Rocky Drift Co.

I didn't grow up fly fishing. I found it, fell hard, and never looked back. Now I log 80+ days a year on the water — impressive or alarming, depending on who you ask.

Home base is Colorado Springs, which keeps Deckers within striking distance and puts the Arkansas at Pueblo, the Dream Stream, and Eleven Mile in reach when I've got a full day. The South Platte is the water I know best — but I'm just as happy chasing the small blue lines that don't show up in most fishing content. I tie most of what ends up on my tippet.

I'm particular about gear — buy once, cry once, own it right. Or so I tell myself. The quiver runs from a Scott Centric 5-weight for most days, to a little 3-weight for tight creeks, to a long rod for euro nymphing technical tailwater — plus a few more I can justify one at a time but never all at once. I preach owning less. My closet didn't get the memo.

By trade, I'm a developer and marketer. Off the river, I'm in the Colorado backcountry chasing big game — bow in hand, same tunnel vision, different terrain. Winter just means ice fishing. There's no off-season.

My son's already caught the same bug — which makes me either a great dad or a very persuasive one.

The best days usually end the same way: last light on the water, a cigar on the bank, no hurry to leave. That's the part all the gear is really in service of.

No best-of clickbait. No padded reviews of gear I've never touched — I fish what I write about. If something isn't worth your money, I'll tell you. The South Platte deserves better writing than that.