Biking and tenkara are a perfect combination. In this episod, Daniel talks to Russ Roca of the blog PathLessPedaled.com about #bikefishing and how to combine tenkara and biking for fun days out. Tenkara+ Biking, there’s real fun to be had with that combo!
In the second part of today’s episode Daniel talks to Bart Lombardo, president of the Central Jersey Trout Unlimited group, to find out more about the issues, challenges and projects Central Jersey TU is facing as well as to learn a bit more about the trout fishing in New Jersey.
0:00:48 DG: Welcome back, Tenkara Cast listeners. I appreciate you returning to yet another episode of the Tenkara Cast. Hopefully, you’re gonna be really enjoying the conversations that I’m gonna be having here today. We’re gonna have a two-part episode as is the new format for this podcast.
The first part is gonna be a conversation, the topic at of the day, and today, that’s gonna be a conversation with Russ Roca from the Path Less Pedaled blog. Russ is the creator of the hashtag bikefishing, and as a lot of you know, we have the campaign, we call Tenkara Plus and it’s the idea of combining sports with tenkara, ’cause the rods are so portable, easy to bring along and so forth. We have a conversation about bikefishing and how to go about doing it and so forth.
In the second part of the conversation today, which is gonna start in roughly the 37-minute mark, is gonna be a conversation with Bart Lombardo who is the current president of the Central New Jersey Trout Unlimited group.
0:01:50 DG: Bart has been involved with TU for a very long time and he’s a good friend of mine and I wanted to get his take on all the different issues, challenges, and projects that TU is involved with in Jersey. A lot of us don’t think of New Jersey as trout fly fishing or trout waters, but there is plenty of trout waters around there and they have unique challenges as any chapter of TU around the country. We’re gonna have a fun conversation about that, so that you can learn a little bit more about TU chapters and their work around the country. As I introduced in last episode, that’s part of the new format of the Tenkara Cast. I’m gonna be doing a two-part episode every time. One part is gonna be the topic of today, like today is gonna be bike fishing and the second part is really a way to highlight the work of Trout Unlimited across the country and I wanna try to connect with every chapter in the country so that everybody knows what’s going on, the kind of challenges they have, and so forth.
0:02:52 DG: Hopefully, you will stick around for both parts of the conversation here, they’re both a lot of fun. But if you wanna skip to the conversation with TU where I talk to Bart, you can go ahead and skip to about the 35 and a half minute mark of this episode and start listening to that, but here we have a conversation with Russ Roca and the Path Less Pedaled.
0:03:14 DG: Russ, why don’t you to tell me… Wait, which one came first? Fly fishing or biking for you?
0:03:21 Russ Roca: For me, definitely the cycling. In 2009, my partner and I sold everything to travel by bike and we ended up traveling for three years. And at that time, we were camping a lot, we were always camping by water features, near rivers and lakes, and I’m a photographer but I can only take pictures of pretty landscapes for so much before you get bored. I began to really wonder what was inside the water, so I got this wild hair of trying fishing and fly fishing just seemed like the most logical form because you’re not carrying bait, it looked pretty relatively light-weight. And actually in the middle of our bike tour in Fort Worth, Texas, of all places, there is this great outdoor shop that had a fly shop and the guy that ran it was super friendly and he was like, “Oh, if you’re interested in… I’m doing a casting class tomorrow, you should come.”
0:04:18 RR: I took the class. He made fishing really accessible because it tends to be kind of snooty and intimidating. And then I was hooked, I walked out of that class with a armful of fishing gear and since then, strapped it to the bike, and now that was back in 2009, I’ve been combining fishing with our bike trips and we actually choose destinations and routes now, that have to have fishing along the way. [chuckle]
0:04:47 DG: Yeah, and I think the first time that I saw you… I started the company, that was in 2009 and I believe I saw your blog, the Path Less Pedaled, not long after that. Is that when you started the blog?
0:05:00 RR: Yeah, pretty much. I remember… Yeah, I remember I got a western fly fishing set and then was looking for a lighter, easier fishing set to deploy and I ran into you guys, and I think I sent you an email about we’re doing this thing and could I trap one of your rods; and I think that’s how we first connected, you sent over a rod and some flies. And yeah, it was awesome, it worked really well.
0:05:28 DG: Yeah, and I think one of the first things that I remember, it might have been right around the time you created this beautiful video of… I forget what you called it, but it was essentially a bunch of people getting their bikes and going to a lakeside area and having coffee and I’m a big coffee fanatic as well; so I loved that video.
[chuckle]
0:05:46 DG: Tell me about that a little bit, what was that video for? Refresh my memory.
0:05:51 RR: Yes, there’s a… We’re really active on social media, in particular, Instagram and it’s interesting to see different trends that pop up in bicycling and one of the hashtags was Coffee Outside, which was actually started by our friend, Rob Perks, who owns a bike company called Ocean Air Cycles. And the whole idea is, not everyone can camp every day, but you can have like an outdoor experience with friends, making coffee. The whole point is to gather in the morning with your bikes and with your cook stoves, find a pretty spot and make coffee and nerd out about bikes and coffee and gear and just a real pleasant way to get started.
0:06:27 RR: What’s fascinating about that is it’s really caught on. It’s like an international phenomena. I think they have the hashtag Coffee Outside has like, I don’t know, over a couple hundred thousand uses users, and there’s different groups across the country that do it. There’s a group here in Missoula, Montana. I know there’s a group in LA, in Santa Monica, in Austin, other places across the country that have a good biking and coffee culture. There’s usually Coffee Outside group that’ll meet once a week and just brew coffee together.
0:07:00 DG: Have you gone back and joined groups that do that, the Coffee Outside thing? Or is that something that you did more back when you lived in Oregon?
0:07:09 RR: No. Yeah, there’s a group that started here in Missoula, Montana. Our friend, Topher, runs it and we actually did it all throughout winter. And I had a fat bike and you’re standing out there, it’s probably like 10 degrees and there’s two feet of snow and there’s people that are still making coffee.
0:07:28 DG: Wow.
0:07:29 RR: When we travel, we usually, if it times out, we’ll visit the local Coffee Outside group. Our friend, Aaron Vasquez, friends of group out of LA, and their friends Brian and Cynthia run it at Santa Monica. We got a friend in Austin named William who runs it there.
0:07:45 DG: Wow, I didn’t realize it was such a big thing.
0:07:47 RR: Usually… Yeah. There’s like a built in bike/coffee nerd community, and there’s a growing bike/fishing community.
0:07:56 DG: Yeah. That’s what I was gonna ask you next. Talking about hashtags, the hashtag Bikefishing has become pretty popular, it seems like, at least within our niche of fly fishing and that kind of thing. Tell me about that one. What… Are you seeing big numbers? Who started that? Did you start it? ‘Cause I think you were the first person that I remember posting about it. Tell me about the Bikefishing hashtag and the whole thing.
0:08:19 RR: Yeah. I started the hashtag that every time you…
0:08:23 DG: You did?
0:08:23 RR: I get a dollar in my Instagram account.
[laughter]
0:08:25 DG: Awesome.
0:08:26 RR: I wish.
0:08:26 DG: You’re getting rich.
0:08:29 RR: Right. Yeah. It’s got about, I think, I last checked, over 4,000 uses all over the world, in Japan, Hawaii. There’s a guy touring in Argentina, that’s with a packraft and fly gear. Yeah, and I really started it kind of on a whim. I was naturally already interested in combining bicycling with fly fishing and at the time, people were getting super serious into racing, and bike packing. I was like, there’s gotta be some kind of foil that brings the goofiness back in there, so I was like, I’m gonna promote just this idea that I already do of fly fishing with a bike and started the hashtag. And since then, it’s actually really fascinating. Lots of brands have picked up on it, lots of cycling brands and even a couple of fishing brands. Several brand videos have come out combining mountain biking or bike packing with fly fishing. And I’m not saying that I’m the total cause for that but I definitely helped instigate it. [chuckle]
0:09:34 DG: Oh, totally. I don’t think anybody has promoted as consistently as Path Less Pedaled has. I think you guys have been certainly in the forefront. It’s, and I believe, do you know the timing when you introduced the hashtag?
0:09:50 RR: It was probably about three years ago.
0:09:52 DG: Yeah, ’cause I think it was right at the same time that I had this idea at Tenkara USA for the Tenkara Plus campaign.
0:10:00 RR: I remember that.
0:10:00 DG: Which is like, a little bit like you mentioned with coffee, like not everybody has a ton of time to go camping and whatnot. With tenkara, you wanna make it accessible so people can just go fly fishing really quickly and you don’t have to dedicate your whole time to fly fishing. You can combine it with other activities that you like so, to me, it really resonated ’cause I was thinking about that like the way a lot of people consume fly fishing nowadays. Might be with their biking trip, might be with hiking, and that kind of thing, so yeah. I think that’s just a little bit of an indication of how people of our generation are now connecting with different sports. It’s not…
0:10:42 RR: Yeah. I think we’re definitely, people that are outdoors people like multiple activities and beyond the goofiness of just promoting biking and fishing, maybe one higher level kinda goal was to show that we all enjoy the outdoors. Usually, you don’t think of consumptive sports like fishing or hunting having to do anything with cycling. We tend to live in our separate silos. But here in Montana, I mean, that’s just not the case. People that bike, hunt, they fish, and we’re actually all on the same team, so it’s a cool way to show this synergy, this melting pot between different activities that don’t typically go together but are actually a natural fit.
0:11:23 DG: Yeah. No, I think you nailed it. They are a very good natural fit and, but tell me so you… And is it your wife, your girlfriend, Laura?
0:11:33 RR: Long-time girlfriend.
0:11:34 DG: All right, yeah. You’re pretty much married.
0:11:36 RR: Pretty much. 16 years.
0:11:38 DG: Wow! Wow, that’s amazing. Yeah, that’s longer than my wife and I. We just celebrated our 11th anniversary but we’ve been together for like 14 years.
0:11:45 RR: Oh nice.
0:11:46 DG: Nice, congratulations.
0:11:47 RR: Yeah, we haven’t figured out if we like each other yet.
[laughter]
0:11:51 DG: Well, but you do enjoy biking and fishing together. And tell me what kind of adventures have you and Laura… Laura, right?
0:12:00 RR: Yeah.
0:12:01 DG: What types of adventures have you and Laura been on that you needed a bike and a fishing rod for?
0:12:08 RR: Yeah, yeah when we were still traveling long term, I learned how to fish in the South, in Texas. Initially, it’s fishing for warm water species, finally got into trout when we hit North Carolina. And then we did a three month trip to New Zealand and that was primarily because I knew that they had good fishing as well. And that was pretty epic. We just spent three months bicycling both the north and south island, trying to find interesting rivers and fishing along the way. Since then, we’ve done lots of loops here. When we were living in Oregon, we loved to fish a lot on the Crooked River around Prineville, which is the perfect tenkara water. We fished a lot in the Chutes. Here in Montana, we’re starting to pick off some of the really well-known rivers and some lesser known creeks and taking the bike and fishing along the way. I think in terms of a long term plan, our next one is to get down to somewhere in South America and do either a base camp and do loops with the bikes and the rod down there.
0:13:19 DG: I visited Patagonia in Argentina two, three years ago, now, and I thought that that would be an incredible region to do something like that. I was thinking motorcycle or something ’cause it’s an expensive country, like very large. The roads are actually pretty good and it’s not very populated. There’s no real dangers, wildlife, I think there might be cougars there but not really, it’s not bears and that kind of thing.
0:13:46 RR: Right. [chuckle]
0:13:47 DG: Yeah, I think you guys will have a blast. [chuckle] And then maybe I’ll suggest that you should look at, let’s say, December 2020, because that’s when the next solar eclipse is gonna be. Actually, they have one in July 2019, but that’s their winter. If you go to South America, Argentina and Chile, you can catch the total solar eclipse in 2020. Something for you to consider.
0:14:12 RR: Yeah, we’ll have to pick your brain on some spots because I think we really want to make it happen in the next two years.
0:14:19 DG: Yeah. Well, let’s talk. Maybe I should tag along for a little part of it or something, [chuckle] if you don’t mind a third wheel. Yeah, no, I think that would be fun. It’s awesome that you’re still planning big adventures with it and that sort of thing. Now, tell me a little bit about your connection with tenkara. You started with rod and reel and then you looked a little bit at lighter set ups, but I know you go back and forth. You use all kinds of rigs. When do you use tenkara and what do you like about it for fishing?
0:14:53 RR: I use it when… I switch back and forth and it really depends on the water. If I know I’d have to check heavy streamers or getting in stand, then I’ll use the western setup. But now, when dry fly season is on or when I don’t have to get down as deep, I’ll use the Tenkara rod. I also like just smaller streams that I can wade in easily. The Crooked River is a great example in Oregon. We actually, we moved to Missoula, Montana and there’s Rattlesnake Creek that runs… That feeds into the Clark Fork. And it’s perfect water. It’s literally a block and a half [chuckle] from our apartment.
0:15:32 DG: Wow. Nice.
0:15:33 RR: I’ll go in there and, you know, but the stream access laws in Montana, once you’re in the water, you can move up and down, so it’s totally awesome to do it here. When we’re traveling, when I’m prospecting and not trying to figure out where the fish are and I don’t wanna commit to putting waders on or assembling a rod, I use a Tenkara rod to throw a couple casts. See if there are fish that are holding, where they’re holding, if it makes sense to fish there or if we’re constantly moving, since the Tenkara rods are really easy to deploy, then I’ll use it in that instance. But also, I’ve found that… I have lots of friends since I’ve been using the bike fishing hash tag that have become fishing curious. That were maybe identified as cyclists and saw me doing this goofy thing but wanted to try it out. And they’re intimidated by the typical fly shop, about all the gear that you have to get, and the reel and all this stuff.
0:16:32 RR: When I have friends that wanna try it out, I’ll give them the Tenkara rod or I’ll show them how to use it and that’s actually how I got Laura into fishing. [laughter] She’d watched me for years, literally years, and was content to be on the sidelines. And then finally, she’s like, “Okay, I’ll give it a try this time.” And I knew line management and the double holes and all that stuff was gonna be really complicated and needless for where we were fishing. So I gave her, I think the Sato was the one that we were using. And it was during the salmon fly hatch on the Chutes.
0:17:12 DG: Oh, nice.
0:17:12 RR: Just long enough to get into where the fish were and the fish were eating and right away she just got in the fishing and was like, “Whoa, this is cool.” [laughter]
0:17:22 DG: Yeah, well, you couldn’t have picked a better occasion probably. Salmon hatching in the Chutes. That’s pretty dreamy right there. [chuckle]
0:17:30 RR: Yeah, you have to pick your timing if you want to get your partner into fishing. [laughter]
0:17:32 DG: Yeah, that’s a great tip actually. One that maybe I overlook sometimes, though. I introduce a lot of people to fly fishing, of course through Tenkara, but often it’s more like working around our schedules. I think timing might be, that’s a huge thing.
0:17:48 RR: Yeah. I feel like you have to set them up for success. [laughter]
0:17:51 DG: Absolutely. That’s a great tip right there. And I was gonna ask you about, gonna ask a little bit more specific in terms of tips. But so it sounds like from what I follow you on Facebook and social media, and you just mentioned as well, sometimes you carry waders, sometimes not. What do you… ‘Cause bike fishing, somewhat, it can be a little bit limited in what you can carry or you can start adding a ton of panniers and kind of things. Tell me, what does your rig look like? What do you carry with you and do you have a bunch of…
0:18:26 RR: Yeah, I give a couple of presentations on this to people that are interested and I tell them it can be as simple or as complicated as you wanna make it. [chuckle] Sometimes, when we were living in Oregon, I’d actually go fishing for steelheads. It’s winter, so I’d carry the waders and boots and everything. But now, like during the summer, generally, I tell people they can wet wade and then they don’t have to get boots. We’ve found that you could get some Crocs which are super lightweight and depending on the river surface, how slick the rocks are, it might be all you need. If it’s really cold, then I’d suggest getting like some neoprene booties and combine that with the Crocs, and you’re generally good to go. We had a friend that came out the other day and he had his bedrock sandals and he was perfectly content just following me through the river wearing that. Generally, it’s more fun to do as a beginner if you’re not super into fishing like when the weather is nice through and you can wet wade. That’s usually what I’ll suggest to people.
0:19:36 DG: Yeah ’cause that’s the times that I’ve done my bike fishing really has been a couple of times taking my road bike for a longer ride, run boulder and I can hit a couple of creeks with a road bike. And I’ll usually bring Crocs with me or some super lightweight shoes in a small backpack and get out of the cleats. And a couple of times, I’ve done some mountain biking trails that have taken into streams but I never carry much. That’s my take. Of course, you mentioned the steelhead, but I think I saw something on Facebook the other day, you’re having some huge cargo on a new bike or something. [laughter] Do you usually have panniers when you wanna carry a little bit extra stuff? How do you handle that or do carry in a backpack? How do you describe that to us?
0:20:21 RR: Yeah, I did the trip just a couple days ago and the modern bikepacking bike, they’ve got these mini racks that go on the forks and are called Anything Cages. And some bikes have the dedicated mounts like it’s a three-bolt mount. And what I’ll actually do if I’m taking boots is I’ll put one boot on each fork and use like a ballet strap to hold it in place and then…
0:20:47 DG: So it gets nice and tight in there. It’s not flopping around.
0:20:51 RR: Yeah, yeah, just a bunch of laces, put them inside. If I’ve got booties, then I’ll put inside the boot itself and strap it down to each fork. If I wanna carry waders, there’s this product called the Anything Cradle by Salsa or any kind of bikepacking style cradle that’s meant to carry dry bag. It also carry waders. You just roll it up so it fits its dimensions and strap it down your handlebar. In that way, you can carry waders and boots if you want. Right now, we’re testing this off-road bicycle trailer. It’s made by Burley, it’s actually called the Coho. [laughter] And when they showed it at Interbike a couple of years ago, they had a big… I think it was like a spay rod connected to the back and then what’s unique about this trailer is it’s got suspension and it’s also got the ability to run a fatter tire, so a 3-inch wide tire. It’s meant for off-road. It’s something like this. I was trying to see how much fishing gear I could put in there. I could put in four pairs of boots in there, few rods, waders and still have room to spare. That’s definitely overkill [laughter] for those places.
0:22:04 DG: Well, we should probably mention to the listeners here that, Russ, you have, your business, if you will, revolves around biking. So you geek out and you review products and you’re gonna test out a lot of different things. But just to let our listeners know, there’s probably simpler ways to do it. They can probably have a basket on the front of their bike and carry everything in it.
0:22:24 RR: Yeah. Basket is another great way. There’s a US basket maker, they’ve been making baskets forever and like the Wald 137 specific model. I’ll put my boots in there, roll up some waders and just put a bungee cargo net over the top.
0:22:42 DG: To keep it from flying out or something?
0:22:45 RR: Yeah, and that’s a super simple solution. I think that basket costs about 20 bucks.
0:22:51 DG: Nice, okay. Yeah. And it’s…
0:22:51 RR: That’s the cheapest, most functional way to do it. You don’t have to get the fork specific mounts and everything.
0:23:00 DG: And what about other activities besides biking? Actually, before we go into that, paint me a little bit of a picture. Like when you’re in Montana, when you’re home, you have a stream a block and a half from you. You’re probably not biking there, right?
0:23:15 RR: No, there, I’ll walk. Although there is some trails that goes into the wilderness. So there’s actually a whole trail system, I can follow it up into the mountains and in that case, I’ll bring a bike with me to explore the upper stretches.
0:23:33 DG: And would you be using a mountain bike for something around your home there or is it like more of a cross bike, or what are you…
0:23:39 RR: Yeah, like a cross bike. A mountain bike in the upper, upper areas, it gets really rocky. But I also have the option of fishing at the Clark Fork in Downtown Missoula. There, I could just take the road bike and go down the hill five minutes and fish a bigger, bigger river. There’s options.
[laughter]
0:24:00 DG: Yeah, no, it sounds like there’s a ton of options. And do you do other things with fishing or is it either fishing or bike fishing, or do you ever go backpacking?
0:24:09 RR: We were actually, before we moved here, we were training for the Flyathlon.
0:24:14 DG: Oh, that’s coming up next week, actually. I’m gonna be joining, not as a runner, but yeah, cool.
0:24:21 RR: Yeah, I had gotten in. We had gotten into trail running and were looking for kind of goofy event because we’re not very serious. We’re not serious cyclists, we’re not serious runners, we enjoy it but we’re not… We have no aspirations to be like performance athletes. We’re always looking for interesting events and yeah, the Flyathlon. I think they have a couple in Colorado, one in Iowa. We started training for that and unfortunately, we couldn’t… We signed up, got the plane tickets, but we couldn’t make it at the last minute because Laura ended up getting this job here in Missoula and we had to move the week before.
0:25:02 DG: I remember that. Yeah.
0:25:04 RR: Yeah. So we cancelled those plans. But it’s something that we wanna do more in the future. And what’s cool here in the Missoula, there’s this, the Rattlesnake Creek, this is a little creek that runs up behind my place. It goes into the wilderness and you can actually ride your bike to the wilderness boundary, ditch your bike, and then go in the trail run 5 miles up, and then fish some lakes and then come back. We were joking about doing like the Missoula triathlon where you…
0:25:33 DG: Yeah…
0:25:33 RR: Bike up, trail run, and then fish and then we go back.
0:25:37 DG: Wow, yeah. That’ll take some commitment, but yeah. It sounds like you’ll be right up your alley if you enjoy biking and running.
0:25:45 RR: Yeah.
0:25:47 DG: I’ve been able to get into biking, I had not been able to get into running but I’m looking forward to checking out the Flyathlon next week. Actually, I’m just gonna go as a, to demo Tenkara rods and and just kind of…
0:25:57 RR: Yeah…
0:25:57 DG: Probably create some videos on it, and that kinda thing. But yeah, I’d love to see you guys joining on the one of the next ones here in Colorado or something or Idaho.
0:26:06 RR: Yeah. I think it’s a cool event. I think there’s gotta be more things like that. I know in the biking space, there’s been a couple of fly shops. I know they’ve done fly fishing for bike packers.
0:26:19 DG: Oh yeah, which also have done that? I haven’t really heard of them coming from fly fishing.
0:26:24 RR: There’s one, I think… I forgot the name, they’re in Teton Valley. It’s like a world of casting or something.
0:26:31 DG: All right, we’ll check ’em out. It like… Yeah, like I haven’t… I’ve been noticing the fly fishing industry seems to be a little reluctant to embrace other activities, which is where I think Tenkara USA tends to sometimes run against them a little bit. We’re saying like, hey, it’s okay to do other activities too, where you might experience the fly shops. Just want people to fly fish and that’s…
0:26:56 RR: Right. Well, that’s like bike shops too. They’re very much like, okay, you wanna be… You go in there, the typical bike shop is like, oh so you wanna… You learn how to ride fast. That’s like default, that’s like the default assumption. It’s, I guess, like going to the fly shop. Oh, you just wanna catch big fish all the time, that’s all you wanna do. But we’ve seen bike shops embrace the idea of combining with other activities and being more than the purveyor of bicycling goods, but other lifestyle things and encouraging these other activities. Yeah, I feel like when… Having gone to old school bike shops and old school fly shops, they’re very similar. [chuckle]
0:27:36 DG: Yeah. Are they equally intimidating to people…
0:27:39 RR: Yeah. You get the same kinda older curmudgeony guy and as a new person to either sport, you feel like you’re being judged.
0:27:49 DG: Oh big time.
0:27:50 RR: Not worthy of being in the shop.
0:27:52 DG: Yeah, yeah, I know, big time. [chuckle] Even after fly fishing for, I don’t know, 17 years or something.
0:28:00 RR: Yeah.
0:28:00 DG: I still feel the same way and I usually run away from the shop when I’m treated that way.
0:28:06 RR: And it’s totally what I dislike about both activities and what, through our content on the, through the Path Less Pedaled stuff, that we try to break down. It’s like, yes, there are some people that take both things very seriously, but you don’t have to do that. That’s not necessarily what you have to aspire to. It can just incorporate into daily life and have fun with it.
0:28:27 DG: That’s what I love about the vibe that you guys have on the Path Less Pedaled. And I think, I feel like it jives really well with us. It’s not trying to take it too seriously and try to make it a little bit more accessible and in the end, oftentimes, we may… Some people might see us geeking out and talking about philosophies in different ways and think that we are, I think, I daresay we’re saying taking it too seriously, but in reality, it’s like… But we’re all sharing stories and sharing content and it’s… But I’d say in time, trying to make it more accessible to people.
0:29:03 RR: Yeah. Yeah. That’s definitely the voice that we’ve always taken with our stuff. We don’t proclaim to be experts. We’re just like everybody else, we like to have fun and experiment. We can get nerdy, but at the end of the day, it’s just about enjoying the experience.
0:29:20 DG: Yeah. Tell us, for listeners that wanna learn a little bit more about bike fishing. Of course, they can go to pathlesspedaled.com. Have you guys done a lot of blog posts? I feel like I haven’t really been reading blogs a ton. I’ve been more like on the social media front reading things. Have you…
0:29:37 RR: Yeah. We’ve got a… We’ve been really active on YouTube.
0:29:42 DG: Yes.
0:29:43 RR: We’ve been putting a lot of eggs in that basket, making kind of unique, likey content that’s not focused on sports. [chuckle] Most of the largest channels on YouTube around cycling are either about road racing, or extreme mountain biking, but not like the every day or… Every day adventure. If you guys visit our channel, we’ll have lots of bike reviews, gear reviews, and we have a whole playlist on bike fishing.
0:30:10 DG: Awesome.
0:30:10 RR: Different bike fishing tricks and tips, both Tenkara and western, and what we carry when we wade. I’ve been kind of sprinkling those things onto the channel just to give people a point of entry.
0:30:24 DG: Yeah, I’ve been watching the YouTube channel, keeping an eye on it and you guys are doing a great a job with the video content, and I’ll make sure to… For our listeners that have our podcast page bookmarked, I’ll make sure to post links to your YouTube channel and your blog and that kind of thing, so people can find it at tenkarausa.com/podcast on this podcast episode page. Yeah, so that’s it. I’m glad you reminded me of the YouTube channel ’cause you guys have been doing a ton of good work there.
0:30:57 RR: Yeah, so you’ll see like the earliest videos like really rough [chuckle] and slightly more polished. Yeah.
0:31:04 DG: Nice, excellent. Anything else you wanna share with our listeners in terms of bike fishing?
0:31:13 RR: I think since I started the hashtag three years ago, I’ve been like, “It’s the next big thing!”
[laughter]
0:31:20 DG: I’ve been saying that about Tenkara for the last what, 10 years almost.
[laughter]
0:31:26 RR: But I do think it’s starting to hit a critical mass, like our friends at… Different bag makers that we know or have made fishing bike fishing, specific bags, and I think that’s when you know that’s like, “Oh okay, it’s becoming more than this fringe thing that your Path Less Pedaled talks about to other… There’s enough of an interest that people wanna try it and also, like you said, different fly shops have been doing bike fishing events. I know one bike tour that’s gonna have a guided fishing element to it.
0:32:03 DG: Oh cool.
0:32:03 RR: Which is kinda cool. Here and there, I think it’ll ultimately still be a small niche thing, but I think people will… It won’t be so strange to bring a fly rod with you when you go on a bike tour in a couple of years.
0:32:18 DG: And had never done before, but 20 years, it’s like a reset button was hit. And he took his mountain bike for a little spin and he’s excited to try a little bit of bike fishing too. It’s definitely, at least in part, thanks to the Path Less Pedaled.
0:32:34 RR: Cool. Good to hear.
0:32:37 DG: Yeah. And for those that are intimidated, just based on our conversation with TJ, too. I think a lot of times people are intimidated in the beginning, they don’t know where to start. And he and I were having a conversation about backpacking which can also be a little intimidating, what gear do I use? But I think about it, I should like to think about it in this way. It’s a… You probably know how to bike, even if you don’t bike well, you don’t have too much strength. It’s like if you know how to ride a bicycle, all you have to do is carry a little rod in your backpack and go to a body a water, whether it’s a pond or a stream, and you’re just combining the two activities in a fun way. It doesn’t have to be a big ordeal, it doesn’t have to be a big adventure. It can be… From our house here, a 10 minute ride gets us to a pond and catch some fish.
0:33:25 RR: Yeah, yeah. I definitely always, on our YouTube channel, always have the beginner in mind because although we’ve been bike touring for a long time, I still remember the early days. There was before this big explosion in bike packing and everything, there was very little information and I’d go in the bike shop, and I’d tell people I wanna put bags on my bike and they’d give me this sideway look and like, “Why? You can’t go fast then.” And now it’s a thing. [chuckle] But my very early formative years, I still remember all that judgment and how difficult it was to find good information that was conveyed in an accessible way. That’s definitely the goal of everything that we do on our channel or our website and all our social stuff.
0:34:15 DG: Excellent. We are well-aligned on that and Russ, I wanna thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me about bike fishing. I’m gonna make sure to put some links on our podcast page and people can connect with you guys on social media for your blog and that kind of thing. I’m assuming all the people can find you a diverse social media platforms with the Path Less Pedaled.
0:34:39 RR: Yeah on Instagram, the Twitters, the Facebooks.
0:34:42 DG: Perfect. Right.
0:34:43 RR: Not Snapchat though. [chuckle]
0:34:45 DG: Yeah, I think that one is probably seen its days already, I think. Bike fishing is here to stay for what I’m hearing, Snapchat not so much.
[laughter]
0:34:54 DG: Yeah, not many people are using that. Well, excellent. Thanks so much for making the time and talk to me. I really appreciate that and hopefully, you and I will get to fish together. We tried to do it last year, right before you guys moved to Missoula so.
0:35:09 RR: Yeah, yeah, for sure. True.
0:35:11 DG: We gotta get together and fish.
0:35:12 RR: Yeah, cool.
0:35:14 DG: Well, thanks so much.
0:35:14 RR: Thanks for having me on the show. It’s a big honor and pleasure. I mean I still remember when you started the company and I was really stoked that you were willing to send us stuff from the very beginning. It’s been fun to track your progress over the years as well.
0:35:29 DG: Well, absolutely. Let me know how else you can support bike fishing. I’m a big fan of the hashtag and what you guys are doing.
0:35:34 RR: Well, thanks.
0:35:37 DG: Thanks again, Russ, for making the time to talk to us about bike fishing. I think bike fishing and Tenkara just go hand in hand, like not many other things combined. I appreciate you shedding some light on the bike fishing movement that you’ve helped create. And now, I’m gonna be talking to Bart Lombardo from the Central Jersey Trout Unlimited group. Bart is actually, as I learned today, the current president of TU in the Central Jersey chapter, and he’s been involved with them for quite a long time, over a decade. And let’s hear what he has to say about the issues and challenges and projects happening at Trout Unlimited in New Jersey.
0:36:16 DG: Hey Bart, welcome back to the Tenkara Cast. I appreciate you joining me again and today, we’re gonna be talking about TU in New Jersey, huh?
0:36:26 Bart Lombardo: Yes. Well, thank you, first off, for inviting me back. I thoroughly enjoyed the first time I was on the podcast and I’m looking forward to this evening’s discussion.
0:36:36 DG: Yeah. Well, unfortunately, we’re not meeting in person this time. Last time was pretty fun, just to kind of hang out and drink the wine that you guys made at home and yeah, that was pretty fun.
0:36:47 BL: Yeah. Well, this evening, I got a glass of some very expensive cognac that my father… Well, just dropped off. I filled up my glass before they left, they just walked out the door a few minutes ago, so I got it taken care of on my end.
0:37:03 DG: I’m staying sober. I’m drinking water, and actually, coconut water too, ’cause if I drink a drop of alcohol right now, I’m gonna pass out. I’m so tired. [chuckle] Yeah, it’s been a long intense couple of weeks here, but in any case… Tell me… A lot of people don’t really think of New Jersey… They don’t really think of fly fishing or trout when they think of New Jersey. Before we talk about TU’s work and what you do with them or did with them, can you tell us just a little bit about how the trout fishing is in Jersey?
0:37:36 BL: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. New Jersey’s one of those states where if you’re in the northeast when you think of New Jersey, you think of the view driving up and down the turnpike. You’re looking at all these industrial complexes and factories and refineries… And that part of New Jersey is actually just a very thin corridor. A very large part of the state is, it’s a pretty wild place. The northern part of the state, we have… I wouldn’t call them mountains but they are some pretty sizable hills of 15,000 feet, 2,000 foot. We do have a hilly region in the northern part of the state. The southern part of the state, there’s a huge expanse of… Actually, I’ll call it wilderness, called The Pine Barrens, and that’s over a million acres of wild land. Not exactly trout country down in the southern part of the state because of water temperature issues, but in the northern part of the state we do have a surprising number of wild trout streams. Now, those trout streams are typically very small watersheds but there are a very large number of small wild trout streams. And we do have four or five, maybe a half a dozen larger rivers that are capable of supporting trout year-round and be talking in detail about one of those rivers this evening.
0:39:03 DG: Yeah. Cool. How far do you have to drive to go fishing for trout?
0:39:08 BL: Well, I’m in located in the center of the state. My nearest quality year-round trout stream is about an hour and 10 minute ride… About 55 miles from my front door.
0:39:19 DG: Perfect. And of course, we’re talking a little bit of trout because we’re gonna be talking about Trout Unlimited’s projects. But some of our listeners may remember that you’re the guy from panfishonthefly.com.
0:39:32 BL: Yes. And the reason that my whole interest in warm water fishing was sparked is because of the type of trout fishing that we have here in New Jersey. Although we do have a number of watersheds that will support these fish year-round, their conditions… The water conditions during the summer are marginal at best. And a lot of times, even though the fish are in the rivers and they’re feeding, just the stress of hooking, even if your intention is to release these fish, the hooking and the fighting of the fish is often fatal to these fish once those water temperatures reach 70 degrees. And we quite often see those temperature spikes during the heat of summer, which is really the time that we’re going through right now. It’s always a good idea to give those fish a break during the summer months. And that’s why I turned my attention to warm water fishing in particular, my favorite, pan fish.
0:40:30 DG: Excellent. You saw that the… Now, I’m doing the TU segments of the Tenkara cast. And then you reached out saying that you are very involved and that’s partly how I know you and your friend Lou as well, ’cause every time we’d done the New Jersey show, you guys are volunteering a TU chapter. What is the name of the chapter, remind me again, please?
0:40:51 BL: Both myself and Lou DiGena, who you referred to, we are members of the Central New Jersey Trout Unlimited.
0:41:00 DG: And can you tell me what your involvement with TU has been over the years?
0:41:05 BL: Well, as of last night, I am now once again president of CJTU. This will be my fourth run as president of the chapter. I had a very long run as chapter president, almost a decade. And I have come back several times as a fill-in for… As we lost members from the board, lost our officers. And it just so happens that our current president resigned yesterday. As of about nine o’clock last night, I am once again the president of Central Jersey Trout Unlimited.
0:41:47 DG: Well, I guess that’s congratulations then, right?
0:41:49 BL: Well, I don’t know if it’s congratulations or a curse…
0:41:51 DG: It’s a lot of work, right?
0:41:52 BL: At this point. [chuckle]
0:41:53 DG: Well, I’m sure you’ll do well. Are you planning to be on as president for a while since you’ve served so many times or are you looking for…
0:42:04 BL: My goal as president is, obviously, to fulfill all the needs of the chapter. But one of the most important roles as president is to find and bring a successor up to speed. That’s gonna be a big concentration of mine in the months to come.
0:42:17 DG: Perfect. All right. Why don’t we dig in and let’s hear, what are the big issues going on in Jersey that TU is usually involved with?
0:42:26 BL: Well, I guess one of the largest issues is the water quality issue and that’s probably one of the biggest areas across the country regardless of what state you’re in. And in New Jersey, we have some unique challenges because of the fact of, although we do have trout water that will produce fish and support fish year round, there are really a lot of these watersheds, they’re right on the brink. It could go either way if conditions go south in the river. So we’re working real hard to keep these waters in the best possible shape. A lot of New Jersey’s trout fishing is put-and-take catch release supported waters. And even the larger river that I’m gonna talk about this evening, it is primarily a put-and-take watershed and that’s the Musconetcong River and that is really the home river of Central Jersey Trout Unlimited.
0:43:29 BL: That’s where we focus the majority of our work on. But it just happens to be that it is one of the highest water quality rivers in the state and it still contains populations of the wild original eastern strain of brook trout that was, at one time, the only trout, or actually, in this case, char species, that was present in New Jersey before the era of stocking. The fact that these fish are still in the river or primarily, in a lot of cases, in the tributaries of this river, we focus a lot of our attention in trying to keep this river in the best shape as possible.
0:44:09 DG: Oh, excellent. Are the main, and remind me again the name of the river.
0:44:15 BL: It’s the Musconetcong River.
0:44:16 DG: Musconetcong.
0:44:17 BL: There are, again, as I said, there’s four or five rivers in the state. You have the south branch of the Raritan, the Pequest River, the Musconetcong, the Paulins Kill. These are our larger rivers. The Flat Brook River is another one. And those five rivers or streams, as they would be in most larger states, they will support fish year around. As I mentioned earlier, most of our wild trout streams are very small streams. The kind of stream that you can, in a lot of places, put one foot on one bank and one foot on the other and straddle ’em. They’re very small watersheds.
0:44:57 DG: Now, is the water… Water quality issues seems to be the main kind of issue that you guys face. Is that caused by anything in particular? What threatens those rivers that you guys work on?
0:45:12 BL: Well, in the case of our larger streams, the biggest challenge is, it’s agricultural use that borders the rivers themselves, as well as, the drain of agricultural use on the water itself, taking water out of the system, and development. Development on or near the river, be it whether it’s residential development, commercial development. All those issues really, are things that we have to watch very closely and how they affect the water quality. Because of the fact that these rivers do run so close to the margin store in the warmer weather, at lot of our work is done to actually improve the trout habitat, try and undo some of the damage that was created by these long-standing agricultural practices and restore the rivers to a more natural condition so they can support the fish and the insect life better than they were previous.
0:46:15 DG: Yeah, there’s been a few studies that I’ve seen. One of them was actually a really cool movie. I’ll try to put a link on this podcast page, about… It was called RiverWebs and it just talks about the relationship of the forests and the rivers and the trout ’cause you need a good amount of tree coverage to provide insects and that kind of thing. And that’s usually, what I would imagine, creates a lot of the problems with water temperatures and water quality when you remove the repairing of forests around the streams. Is that something that you guys see a lot of?
0:46:52 BL: Yeah. And that’s exactly the issues that we’re faced with and some of the stuff that we’re trying to correct. For example, two of our most recent projects on the Musconetcong River actually involved, now they involved relatively short sections of stream. In one case, it was, I think a little over 300 yards of stream and the last one, I think, was right around 1200 feet, as well. And basically, we were focusing on sections of the river that were, in other words, ideal habitat but for one reason or another, be it from past agricultural use or flood control measures that were enacted, the natural characteristics of the river were removed and the river was channelized and basically featureless for these significant distances. And then upstream and downstream of these locations, the river was in a more natural state. What we did to correct this…
0:47:53 BL: These projects were pretty involved and I could talk a little bit about the last project that we just completed. And the first project was practically a mirror image of what we did recently. We did two projects on the Musconetcong River, the first one that we completed a couple of years ago. When I say we, it’s not just Trout Unlimited, it’s multiple chapters of Trout Unlimited, as well as other organizations, other watershed organizations. For example, in the case of the Muskegon River, we work very closely with the Musconetcong Watershed Association which is basically another non-profit group, that their prime focus is the overall health of the entire river system. They do a lot of good work on the river as well.
0:48:47 BL: But what we did in these sections was really we… The rivers underwent a major reconstruction where there, we got into the river. When people see the work going on, they wonder what we’re doing because we’re in the river with heavy equipment, big earth-moving machines, and we’re moving boulders and we’re realigning, we are re-establishing banks and dredging out holes and… Basically, what we’re doing is restoring a lot of the natural characteristics, the riffles, the runs, the pools, the point bars, all of these features that occur in a natural untouched river. All these features were removed for one reason or another, be it agricultural usage or channelization to try and minimize the effects of flooding. We go back in there and we narrow the river channels and we re-establish the riffle-pool run sequences in the pool, putting point bars back in, re-planning those bars with the riparian vegetation, and basically restoring that stream to a natural condition. And the results have been phenomenal. The work that we see, the before and after and how the river responds is truly amazing.
0:50:06 BL: The first project we did, the Point Mountain Track, which is actually a special regulation piece of trout order. It’s what we call a trout conservation stretch and there’s special angling regulations in effect for that particular body of water anglers. It’s basically catch and release with the exception of the fact that an angler can keep one fish over 15 inches, if they choose. They can fish with spinning or fly gear but it is artificials only. There are some restrictions placed on the river but those restrictions really help the overall fishery. And we completed that work within an hour of getting the machinery out of the river, an angler had walked in. He was fishing and actually caught a fish in water that we had literally just reconstructed and as little as an hour, previous. It was pretty amazing that the fish had moved back into this water and were responding.
0:51:02 DG: Wow, that’s incredible. Yeah, it’s not the type of result you usually see right away. That’s really cool. [chuckle]
0:51:08 BL: Yeah, it was quite surprising. And the work that we just completed was once again on the Musconetcong River and both these sections are public waters. This work is also being done on a lot of private tracks as well, but this was the second public track that we worked on this past early summer. We actually started at the end of June and beginning to end, the projects only last four or five days and we’re out of the river, and you wouldn’t even know that we were there.
0:51:39 BL: The second project was on what’s called the A-frame Track and it is a section where they get about 1,200 feet of river that actually resides between two private fishing clubs. And both those clubs take pretty good care of their stream in their areas but this track, again, it was one of these 1,200-foot long barren sections of river, very shallow, featureless just like one giant shallow run. And by shallow, we’re talking about 12 inches to 18 inches deep, very poor habitat for fish, very poor habitat for invertebrates. So it was… We went in there and basically did the same kind of work, I believe. I don’t know if I’m misspeaking. I think we created a total of seven pools in that stretch, at least that’s what the original plan was.
0:52:33 BL: I think they may have done a little fit and field change at the very end but the original plan called for constructing a number of pools where there was none. These pools were deep enough to get down and get access to the ground water, which actually cools the river down significantly. These are, for all practical purposes, big [0:52:57] ____ line lime stone streams that we’re talking about, at least in the case of the Musconetcong River. And just the re-establishing of the natural characteristics of the river will do a lot to improve the habitat for the fish. It now creates water that did not hold fish at any time of the year and created water that will hold fish 12 months out of the year and it’ll vastly improve the insect life in the area as well.
0:53:22 DG: Nice, great work. It sounds like you completed two major projects. Or is there any major things coming up the pipeline or you guys are starting to work on right now?
0:53:32 BL: Well, all the chapters they get… We did work in conjunction with other chapters on this and there’s, I believe we have 10 chapters in the state of New Jersey. Yeah, we are a pretty densely populated state.
0:53:45 DG: And is there, before I forget, is there a New Jersey TU? Like in Colorado, we have a Colorado TU and a bunch of chapters within Colorado. Is that how it’s organized?
0:53:54 BL: It is the same exact structure here in New Jersey. We have our NJTU, the State Council. And then, in support of that, there are 10 additional chapters. If you include the state council, we’re looking at 11 different chapters in a relatively small state. But we are a pretty high population density in here, so we do have a probably, a pretty good number of members off-hand. I’m not sure exactly what our total is, but it’s in the thousands. I know just the two top chapters. I think Central Jersey’s the second largest chapter in the state, if I’m not mistaken. Between us, and the largest chapter, it’s probably well over a thousand members just between those two chapters.
0:54:40 DG: Nice.
0:54:42 BL: Some of the stuff that we’re currently involved in… We have a very robust Trout in the Classroom program here in the state that is supported by Trout Unlimited volunteers. All the TU chapters in the state run various education programs such as fly tying classes, fly fishing, and fly casting classes, just to introduce new people to the sport and hope to get them interested in protecting the environment these fish live in.
0:55:12 BL: And we also have, as far as Central Jersey, we also focus on some of those small wild streams. We have a project underway right now on a tributary of the Musky called Anderson Brook. And actually, I think it’s next week, we’ll have folks from Fish and Game in the river doing a electroshock survey to determine the fish, the trout species that are present in the brook. We’re hoping to find some of these Eastern String Brook trout in there, but we know for sure that there’s definitely wild reproducing brown and rainbow trout in there. And the work that we’ll be doing in that particular tributary, once we establish what species of fish are present, we’ll get in there, and we’ll start doing some stream clean-up work, removing any debris that may be in the river, as well as bank side cleaning. There’ll be some invasive species removal. We’ll get in there, we’ll do some bank repairs, planting, and if need be, if the results of the electroshocking study shows that we do have this wild strain, this original strain, of brook trout in there, there may be additional measures taken to protect those fish and try and isolate them from the effects of stock fish getting access to them.
0:56:40 DG: Wow, it sounds like you guys have your hands full. As you said, it’s a very populated state, but there’s a good amount of waters. And it sounds like if more work gets done, there will be more habitat for the trout and maybe even the water might get connected more with different rivers and different places that need it. Can you tell us what is the best way for somebody in New Jersey to get involved with either the New Jersey TU Council or a local chapter? Where do they start?
0:57:13 BL: For New Jersey itself, an individual would join a local chapter. Now, on the national TU site, you can actually, they have a chapter locating tool there where you could bring up a graphic overlay of the state of New Jersey, and it will show you exactly what chapter covers your geographic area. And as I’ve mentioned before, we have a total of 10 chapters in New Jersey. If you live in New Jersey, you can go to Trout Unlimited’s main site, use their chapter locator tool, and you can find your chapter that is in your geographic area. Now, I’m a long-standing member of Central Jersey Trout Unlimited. I’ve been a member for so long, I don’t even recall how I associated myself with Central Jersey because they are not the geographic chapter that I would be assigned to if I use that tool. You could join any chapter in the state if you like the work that one chapter is doing. Such in my case, I was always a fan of the work that was being done by Central Jersey. I travel that little bit of extra distance to participate in that chapter’s activities.
0:58:28 DG: And for the Jersey listeners, who are listening right now, just to give a little bit of a geographical overview, I’m not super familiar with it, but what are a couple of the major cities that would be essentially part of the Central Jersey TU chapter?
0:58:44 BL: The Central Jersey TU chapter starts in the far northern edge of Mammoth County, probably, or actually, far northern county of Mammoth county, or maybe the southern portion of Middlesex County, and runs a pretty wide swath, about a equal distance on each side of the Rahway River. Towns, the largest cities in the area that would be covered in our area would be the Brunswick, North and South Brunswick, East Brunswick, Hunterdon County, towns like Bound Brook and Bridgewater. And we’ve lost some of our space over the years with new chapters forming. For example, the Rahway River chapter was once entirely within our area, and there was enough interest for folks that didn’t wanna travel to our meetings that they started their own chapter. We lost a little bit of real estate there, but we’re still the second largest chapter. And if you took a look at the map, and you looked right at the central part of the state, that’s our area. That’s where we’re located.
1:00:00 BL: And again, our Home River that we consider is the Musconetcong River. That’s actually a watershed that’s not technically in our area, because of the way our trout streams in New Jersey are. They’re primarily all in the northern part of the state. We do have a few rivers in the southern part of the state that support trout. There’s a lot of put-and-take fisheries in the southern part of the state, but most of the trout production water, and the water that will actually support fish year round, they’re located almost entirely north of Route 78, which really falls outside of our area. We’ve adopted streams in that are technically in other chapters, areas, ’cause that we need a place to do our work.
1:00:43 DG: Excellent. Well, Bart, thank you so very much for joining me and sharing some of the issues and projects and challenges that Trout Unlimited in New Jersey and the Central TU might be working on. Hopefully, some newcomers to the sport will get involved. I think that’s the main reason I wanted to do these conversations with TU members, is getting all the people that are taking up fly fishing because Tenkara to join their local TU chapter. Hopefully, some people come to meetings. They can log in to TU.org and just take a look at when the meetings are and what the chapter are.
1:01:23 BL: Yeah, and if anyone is interested in learning more about Central New Jersey Trout Unlimited, we have a very easy website. It’s CJTU.org. It’s pretty easy to remember. We also have a presence on Facebook and Instagram under the same name, so we’re pretty easy to find. And just as a side note, you mentioned Tenkara. One of the things that, now that I’m once again president, I’m gonna be looking this year. We run a number of fly casting clinics, and there seems to be a growing interest in our area in Tenkara. We’ve done a number of presentations, both myself and Lou DiGena have provided presentations to about Tenkara to TU chapters and other fishing organizations within the state, and there is a growing interest so we are gonna be adding or my plans are to add a Tenkara class to our fly fishing education classes that we we run so I’m looking forward to doing that.
1:02:23 DG: Perfect. Another great opportunity for people to stop by and learn more about Tenkara, too. Thanks for doing that. Well, it’s a pleasure talking to you again, Bart, and if anybody is interested in that pan fish episode, you can find that at TenkaraUSA.com/podcast. And that’s also where the information from this episode, anything that we’ve referenced here that needs a link, I’ll be make sure to post on the CJTU chapter or episode of the Tenkara cast. Thanks for, again, for joining, Bart, and making time.
1:03:00 BL: Daniel, it’s also always a pleasure.
[music]
1:03:08 DG: And as always, I’d like especially think Nick Ogawa Takenobu. You can find his music at takenobumusic.com as well as our Spotify playlists. In Spotify, just look up Tenkara, and you should find Tenkara tunes with a lot of Takenobu’s music. You’ll find any information referenced to this podcast at TenkaraUSA.com/podcast. Just find the link to this podcast episode and you’ll find any photos, links, or any information referenced right there. This song is called Voyage Across the sea by Takenobu.