Hands on

 

 One of the things I’ve always enjoyed, aside from actually going fishing, is tackle tinkering. This hands-on activity can take many forms: cleaning your fishing kit, swapping or replacing lines, re-organising towards a new sense of working order, making bits of tackle, repairs and refurbishment, et cetera. It’s enjoyable and time well spent. It has a similar cerebral effect to poring through tackle catalogues, all grist to the mill of ‘What ifs?’,  the imagination is free to run.

 Just because, I posted a photo of some old trout-fishing paraphernalia [cast packets, line boxes] onto Instagram and Facebook, and found some of the reactions interesting. This stuff belongs to a friend, arriving with an on-line purchase; we estimate it’s probably forty-fifty-odd years old, of very little value, but compelling to look at, touch, and imagine.

 I am not a collector of old kit, although I do have some old stuff which I use today, on certain venues and occasions. An eight foot Partridge cane rod from the early eighties [probably] is coupled with an Intrepid Rimfly reel, possibly ten years older. They work well together. Another ‘old’ reel is a Ryobi Superlight 355mg, also thought to be from the 80s, which I use for #3 or #4 lines on my wands for small rivers and streams. None of these are worth much but they are an integral part of my fly fishing gear. I baulked at using the word ‘collection’ there, because it smacks of hoarding, but concede that’s what others might call it: eighteen rods, eighteen reels [many with spare spools], but lots are interchangeable for specific conditions. Another facet of tinkering!

 If I was silly rich, I probably would have a ‘proper’ collection, and spend time gloating. For now, and the foreseeable, I’m content with what I have, just enough for my fishing plus some tinkering whenever I get the chance.

 By the way, please don’t start me off about fly-tying and fly box organisation!