In spite of heavy thunderstorms in the forecast… I sought out a remote trout stream deep in the woods. The air was sweltering and thick with bugs, but I was rewarded with lots of blueberries, dwarf raspberries, and strawberries on the trek. As I was snacking on the bulbous red morsels, I looked to see other small things, bulbous and red, snacking on me. It was a matter of eat and be eaten. Mosquitoes, deer flies, and horse flies. July deep in the woods. Bad idea?

The art of fishing tiny, overgrown trout streams in the woods of Minnesota, I have yet to master or even imagine how to manage. They are so overgrown with willow, alder, and various other trees and shrubbery that it is nigh impossible to access, let alone fish it. No room to cast, especially with a 9′ rod of 5-6 wt. I’ve read it best to go with a lighter weight rod with 6′ length… but even still I don’t know how to manage it. Yet I still remain challenge-accepting. Bad idea?

After futile attempts to fish an overgrown stream in the middle of nowhere, I hit the road and drove an hour or so to a new location– or a new location for the day, but a regular place that I haunt. I wanted to get out to the bog and see if there was anything new in season, specifically to see if the pitcher plant blooms were at peak or not. I was already exhausted from bushwhacking through undergrowth and sweltering humidity, but I decided to go back into the thicket. Bad idea?

I stomped around the bog, retrieved the memory card from my trail cam on some upland, higher ground. Perspired and spiritless from the extension of my adventuring, I hiked back out of the woods, into the car, and drove three miles north for another mile hike into the woods farther up. Bad idea?

The third stop on this humid day was to try for some trout again. I hiked a mile into the woods and found a usual spot of mine. Along the way I stopped to snack on dwarf raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries, all the while swatting at the swarm of ‘squitoes and flies that surrounded me. I snapped a few photos with my phone and put it in my breast pocket for easy access. I reached my spot and reassembled my rod. I hopped along the shore to the fallen tree I’d used as a pier to cast past the littoral lily leaves and watershield. I failed to consider that it had been raining for a day or two, and the air was wet with humidity, and I failed to predict that the log I had so easily navigated before might now be slick with moisture. Bad idea. A hop from the shore to the fallen pine and immediately I was deflected right over it. My muck boot filled with water, my hat floated free, and shortly after I realized a pain in my right pinky.

Gathering myself together and draining my boot, I suddenly panicked, frisking myself to find my phone. No where to be seen. I looked in the water. It was still hazy from muck stirred up by my recent disturbance. Yet I didn’t see a phone there. I hoped, seriously hoped, it had fallen out on the trail some time when I had bent over to pick a berry or take a picture. Some time had passed, and the water cleared, and my heart sunk as I saw a silver corner peeking out of some light colored muck. I had left my phone in my breast pocket when hopping out onto a littoral lying log, and it took the opportunity to go for a swim. Bad idea.

End of the day, I went home with a tired and sweaty body, a waterlogged phone that couldn’t be restored, a soaking foot with a boot that needed draining and airing, and a day off for relaxation that turned into exhaustion. Bad idea? or maybe, just enough misery and misfortune to make for a memorable day of adventure.

(Meanwhile, a month and a half later, my replacement phone already has a small crack in the corner of the screen and my possibly sprained pinky is still in occasional pain. And yet, I don’t regret the day at all.)