FW: Extravagant Thanks To Each of You for Attending E-17!!

From Group Two's Kevin "CPA" Sweeney:

 

Well done. You do a wonderful job. We are grateful for the world class fishing and introducing is to magnificent Montana

 

FW: Extravagant Thanks To Each of You for Attending E-17!!

Wishful thinking from Group One nee-rookie Mark Howe:

 

Thanks Ron.  Montana is indeed a special place.  Shana and I really enjoyed the trip, but we were wondering if we could get a boat where the trout just jump into the boat next time.  Yes we will throw them back -- after taking their picture of course.

 

 

Mark Howe

MSH Group

 

FW: Extravagant Thanks To Each of You for Attending E-17!!

 

A nice note from Group One veteran Craig “El Senor Feo” Benjamin (who event got to fish out of Craig during E-17!):

Hello  Ron,

Thank you once again for your herculean efforts and providing a life altering experience year in and year out.  Truly, nary a month passes without me talking of you, the Extravaganza and all that is the Montana fly fishing experience.  Cheers to you, my friend.  May our paths cross for many, many years to come.

 

All the Best,

 

Craig

 

Craig Benjamin, CFP
Marquis Financial

 

FW: Extravagant Thanks To Each of You for Attending E-17!!

A wonderful and much appreciated note from Group One veteran Joe "Great Wall" Arnao:

 

Hi Ron,

 

Thank you for your continued hospitality and support of all things Montana has to offer.  I genuinely look forward to my Extravaganza adventures every year.  They allow us all to keep an eye on what's important in the world, and they wouldn't be possible without your tireless dedication and passion.  You are one of a kind Ron, and I am glad to be part of the story.  Thank you again for being such a great host and cheerleader.  Until next time, see you on the river.

 

Thanks my friend.

 

Best,

Joe  

Extravagant Thanks To Each of You for Attending E-17!!

As I now have done for each of the last fifteen (count ‘em!) years, back in Montana après the multiple tsunamis that are otherwise known as a now-typical Extravaganza, I write to thank each of you for attending this year’s Extravaganza. 

Each year’s event in retrospect seems to have a character to it and, looking back, this year was a year of multiple impressions:  Group One not only froze their butts off but also had the pleasure of two days of motor coaching over the Continental Divide only to return to home waters to fish their third and final day in a driving and chilling rain storm; Group Two started off chilly but warmed up just as the fishing did for a(nother) banner year on the water; and as to Group Three, never in all of our years have we had quite the Southern uprising that we had this year where, festooned with a gaggle of Southern battle flags and entertained with Zionesque h.d.’s of epic proportions, The South, indeed, DID rise again with all of its wonderful accompanying softness and charm of presentation and acute consumption of Kentucky bourbon—multiple bottles as relates to the latter.

 

For many of you this was your first Extravaganza and, frankly, I had my eye on each of you to see just how our now traditional zaniness and total disregard for the necessity of sleep would fare with you and, in reflection, I congratulate each of you in your progression to now Extravaganza veterans, with the words of Group Three South Carolinian Juli “Da Teach” Jones summarizing the import of it all with her own post-Extravaganza posted observation that “a river now runs through me”.  Bravo, bravo, bravo!

 

And, as to you seasoned veterans, I am simply honored by your return visit(s) to this wonderful corner of the earth, where time has stood still, Mother Nature has preserved all that was there for Lewis & Clark to first see over two centuries ago, and, as our Montana Matters Troubadour sings in his now epic Montana Matters hymn about this great state, “where people still waive hands” ( that is, all the combined fingers of those hands, not just a miscreant subset thereof!).

 

As all of you now have witnessed first-hand, what exists here in Montana is truly special and I hope that in my small way that I have implanted some extravagant memories in your mental hard drive so that one early morn you will awake with the quietude of Montana paying you a visit, that on some special quiet occasion a smile alights on your face as you reflect back on all that you saw here and all that you did together, and that, as now part of your annual ritual, you reach out as we all collectively did to help those who are dedicating their lives to make this special state even better. 

 

To that end, thanks to each of you, we met our goal to raise $30,000 to fund and foster the virtual naturalist program of the Montana Natural History Center and, because of you, every school day in the coming years we will have extended to the grade school youth of Montana the wonders of Montana’s flora and fauna and thereby light a spark that may well give birth to the next generation instilling in them the awesome pleasure and duty they have in caring on your environmental torch to their ensuing generation(s).  Also, with our initial givings to the National Wildlife Federation this year, my now decade-old Montana Matters campaign helped fund and create our first Camp Montana Matters which I had the great pleasure of opening with twenty awarded high school students last Sunday evening “in the wild” at the confluence of the Selway-Bitterroot and Frank Church National Wildernesses, the combined magnitude of which is 3.6 million acres.

 

Indeed, all, Montana Matters.

 

So, as we put a bow on this year’s event, I take off my E-17 fishing hat in salute to each of you and thank you for travelling all this way to spend five extravagant days here.  I can tell you first-hand, that, as is our tradition and trademark, everyone and everything we touched this year is better off for the experience—your heart, your soul, our friendship, and the great State of Montana where, thanks to you, even the 1500+ fish that we collectively caught and released are better off for the experience.

 

Yes, it ALL matters!!

 

Best to all from the now concluding scene of it all,

 

Rock Creek Ron

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E-17 Thanks

A special note from a special, veteran Tattooer, Al “Good Earth” Baylacq:

Hi Ron,

I wanted to follow up to again tell you how great this last Extravaganza was for me (and Dakota).

 

Not like I've been going to MT forever, but I really struggle recalling being in a prettier place EVER.

The entire area is so full of life (at every level); Dakota and I discussed how 'one can actually feel the life' in the air!

 

Take care pal,

Al

 

Al Baylacq, Partner

Good Earth Natural Foods, Inc.

Group Three Photos

A delightful note from an equally delightful now-veteran Group Threer Juli "Da Teach" Jones:

 

Thank you so much for posting the pictures of our incredible trip! I have been missing the rivers ( not to mention the fabulous folk) since I left. The rivers now run through me...

Thank you!

Juli

 

The Threes Bedecked In Yellow!

 

 

 

Them Threes!

Well, folks, as shown above, Them Threes, indeed, saw The south Rise Ag’in with a plurality of its constituency from the Carolinas and the residue balance from the West Coast.  What a grand time it was for all, as each night, thanks to the flown-in assistance of Mark “Z-Man” and his now Yellw Hat doffing bride Julie “Z-Woman” Zion, the Threes were smothered in marvelous h.d.’s Southern style, all the way from bbq pork sliders to Pimento cheese blintzes in between three days of fishing where, get this, the weather was actually delightful—in the mid-80’s each of the Threes’ fishing days!

 

While the Ones and Twos fared more chilling weather but landed twenty eight (count ‘em!) twenty inch fish, Dem Threes lived up to their name and only caught and released three of same—one by Carolinian contractor Jeff “LJ” Sullivan and the other by yours truly, RCR, and his fish son Tyler “Lefty Clausen”, earning the first and last of the trio Yellow Shirts the fish size for which for the Ones and Twos would have barely passed for honorable mentions.  But that’s fishing folks, and by the volume of Southern bourbon that was imbibed by this masterful group the paucity of the moment was not lost on this group—not by a long shot!!

 

Every night’s boat report was heard to acclaim “my best day of fishing” by more than one Three, showing to all that it is the magnificence of the Extravaganza experience and not just the measure of the tape that draws most important measure.  For example, Gary “RX” Jones brought his bride of now 38 years Juli “Da Teach” Jones with him from South Carolina with the expectation that she would just be his “camera woman” but, lo and behold, once a fly rod found her hand and once there never left—catching initially white fish but then graduating with great pride to rainbows and cutthroats.  As you will see in her après fishing separate post of thanks, Da Teach now realizes that “a river runs through me!”

 

Thanks to North Carolinians Ray “The Garret” Garruto and Max “The Bag Boy” Richardson for bringing not only LJ along with them but also Palmetto contractors Greg “The Poacher” Caniff and his wonderful bride “Maryn County” as well as bridge builder Jim “JET” Triplett who unfortunately had to return a day early to attend to pressing business matters at home (but not before taking a Yellow Hat with him!)

 

And what a delight it was to have the “Sailors Four” from the Richmond (CA, that is) Yacht Club back in and amongst Them Threes, with two of them (“Little Richard” Deveau and Scott “Not So Flash” Gordon) packing Yellow to take back with them while “The Mamadore” Susan Hubbard and now-aptly named Cindi “The Relocator” Deveau carry their bags for them in due honor.

 

Bravo, Threes…indeed, the South DID again Rise again under your auspices and I can’t wait for the sequel next year!

 

Best to all from the now-concluding scene of it all,

 

Rock Creek Ron

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