Train Excursion

We decided to visit my parents' home today by train.

It might be first try not only for her but for me also. As usual, we used automobile, but current oil price made it difficult.

She was so excited for everything and was doing excellent in public place.

I could have enough time for rest, because they took care of her so well.

Thanks, Dad and Mom!

It likely will be rainy tomorrow though, we are planning to do something active.

Review of This Week

Wednesday;

My sister-in-law gave this treat as a souvenir of Myanmar business trip.

It tasted a kind of light and likely matched current season well.

Thursday;

As a business trip, I was in Nagahama.

One of treats there was the YAKINIKU(Grilled Beef)!
It was my first visit to TORIFUJI. Nagahama itself is famous for Ohmi Beef. But it handled Hida Beef there, and I loved it!!

Especially broiled innards, we call it 'Hormone' in Japanese, was best bet.








Sunday;

With my friend's family, my daughter and I had good time in swimming pool of my company's facility.

After that, they seemed to be having good time drinking yummy soft drink.

I'm getting used to be usual life in Japan after trip to China anyway, but I'm sure that I'll miss the fishing as next step soon...

Woodcut & Dumplings ; UENO Tokyo

Do you know the 'BANINTEN'? It is the annual exhibition of NIPPON HAGAIN. And my mother-in-law's woodcut work was accepted last year as first time!

This year, her work was exhibited again, so we planed to go there and appreciate their works at Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, Ueno.

Including her work, we enjoyed their fantastic ones.

Though it was in rainy season, we had fine day today.

In celebration of her job, we had gorgeous lunch together at SEIYOUKEN restaurant.

After that, we walked into the Ueno Zoo park. My last visit there was almost 30years ago! Everything looked like better than before.

As afternoon tea time, we stopped at this tea house.

The hydrangea at entrance likely made it tasteful.

These dumplings were so nice!

I seemed to felt unique taste of Japan in this season so much today.

LUK YU TEA HOUSE; last day in China

Last day, which meant moving day back to Japan, I had some time in Hong Kong to the flight.

This is my favorite tea house to enjoy having 'dim sum'. It locates close to Hong Kong station, 5min walking.

Especially I like its classical style interior.

Food itself tastes great with reasonable price, not expensive.

It was 2nd visit there, and I was so satisfied with everything.

Every time it gave me time to relax just before back to Japan.

Dragon Boat Festival; 2nd weekend in China

As it was getting close to second weekend, the waiter at every restaurant got recommending us 'Zongi'.

'Zongi' is the sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves. We call it 'Chimaki' in Japanese.

2nd weekend was just 'Dragon Boat Festival' as lunar calender, and Chinese people eat Zongi as their traditional custom.

It is called 'Boys Festival' in Japan. And we eat a rice cake wrapped in an oak leaf. It is my favorite!

I tried several 'Zongi' at each restaurant, and found there were some variations.

My favorite was Shanghai food restaurant's one.

It was hot sunny day also this weekend, just like summer.

But I didn't dislike it. Since I got to there, it had been cloudy or rainy everyday.

3rd business trip to China; MACAO again

On the morning of May 27, JAL flight 731 took off.


It might be my last business trip to China, so I decided to enjoy everything including working.



Setting working aside, let me report my first weekend there. Since I knew the MACAO's historical background just a little bit, I'd thought I would like to visit there again.

I found this lotus flower at the same place as last trip 'Monte Fort '.





This Museum was one of my destinations today.

I had new understanding which MACAO was essential relay place as trading, between Europe and China.









We picked this Restaurante FERNANDO, Portuguese food, for our lunch.


I'm still not sure what was its feature, but totally good. Especially waiter's recommendation, clam food was best.








As Sawaki's novel, I thought I should try some gambling.



But I didn't... It seemed that I didn't like such a kind of thing.

Mayflies; Our usual weekend

My daugther asked me to take her outside as usual weekend.

When we opened and closed the entrance door, noticed he was seeing us off by chance.

He, Akamadara mayfly dun(male), did shed its skin on our door! What a amazing location here!

On the way down to parking lot, we found another one.

It had only two wings, two tails, and its size was about 5mm. It seemed to be Futabakokagerou.

First, we visited Goryu fall. As you see, it was just flood because of last night's rain.

Even it was not good condition including weather, she looked happy to be there.

Next destination was Momosawa river.

We found the biggest mayfly which we'd ever seen.

It was Futasujimonkagerou's dun, and its size was about 25mm.

Mokagerou family is famous as its size in Japan. But we liked its pretty color also.

I would like to try its tying soon.

Hair Wing Dun again

Since I tried this pattern at last fishing trip, I've liked it.

I know CDC's superiority to represent fuzziness well, but also know that Elk hair's merit like easy to be dried.

In addition, it was so visible and worked for the rising fish as mach the hatch.





Especially I'm expecting mahogany's one for Akamadara mayfly's hatch.

Nasty pix... ; 6th trip to Oshino

Let me say something first.

On the way to Oshino, I wondered where I take my favorite digital camera, and noticed that I left it at home...

Which meant I had to take pix by a digital single-lens reflex camera with a zoom lens only. I seemed to be almost impossible to take nice pix for fish and aquatic insect...

So I got these pix by the zoom lens's one, they are not my favorite as I imagined. Although I hesitated to upload these, decided to do that just as my fishing record.

I had some themes for this trip. One of there was the natural drift to downstream. So I picked the hole in front of old Fujikyu hotel.

Ant
Late afternoon, there were some fish feeding the nymph around water grass. So it looked like that sight nymphing was best bet for me.


Then an aunt climbed my fishing vest up. It likely gave me a inspiration, so the ant parachute was tied as first try. There were several rises also.

It attracted more fishes than I expected!

And I hooked first rainbow up. It gave me a confidence though, some big boy refused just close to my fly. Which meant my drift of fly was not good. It should be my next theme .




Akamadara mayflyWhen it was getting early evening, there were some mayflies flying. So I changed it to crippled dun type.




That seemed to be good decision. This was about 40cm(16inches) brownie.

It needed more than 1 meter to take this pic because of zoom lens...



In his stomach, floating nymph of akamadara mayfly was dominate. It was not bad choice.

After that, I got two more fishes. I think everything is getting better than before.


Today's hit flyant parachute #18
flav crippled dun #18
hair wing dun #14
floating nymph(PT) #18

Parachute and Hair wing dun

To make the Parachute type fly beautifully is one of my tying themes.

I still have difficulty for attaching the hackle...

This is Hair wing dun type.

I hope they'll behave like Hirata mayfly, and deceive the fish.

River Watching; Shiba River

Shiba river is one branch of Fuji river's basin. I thought it should take about half hour by car from our house, but actually it took an hour.

After she enjoyed her bike time, we started to check this river.

Under the stone which was turned over, we found several nymphs of aquatic insects there.









I think this is one of Hirata family. This type is called 'Clinger type', which means it attaches itself to the back side of stone and not good at swimming. As you see, it has flat body.






On the other hand, this type is called as 'Swimmer type'. As its name itself, it is just good swimmer.

I guess this is Kokagerou's(Baetis) one.









There are all sorts of nymphs. I likely need more knowledge and learning. Should keep my eyes peeled.

HIRATA & KOKAGE

This late afternoon today, my daughter requested me to play together with her bike. I was thinking of destination, and picked MS river for biking and fishing together.

After her bike practice, we went down to the river and saw many aquatic insects there. Also there were several splash rises! Yeah, it was time to grab our fishing pole.

We began to identify the species of mayfly's spinner as start.

It had two tails, and green eggs. Body size was about 12mm. It looked like one of Hirata family, Elmonhirata? It was new to see for us.

We did see small one's hatch. That must be Kokagerou, two tails, small body(6mm).

Then the bigger one also hatched. It looked so lovely, and same as the first spinner.

I tried several pattern in short time, but had no luck...

Maybe they were so skittish or there were very few fishes.

But it was really fun to observe their activity and identify their species.

About Aquatic Insects

I've been thinking that I would like to know about Aquatic Insects more in detail. Last week I met this book casually at bookstore next to my parents' house. It was much better than I expected! If you are interested in such a kind of stuff, let me recommend it for you.

My rough guess says this should be Akamadara mayfly' dun. It was on the post box yesterday. His huge turban eyes told me he was male.

And I found its spinner and shuck also on the our apartments' wall. He must have molted on the wall! Perhaps it is a good place to observe their life, because it locates just by the Kise river.

Sight practice and Higenaga Caddis; 5th trip to Oshino

I've thought the spring were already gone and it was already early summer here. But at Oshino, it was still part of spring. The effective temperature which I felt was much cooler than Numazu, kind of cold still.
Let me talk about this trip as three parts.
Part1; Day time, Sight Fishing
Since there were not any rises except small yamame trout, I tried sight nymphing as first. Several takes of fish pleased me though, a bunch of mishooking made me disappointed. Even I succeed in setting a hook once, missed it... But it could be a good practice for me. My MORPHO Marabou worked well.



Part2; Early Evening, Spinner?
The number of rise was getting increased a little at early evening. It was hard to identify their target of rise, but I got several good reactions for my parachute, and spent caddis pattern.
This was caught by parachute type.












Part3; Late Evening, Higenaga Caddis? No, another one
We could often see their rises at late evening. I picked Higenaga caddis pattern as first, because I saw its adult in a daytime today.
Fortunately it worked! Healthy good one was caught by it.
On the other hand, I saw some middle size mayflies flying. I suspected my luck with Higenaga was just lucky one. The target of their rises looked like different from Higenaga caddis.


Kind fishermen gave me a hint later. His result of stomach pump showed that there were several nymph, which seemed to be a kind of madara mayfly.

I bought stomach pump and shale for my further improvement.