Fly Fishing in Burgundy

Casting beneath overhanging branches, I tried to stretch each cast deep into the shade, to present my dry fly as daintily as possible. Matching my wits against the ever-more-acute wits of the fish, I practiced my casts (and in my experience with fly fishing, it is always practicing, always striving for more extension, greater precision, better presentation, striving—but never achieving—perfection). Subtlety, finesse, patience. I love the sound of the heavy line, somewhere between a faint whistle and a distant singing, as it arcs through the air during a false cast, then glides outward toward its target.

It’s easy to romance an afternoon on the river. And annoying to those who have never tried it, I suppose. So I’ll restrain myself here. In fact, I never did catch anything all morning, nor did I so much as see a trout rise to take a fly from the water’s surface. I suspect there were plenty of fish in there, but they were too wise or too lazy to fall for my efforts. Nevertheless, the hours slipped away in a state so sublime that I wasn’t the least bit disappointed when Michel gathered me up for lunch.

My soggy colleague (she had tumbled into the river, filling her waders with water) returned from the forest where she had changed out of her wet togs, and the three of us sat down at river’s edge for a veritable feast. Michel had prepared a picnic banquet of regional dishes (including a rock hard cheese—the sensational “core” must be whittled out of the ¾” inch thick rind with a knife—from the monastery we would visit after lunch), and we drank local wine, ate heartily and embellished our stories. Always stories on a fishing trip, and despite the obvious appeal of the grossly exaggerated account of my colleague’s plunge, it was Michel who told the best tales, apparently endowed with an endless reserve of fly-fishing anecdotes and historical footnotes.

Following our sylvan banquet, we spent the afternoon wandering in the forest behind the Monastère de la Pierre qui Vire, a 19th century monastery. This enchanted forest near the Trinquelin River transported us into the magical tales of our childhood. And deep into ourselves. Colossal trees, at least a century, maybe two, older than I, soared upwards and stretched vast canopies across the heavens. Sunlight, filtered through the dense leaves, dappled the mossy, boulder-strewn landscape. If gnomes exist, it is here that they smoke their pipes and race slugs for glory.

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