St. Vrain Angler News & Muse January 17, 2006!

Greetings!

It's another lovely day in Longmont, Colorado. The sky is blue and clear; it was cold last night, but will warm up today. Jess had to scrape ice off her car windows. She's safely back from her trip to India; it was quite an experience for her. The henna on her hand is still there, but fading fast; I don't think the memories she made will fade at all. Rachel and Brittany are back in school, doing well. Wedding plans are taking shape. Shan and the girls are having a good time making plans for a very important day.

So am I. Planning, that is.

This will be the last week that St. Vrain Angler is going to be open as a retail fly fishing pro shop. I'm out of gas. In addition, sales have been very poor and continue to go downhill, and so on and so forth.

When I opened the store in 1991 on 4th Avenue I had a dream. It was much less than Martin's, but it was a dream, none the less.

The goal was to provide an income for my family while fulfilling people's fly fishing dreams. I hoped to build the business to the point that I could write, compose music and practice the piano enough to do local performances.

In 1993 I opened the Estes Angler and in 1996 we moved St. Vrain Angler to its present location at the same time we opened St. Vrain Angler in Westminster. For awhile things went pretty well. The shops were thriving; but I was owned by them.

Then, my poor business acumen began to rear its ugly head. It was nicely aligned with other events that changed how we look at the world. We all remember 2001, and always will. And then gas prices went through the roof, fires, drought and dryness plagued Colorado and the Rocky Mountain West - our own Governor announced that the state was on fire and people should stay at home; that sure made people want to go fishing; every leading news story for two summers had a backdrop of a forest fire with a sage person telling us how much damage was being done; every newspaper had a picture of a fire or burnt forest, house and so on on the cover and above the fold; the recession issues were deeper than many of us realized - I, for one, never expected so many people would trade their time to go fishing for working more hours and not going fishing, or tying and so on. Fear seemed to permeate our society; fear, and distrust of Institutions. The 2000 presidential election took months to decide; our own school system didn't reveal the entire truth to voters when money was at stake; big corporations shut down and defaulted on their employees retirement programs; others closed, or moved, or laid people off; and the list goes on.

In 2002 I closed the St. Vrain Angler in Westminster; in 2005 I sold the Estes Angler. Now, I'm going to close the St. Vrain Angler in Longmont.

These are interesting times, to say the least. And Robert Traver, the sage attorney from the UP of Michigan who pretty much gave up his promising practice to fish for brook trout or hunt deer, said he didn't fish because it was all that important, but because other things seemed equally unimportant to him, and were much less fun.

Imagine that.

I'm ready for a new chapter in life with my wife and our children. They are all excited about this change - and very sad about it, too. We've had some tears. Yesterday, Brittany asked when the last day was going to be. She wanted to stop by the shop and walk around again.

"Brittany, you've been there lots of times," I said.

"It's not for; it's for me, Dad," she said. Then her eyes welled up with tears. She's an emotional girl, and full of caring compassion.

Fair enough.

I love my girls. Their support is delightful and full of love.

I'm not sure how everything will take place, but change is required at this point. I'll take a short amount of time to try to refill my tanks by writing and practicing the piano. Rachel needs a piece for her Senior Recital in early April, and I'm composing a Woodwind Quintet for her and some friends to play; that's exciting, I'll tell you. There are more Solutions Booklets on the way; the Fishing The Flats is about done, and by the end of today or tomorrow I'll be done with Hackle Tying Solutions - sort of a celebratory booklet for Saturday's Hackle Extravaganza, you see.

I'm going to set up specific tying classes, casting classes, Mini-Camps and guided trips, as well as Destination Trips for the folks who'd like to spend time with me at the vise or on the water. Most of what I'm going to do will be on private water so we can focus on the fishing and learning rather than avoiding other folks.

I love teaching, and hope many of you will take advantage of the offers I'll be making. I'll keep working on the www.stvrainangler.com web page to provide useful information that is fun to read and instructional in nature. You'll be able to buy stuff on the web site if you'd like. The phone number - 303-651-6061 - will continue to go to me; I'll call back. I'll maintain angler@peakpeak.com as my email address.

In other words, part of what I'll do is continue to try to fulfill your fly fishing dreams. I'll sell my Solution Booklets and Fly Boxes, Solution Tying Kits and Fly Samples that I tie - these will always be limited, so sign up early. I'll also continue to sell odd-ball hackle, hooks, tying materials, leaders and tippet material and other terminal stuff that helps you get on the water and do well. I may start doing some trade in bamboo rods, which I love. I'm also going to do programs for fishing clubs around country as opportunities present themselves.

We're going to be out of the shop location by the end of the month. This week everything in the shop will be marked down by 15% when you make a purchase; come early to get the best selection of what we do have. There will be other items that will be marked down even more.

The Hackle Extravaganza this Saturday, January 21, 2006 is still a complete go, and will function as a celebratory goodbye. I'll be tying flies to demonstrate how you can use the hackle and hooks we'll have, as I've done for the past fifteen years at St. Vrain Angler. We'll have fun!

That's been the point: to have fun, to relax, to let the world spin while we talk fishing, prepare for fishing and go fishing. I sure love the folks who've come into the shop and shared stories, asked for help, offered help, bought gear, taken trips, tied flies, learned to cast a fly rod, taken classes and sat around solving the world's problems. We did it, too; it's just that no one listened to us. So it goes.

I hope you choose to feel as good about this as my family and I do. If not, go fishing. I'm going to do some of that as soon as I can. There are some filming opportunities for me on the horizon; I'm going to try to assemble the Solution Booklets for publication; I still hope to host a Flats Trip to Ascension Bay in February - want to come along? - and I'll keep you posted on classes, guiding and other instructional opportunities. I'm going to take a few groups back to Lake Maria to hook some very large fish in the near future - who wants to come? I hope to host a trip to Argentina about one year from now; that will be fun. I'd like to keep doing Flats Trips with folks; interested?

Please stay in touch. Let me help you as you will.

Thanks for reading, and for the great times we've had. I love all of you and wish you all the best.

This isn't really goodbye; it's just a change of venue. I'll be in touch and look forward to hearing from you, seeing your pictures, hearing your stories and maybe guiding or teaching you. Let me know.

See you soon.

Dale Darling

PS: I hope you'll join me for the following pictorial tour down memory lane. Thanks for being part of it; I've enjoyed the trip and hope you have, as well.

Thanks.