There are certain items, articles, artifacts that people wear or fly or put on themselves that look like one thing but immediately dredge up a harsh truth. A person up in this neck of the woods flying a Gadsden flag most likely does not mind how much the current administration is treading on the people of this country.

The notion that conservatism has dealt less in conservation these past couple years and adopted a mentality of “How much are these public lands worth to these large corporations?” A person wearing a Nirvana shirt in 2026 can most likely name one song, if any at all. And a fly fisher decked out in all the most expensive (and usually completely clean) gear are typically the fair-weather fly fishers who would rather look good through their phone lens than put the darn thing away for a few hours on the water.

Now, those are broad generalizations but there is truth to them all. I am not saying that everyone falls under these thoughts of mine, but I am sure each and every one of you knows at least one person who does. I am mainly here to talk about the fly fisher there – the one with all the money and without a lick of sense. I know a few of them, personally or from interacting in a creekside parking lot, and I mean, they can fish.

But as I sit next to them with my pre-war Goodwin Granger, a JW Young Beaudex that is rubberbanded onto the reel seat and a fanny pack over a basic t-shirt and shorts, the question is – are they really more prepared than I am?

I don’t believe so.

I have always had a love for vintage things. My earliest collections that I started were old video games (mainly early Nintendo) and vinyl records. This led to an obsession with old 70s and 80s sci-fi and fantasy paperbacks, and then dipping my toes in the old tried-and-true fly rods and reels of the day. Yes, I see the innovation in newer graphite and glass rods. I know what they can do, how fast they are, how pinpoint accurate they can be in the right hands. But hey, a fine fly caster can hit those spots on the river good enough with a very slow 1970s fiberglass rod as well. In a sense, it is lo-fi fly fishing. It is more about focusing on the core of the sport rather than the fine and polished aspects.

I remember back in the late 90s riding my bike up the South Hill in town here to go to Small Potatoes (any of you readers who have doubted my locality to Bonners Ferry, I bet you have no clue about what Small Potatoes was). I was in theere’s Nothing Wrong With Love by Built to Spill, and Lonesome Crowded West by Modest Mouse. The c market for a used CD or two after I earned my chore money for the week and I came across two albums – The covers caught my attention since I had no idea what they sounded like, and when I got back out to my bike, I slapped Lonesome Crowded West into my Discman and began to ride. The crunchy sounds of the production, the blasted out vocals, the dirty sound of the whole thing had me hooked immediately. Little did I know that those two albums would spark a love for all grimy-sounding lo-fi indie rock albums that years later I would find out were complete classics in the genre. There was a rawness to it, an emotion brought out by the sound that some of the cleaner pop-rock that was playing on Spokane’s The Peak 105.7 couldn’t spark in me. Don’t get me wrong; I still loved the Gin Blossoms and Harvey Danger. But they didn’t do it for me like what was playing in my discman at that time.

When I use old gear – the well-loved, the wall hanger, the underappreciated – it personally leads me to respect the whole game more. I have bad rods, more akin to broomsticks than anything you would consider to fish with, that I will still take out and give a little bit of love to and it opens up a whole different world of fishing. Not necessarily a good world, but back in the day, these Montague and Horrocks-Ibbotson bamboo fly rods were what the low-paid, blue collar workers could afford. And if they could catch fish swinging these things around, so can I. And I do, quite often.

Is it a good experience? No. Is it worth experiencing? Arguably, no. But it causes me to slow my role, relax into the sport of the day, appreciate what we have from an aspect of where we came from. That makes the whole thing enjoyable in the end.

But, to bring us back to the music analogy, these rods are the (subjectively) garbage lo-fi albums of the day. These aren’t no God Ween Satan by Ween or Alien Lanes by Guided by Voices (yet more that Michael at Small Potatoes put me onto back in the day). No, God Ween Satan would be my Heddon Golden Mark fiberglass rod; Lonesome Crowded West my Goodwin Granger. While old, and a bit sloppy, once they click with you, you wouldn’t trade the rod (or the album) for anything else in the world.

There is an aspect inherent to fly fishing that is not entirely about fishing. I have brought this up many, many times to the point where it is probably becoming a bit tiring, yet it is something I will stress until the day I die: the point to a lot of folks is not the fish, it is being in tune with the things around you.

One of those things is what you have in your hand. I understand having a fast action rod to whip streamers out quickly at ten million miles per hour and hard-setting your rod to rip a trout’s mandible because you saw someone on YouTube do that for excitement and video clicks.

But standing knee deep in a high mountain creek with the slowest possible action rod in your hand, hearing the old click and pawl reel chatter as you pull more line out, and being in tune to the metronome of the roaring water opens up a whole new perspective on the sport in itself. Feeling the cool water split on your shins makes you glad that you left the waders at home; the fish in your net you caught under that eddy a prize for your “hard” work.

With all the new-age gear, I feel like I am fishing. With the vintage stuff, I am fishing.

Could this be construed as pretentious? Sure. But am I telling you that this is how you should fish?

Absolutely not.

One has to find how they want to fish in the rivers, lakes, and streams. Like any sport, there are more ways than one to skin the cat. Some people like to duck hunt with a semi-automatic 12 gauge, or an over/under. I prefer the pump action, as I grew up with that and there is a sense of doing more that gives me an endorphin rush that the other shotguns won’t.

When I paint, I prefer watercolor over acrylic or oil. I draw with a pencil, not a pen. I typically write on a typewriter before I transfer it to a computer. These are all mediums that I would consider these days to fall under the lo-fi label. And in fly fishing, that is just about where I like to be.

We all do things differently, and there isn’t a single right answer of how to do whatever we are trying to do. Use what you got, and as long as it makes you happy, then be happy. But I will still argue to the death that my Orvis Silver Label Superfine 5wt does everything the new Orvis Helios can do, and it cost me a tenth of the price. I don’t have the money to spend on the big boys (though, if I stopped buying so many vintage rods and just saved that money, I am sure I could have bought a few). I am rarely in the situation that I need a drag on my fly reel, and I wouldn’t give up an old click and pawl in most situations anyway.

It’s all preference, and I prefer what I prefer. You do you, I’ll do me. But I will still let out an internal scoff when I see a fly fisher in the St. Joe with about $3,000 to $4,000 worth of gear on him. Jealousy? Sure. But at least my waders would be dirty.