As the sun begins to shine through the clouds on this beautiful Sunday morning, sweet ukulele notes ring out in the distance, then closer to the participants’ rooms. It is the morning alarm clock, featuring Catherine and Marie-Michelle, a classic during the stays of On the Tip of the Toes Foundation which makes everyone happy.
Everyone quietly gets ready while the logistics team prepares breakfast. All one must do is get dressed and show up to receive a turn-key service.
After breakfast, it’s time to get ready for fishing with a short course on fishing ethics and regulation.
By listening to the group’s fishing mentors, participants learn that fly fishing is an art. When the water is low, a more colourful fly should be chosen, and a darker one when the water is high. Some fishermen also open the stomachs of fish to see what kind of insect is in them, and then choose the fly that looks most like it.
In addition, trout and salmon change colour within a few weeks of entering the river. Salmon start out silver and turn black, while trout, which are speckled, turn blue when they enter the freshwater section of the river. Note that at this time of the year, only sea trout can be caught. With the Lâcher prise group, all catches will be returned into the water.
“It’s amazing to think that salmon come from all the way from Greenland to breed here,” says Faruq, one of the fly fishing mentors. “Many people think that salmon come to spawn in the river where they were born, but recent studies have shown that they scatter to different rivers,” agrees Raynald, another mentor.
The science of fly fishing goes far beyond fish, as projects and studies have also been conducted on the potential of fly fishing as a therapeutic tool.
Programs like “Casting for Healing” have been helping women with cancer in the United States for several years. For war veterans, who have suffered post-traumatic shock, a program called Healing Waters, allows them to return to a more normal life. The Foundation was inspired by these programs south of the border to develop its own program.
Then it’s time to get down to business and go fishing for real. On the shore of the Sainte-Marguerite River, Raynald first demonstrates basic casting techniques; then the team splits into four groups, each accompanied by a fishing mentor.
The participants learn how to mount their fly-fishing rods, set up their flies, and begin to practise.
In the hollow of the river valley, the scenery is breathtaking as the fishing lines make great movements in the air at the base of the great rocky cliffs. The fiery colour of the trees in the fall adds a layer of magic to the moment.
“Fly fishing very Zen, ‘notes Anik. To make a good cast and visualize where the fly will go forces you to be in the moment.
The women, all lined up on the riverbank and fishing, makes an awesome picture. After a few hours of practice, casts improve, and after lunch, the groups spread out to four fish pits.
The group, composed of Joanie, Émilie, Marie-Michelle and Raynald, had to walk in the river to reach a rocky bank where the pit was located. With such a beautiful setting, it’s easy to get lost,’ says Joanie, as she casts her fly into the water. And there’s so much to learn about casting, the river, the flies, that one must really let go.
Further down the river, Genevieve is well into the St. Margaret’s River, with water up to her mid-thigh. As her fly drifts in the current, she grabs her rod and tips it back, before giving a jerk forward to cast the line (part of the fishing line). ‘It’s really great, I love it,’ she says, as Catherine has just realized that her pant boots … aren’t totally waterproof!
In another pit upstream, Everard, Anna, Cecilia, and the nurse, take a break from fishing to ‘floss’ dance while Yves fishes and laughs. Then, when they see the photographer coming, they throw themselves on their rods to start fishing again laughing their heads off.
On the other side of the river, a fisherman caught three trout, but no one in the group was so lucky. ‘There is only one fish missing for everything to be perfect,’ Mariève underlines in the evening, around the fire, all smiles…
Guillaume Roy, Blogger and Photographer for the On the Tip of the Toes Foundation
In pictures
