vietnamese women, I walked out of a hotel as the retinue of American Beauties was walking into the hotel. What Giants! I thought. I went to the Bob Hope show, but, it did not do much for me. There was a huge, packed crowd there though and I appreciate his groups willingness to put themselves in harms way to provide a taste of home to us.
There are many more recollections, some vague, some fuzzy, some sharp, some painful and many happy. As time permits, I will try to bring some of them to life for a few moments.
In the meantime, if you are a fisherman, woman or child or know a fisherman, woman or child, you can help support this blog by visiting the www.WhyBuyEmmrod.com, www.MyCompactFishing.comsite (Same site, just different roads.) Check out the Emmrod Packer, The Emmrod Mountaineer, The Emmrod Stream Master Fly Rod and the many other great products there. Thanks for stopping by. Dave Atherton
The Emmrod Packer fishing pole description and history
Wednesday, February 10th, 2010The Emmrod Packer is the fishing pole that got Emmrod up and running. A short ten years ago, Duane Markley adapted and upgraded a 1930’s product idea with current technology. He wanted to have a fishing pole that maintained the casting ability and benefits of a six to ten foot pole while picking up the benefits of a much shorter pole. He did it too! Ten years later, the Emmrod Packer is still selling across the country and bringing joy to fishermen and fisher women and fisher boys and fisher girls across the world!

The Fishing Pole that got Emmrod Started
What you see here, is the handle and the rod together. The rod, which is the metal end with the spring coil, fits into the handle with a quick set 1/4 turn, spring load that holds the rod firmly into place, yet lets you switch rods in just seconds.
There are four basic Rods. 8, 7, 6 and 4 coil. These graduate from pan sized fish, to up to two pound fish, ten pound fish and twenty-five pound fish. If you are fishing for larger fish, you can use the double tip rods shown next.
Check out the blog about Mel. He uses this tip on the Emmrod Packer along with a huge bait casting reel with a harness to catch large fish off Florida Docks. He recently brought in a 7 1/2 foot shark on they type of rig.
This is a good time to talk about reels. The Emmrod Packer uses two types of reels. The closed Face Spinning reel and the bait caster reel. Any standard reel of these varieties fit.
What sort of fish might one catch? The world is your oyster! Sharks and tarpon seem to fall to Mel’s Emmrod Packer. Bass, sunfish, trout and steelhead all end up in the frying pan.
What makes the Emmrod so great? a man asked me at a recent show. First of all, the compact nature of the rod when you prepare it for travel. It is only 12 inches long. Second, you can cast it as well as any standard fishing pole. You can also “shoot” it, hence its nickname “Dock Shooter.” It is unbreakable. It is flexible in that you use the rod designed for the weight of the fish you are hoping to catch, pan sized to shark sized! Simply put, it meets almost all capabilities of a regular pole and keeps on giving with the characteristics mentioned above. So, if you are looking for a cane pole, look elsewhere. If you are looking for a fishing pole you can cast, carry, troll with and keep in your glove compartment, you are looking at the right place.
Enjoy meandering through www.WhyBuyEmmrod.com where you can buy the Emmrod Packer, the Emmrod Kayak King, The Emmrod Mountaineer and many other fine fishing poles. Check out the WhyBuyEmmrod video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ukf-GcVeKY
LTC Sewell and the Walrus’s Mustache
Sunday, January 31st, 2010Generals all have their quirks. It comes with the territory. They have generally paid their dues and deserve to have their quirks. Hey, we can all live with that. Most generals, in my experience had many memorable traits that made you love them or hate them, but, the main thing you remember about them is not their quirk. It goes to the man, the soldier. There are exceptions.
One of our Commanding Generals during my stay at VIIth Corps in Stuttgart, Germany, hated mustaches. He hated them to the point he assembled the entire corps headquarters and harangued us for 15 to 20 minutes about the evils of mustaches. We learned numerous scientific studies proved women did not like mustaches. On and on he went. You know, I do not recall much about that guy except his hate for mustaches! So, being a good soldier, I refused to shave mine off until the day I signed out of the unit.
One day, one of my Sergeants, SSG Brown, came to me all nervous. As SSG Brown walked up the road to the headquarters building where we worked, The General’s sedan had screeched to a halt, The General had jumped out, locked SSG Brown’s heels (called him to attention) and chewed him out berating him for his evil mustache. Now, I have to admit, to a mustache hater, SSG Brown’s mustache was a bright red flag. It was full. It was thick. It was bristley, but, it was legal and neatly trimmed. Never-the-less, any walrus would have been proud to have a mustache of SSG Brown’s Mustache’s magnitude. Finally, The General Screamed, “Where do you work?” “Sir,” SSG Brown said,” J-2 Ops with LTC Sewell.”
“COL Sewell, we have to talk” I said. But, I am getting ahead of myself. My Col, LTC Sewell, was the J2 Operations head. In any disagreement over plans, J3 Operations will almost always win. The Col in charge of J3 Operations was LTC Bailey. LTC Bailey and LTC Sewell had butted heads several times and there was not a lot of love lost between them. So, back to “the situation.”
“COL Sewell, SSG Brown was accosted by The General. The General was really upset about his mustache and screamed at him for almost ten minutes. Finally, he asked SSG Brown where he worked.”
“Oh No!” Said Col Sewell.
“Well, you do not need to worry, Sir, SSG Brown told him he worked for COL Bailey in J3 Ops and Col Bailey said he did not give a hoot for how The General felt about mustaches.”
I do not think I have ever seen LTC Sewell, or anyone for that matter, turn that shade of white. All the blood drained out of his face. I lost it. I laughed so hard I am sure it cost me a point or two on my evaluation that time around. But, it was hard to get around LTC Sewell and I had done it. I guess I do not hate that stupid general so bad after all.
If you fish, if you backpack, if you have a kayak, if you like trout, bass or bluegill, you need to check out Compact Fishing rods made by Emmrod fishing gear. Check them out at www.whybuyemmrod.com or www.MyCompactfishing.com