USA TRIP PART : Hi Mr Aleks!
By Goulven Dollé.
Saturday and Sunday are two special days, they're "In between" days, days of transit, of rest. No more fishing, no more business. We're out and about.
I leave my hotel in Sequim, and make my way to the Seattle suburbs, where Aleks Maslov, the boss of North Fork Composites, is staying, and has given me an appointment to meet him at his place.
I'm off like a shotgun, without having looked too much at the map, in Zombie GPS mode, but when I look at the route it's actually full of inlets everywhere, I'm going to have to take a ferry if I don't want to be forced to go all the way around the Puget Sound, that piece of Pacific that goes way inland, and on which the city of Seattle sits.
It's also tourist season there, and it's crowded, so I'm about to lose a few hours in traffic at the boarding gate, but it's well organized, and it goes pretty quickly.
Before my first trip to the US, I imagined, I don't know why, a rather messy country, a mix of cowboy and bad boy country. And in fact, from what I've seen, it's very organized, even disciplined, there are systems everywhere like in airports to avoid free-riders, everyone's calm, no one tries to overtake. The same goes for crosswalks, where everyone crosses at the green pedestrian signal, whether there are cars or not. Overall, it's much more Germanic than Latin. People are pretty friendly, and the first reflex of the people you're talking to would be more "how can I help you" rather than "I haven't got the time!"
.So I catch my ferry at the end of the Kingston pier, and after a fairly quick crossing, about 20 minutes max, I disembark at Edmonds and head for Aleks's.
. [caption id="attachment_1674" align="aligncenter" width="720"]I arrive in the early afternoon, well advanced, Aleks and his wife have waited for me to have lunch, it's super nice. We settle down in the garden with sushi and a bottle of white wine. It's okay, we know how to live around here too, it's off to a good start.
[caption id="attachment_1673" align="aligncenter" width="720"]
Aleks and his wife[/caption]
Aleks is a really cool, amazing character. Originally from Eastern Europe, he emigrated to the US during his early childhood with his family. In his mid-thirties, a former Amazon employee, he felt the need to change a few things in his life. He was recruited by Gary Loomis to manage the operational side of North Fork Composites, and they eventually became partners. Rodhouse has been distributing NFC for 7 years, so I knew the company before he did. We were already working with them at the time, but it lacked a bit of life, desire and drive.
To sum up Aleks, I could tell this anecdote, which sums up the way he knows how to put people at ease. It was 3-4 years ago, when he took over, and it was our very first Skype together. He told an anecdote, attributed to Hemingway, along the lines of "When I made my first million dollars, I spent half on prostitutes and whisky. And the other half I spent on nonsense". Instantly, I thought we were going to get along just fine. It had been time for a one-step pass, over two days, to see us in Rodhouse last year, also in July, I'd welcomed him to my home, we'd got to know each other, and I'd taken him Sea bass fishing, on my boat, with his blanks.
[caption id="attachment_1676" align="aligncenter" width="671"][caption id="attachment_1675" align="aligncenter" width="800"]
First Sea bass for him. Sounds like stripped bass, doesn't it?[/caption]
Four years after that first Skype, I'm at his place laughing as I finish a bottle of white in his garden. Aleks makes a video call to Gary Loomis, so we can say hello. I don't know what they put in their piquette, but my head's spinning a little.
. [caption id="attachment_1670" align="aligncenter" width="503"]
Yes yes, I'm skyping with Gary Loomis...[/caption]
We end the evening at dinner with his family, TexMex style, and I rejoin my Hotel.
The next day, Sunday, is another day in between. Aleks wanted to take me fishing, but I found out it was his daughter's birthday. He's also the kind of guy who sleeps in the office, so I'd rather he enjoyed his family and I declined. As a result, I'm invited to the little party in the afternoon.
So I take advantage of my Sunday morning to go for a walk. On the net, I spot a shopping mall that looks a little less daffy than the others. It's a sort of country village, with artisans, little restaurants, handmade products, trinkets stamped with authentic eco-friendly tree wood, flea markets, it's green, wooded and calm. I wander around, buying a few things for my family, and a few things for Aleks's kids. I find myself a little Mediterranean restaurant, and sit on the terrace. Fried calamari, a little Corona and you're my Tintin. It's a beautiful day, I'm in the US, sipping my beer, and I have to pinch myself to make sure I'm not in the middle of a trip.
I then join Aleks and his people at his place, there's family, friends, kids swirling everywhere, we eat watermelon sipping Chawdonnayyyyy. People are easy-going and cool, and I'm still glad I went on this solo trip, because I feel I'm getting more, that people are giving me more of their privacy, their home, their life, than if I'd been in a "group". We talk about all kinds of things, about Europe, the US, vacations and jobs. There's a lot of rotten stuff in the U.S., and I'm not here to talk about that. But there are things that work well too. On weekends, for example, this kind of American goes camping. There are lots of them. They've all got a piece of nature, by a river, in the green, that they pass on to each other, that they pass on between good buddies, a little piece of paradise, they go off with two or three couples, they fish, they go boating, they enjoy nature, and when they leave, there's nothing behind them. It reminds me a little of Hoedic, one of the islands back home where you can breathe a little. That's probably one of the feelings you get pretty quickly in the US, a slightly freer contact with nature and the pampas, than back home. Mind you, when it's private, it's private: you go into someone's home uninvited, and the guy can experiment with you if he wants to, and no one has anything to say about it. But when it's public, it's free. But it's not an open Sea bass, where you just smash the shit out of everything and then the flood comes. To understand the idea, let's say that if there's a lake, you have the right to camp there, and if there's a seaplane, you have the right to land there. I'm not giving a law lecture here, I'm just trying to describe a state of mind, where it's true that back home I sometimes get the impression that the field of possibilities is getting narrower and narrower. That the norm is everywhere, that the slightest discussion about fishing, drones, whatever (my current topics) very quickly becomes not a passionate discussion, but an exchange where the winner is not the one who knows best, but the one who knows the most about the laws. I'm not fooled, the US is becoming more and more like here, but the little air of freedom is still perceptible for those who want to listen.
The evening passes quietly, it's unusually warm in Seattle, the kids ambush each other with water bombs while the parents laugh, it's a cool birthday party, like in every country in the world. I'd like to thank Alex, his friends and his family for allowing me to experience these moments of real intimacy, in their own world, their loved ones, their life as it is. I wasn't sure how to tell it, or even if I should tell it at all. Having chosen to focus the report on a slightly personal tone, I'll talk a little about it, trying to respect as much as possible the universe of those who welcomed me so well.
Back to the hotel. Aleks briefed me on the next day's program. Dudes, I think we're in the paranormal here. Tomorrow, we're going bass fishing in the desert, west of the Columbia River. But how am I supposed to get any sleep? "
USA TRIP PART 5: NFC fishing time.
By Goulven Dollé.
Waking up early on Monday, I have an appointment with Aleks. We have several hours of driving ahead of us. Heading east, we leave Seattle towards a sort of near-desert bordered on its west by the famous Colombia River.
The day before, we did a bit of shopping in a Cabelas, as tradition dictates, and bought a whole bunch of small soft lures, from TP, to replenish Aleks' stocks.
[caption id=""attachment_1688"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""720""]We get into our F150 (I wonder if at birth in the US the basic equipment doesn't include an F150) and off we go for a few hours' drive. We take Interstate 90, crossing the mountain range that defines the green part of Washington state, a superbly pretty, dense, steep mountain landscape. We cross the Columbia River, and suddenly find ourselves in a desert pampas, with kékés, dust and sand as far as the eye can see. It's a super hot day, 42 degrees, and we're clearly better off in the truck than outside.
We stop to do a little shopping in an unlikely burg, something to nibble on the boats and not die of thirst, translate chips, beef jerky and a few cases of Coors.
We've got an appointment with Jason, NFC's communications manager, a former Lamiglass man, who's here to enjoy the day with us, take photos, take the drone out. He's a nice guy, a kind of huge Droopy with tattoos from head to toe, and above all a complete fishing obsessive. Here again, he's the kind of guy who'll always be more into it than you are, so don't bother trying, he lives and works for it. Fishing, all the time, everywhere, a real lifestyle, nothing else. Here again, I'm talking about a complete incurable.
We head out in two vehicles and join the day's fishing guide, Dave Perkins, another unusual character, member of ProStaff NFC and Edge Rods. He's a firefighter, ex-Iraq and Afghanistan, who broke his back falling from a chopper. He's the adventurer type, always with a story to tell, the joke in ambush H24, I don't know if we're going to make fish, but obviously we should at least have a laugh.
He stores all his gear, his Bass Boats, Pontoons, etc., in a Box area where we find him. He's got a 2500 Chevy Silverado, which is starting to look like a big beast. From what I understand, Pickups in the US are catalogued according to displacement, starting with the F150 (the little ones ^^), and ending, if I remember correctly, with the F550 (or5500, or 55 etc,) which are double-axle, equipped with trailer and semi-trailer attachments, really intended for hauling and lifting, and also, what I didn't know, very often diesel. The hood of his 2500 is higher than my shoulder, so it's not exactly a made-in-Europe city car.
[caption id=""attachment_1684"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""] This is starting to get serious![/caption]
So this time we're on a 3-car route, and at one point we leave the main road, and get onto roads that aren't passable. We join up with other guys in other pickups and bass boats, and it starts to feel like an expedition. There's some ProStaff NFC, some of their buddies. There must be 6 or 7 of us, making a cloud of dust from hell, with the following vehicles literally covered in sand.
. [caption id=""attachment_1685"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]I'm beginning to doubt the existence of this lake, everything is arid, we pass horses in semi-liberty, I don't see a drop of water, moisture, vegetation, in my opinion there's no more water here than in Dave's fridge.
Fishing bass in the desert with Aleks Maslov from NFC (North FOrk Composites)And suddenly, after ten minutes of wandering, it appears. Set into the rock a crazy lake, completely invisible from the now distant road. A mirage. Full length, with a bend, it's probably 500 meters long and 50 meters wide, with shallow areas of weed beds, Carp porpoising in the sun, crazy banks everywhere, vegetation on the north side, and it drops to 13 meters in the middle. Guys, this is going to be a wild ride ...
Dave has exclusive fishing rights on the lake, which is private, and he promises us 10 Lbs chickens like it's raining.
We put the boats in the water, Dave's pontoon, which we row forward, and off we go. I'm with Aleks, Dave and Ben Hill, a top guy who owns a company that builds bass boats and pontoons, including Dave's.
.And then, as so often in fishing, it's more complicated than expected... The sweltering heat nails the big chickens to the bottom, and it's not the orgy we'd hoped for. The active fish are on the edges, in the very first meters, and they're not big fish; the biggest of the day must be hitting its 50 cm.
We fish spinning and Casting, on small 2-10 grams. On the lure side on our boat we'll do all our fish on small green commas and small 2/3 gram TP shells. As usual, I try to play it smart for a while with craws and crap like that, like guys I'll show you what it's like to be a Sea bass angler, I try to scrape, I try to trigger cows in straight retrieve on the sunken side when everyone's splitting their sides on the 40 bass on the banks, and after a few Coors and no fish I give in, tap into Dave's box of lures, and try to do what everyone else is doing.
[caption id=""attachment_1690"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]Except that the fish are a bit stupid, they must be after my accent, and it takes me a few minutes to find a pattern that works well, cast flush with the bank, small linear slow, return the hand, do-nothing between two waters, and ferrage . Once I've got the pattern down, it works almost every time, and we'll do almost all the fish this way. We hoped that the evening and the falling cool would bring out the turkeys, but nothing, only another boat with little geeky teenagers including Jason, much more into fishing than we are, will manage to make some nicer ones on the surface, in the evening, but they're not the expected monsters either.
[caption id=""attachment_1691"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]We've been having fun with the 40 & company for a while now. The main thing is elsewhere. On our boat, we're laughing our asses off. We're boiling hot, but when I say boiling hot, I mean boiling hot. We talk, we chat, we put the rod in the pontoon, we step outside, splash, immersion of the spaceship, we go back on board, no worries in 5 minutes we're dry. We hurt the Coors coolers too, we're ruthless. We're a bit of a slacker boat, we do a lot of diving, a bit of piracy with the other boats more diligent than us in their fishing, really we have a laugh, all the while housing dozens of bass of all kinds, and little crappie fish.
Like a lot of boats, it's about a lot of stuff, and uh ... love of course. I think that with the flow that goes with it, the periphrases, the local vocabulary to talk about all that, these discussions will have been the ones I had the hardest time following. But don't worry, Americans are just as dumb as we are on the subject.
The day goes by, we're on our pontoon in a lake full of bass in the desert, drinking beers and laughing, I love this day.
Evening falls, it's getting more breathable, we take advantage of the cool again, get the boats out and put the ends on.
[caption id=""attachment_1693"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]It's a bit late for a quiet ride back to Seattle, so Dave suggests that Aleks, Jason and I spend the night at his place, a McMansion not too far away. A McMansion in the U.S. is a kind of mushroom town in the middle of nowhere, middle class and a bit cheap, where everything looks the same: the houses, the McDonald's in the middle, the supermarkets. A sort of basic city with endlessly repeatable modules and derivations. Nothing pejorative on my side, as Dave himself explains. The kind of city you can leave and move to another, without realizing you've changed cities. Once he's told me that, I open my eyes and look, and it's true that there are loads of cities like this, which look as if they've been dropped from space in one piece. This must be the counterpart of those departmental towns, where billboards by the hundreds tell you to get out of town and into shopping center territory.
We stop for burritos and tacos, and head over to Dave's, debriefing the day over a bottle of Canadian whiskey. At one point at his place, I notice some kind of big firecracker, and I ask him if it's AirSoft? He laughs, "No, it's not. Well, we're in the U.S.
.We end up tanking up, a little late, a little burnt out. It was a pure day out with the guys from NFC, with more great encounters, another face of the US I didn't know, people who tell you about their lives, their clubs, their buddies, their way of life. I immersed myself in this lake just as I immersed myself in their lives as fishermen from another continent, for just one day. I remember the water that seemed icy cold next to the furnace outside. I remember those astonishing discussions, so different from ours, when someone starts a story, the flow changes, the tone drops, and the others listen pensively. The story, the way they're told, the way they're given time, I think that deserves a book in itself. Another country. Distant cousins.
Tomorrow we're taking off early with Jason and Aleks, needing to be at 8am in Woodland, where the North Fork Composites blanks factory is based. Tuesday will be my last full day in the US. I'm going to meet someone I really want to introduce to you right now. I'm talking, of course, about the great Gary Loomis. American Legend.
"USA TRIP PART 6: Meeting with the legend Gary Loomis
By Goulven Dollé.We take off early from David's fishing guide and head off with Aleks, heading for Woodland.
After a few hours on the road we arrive at the brand-new premises of North Fork Composites.
Immediately I meet the legend, the mythical animal, I name Gary Loomis. He's not even a character anymore, at this level, he's a ...piece of fishing rod history.
Gary Loomis is the creator of the G.Loomis brand, which bears his name. Before that, way back in 1974, he was already working for Lamiglass, another American rod manufacturer. Before that, he had developed new blanks for steelhead fishing by assembling pieces of blanks. These blanks have now become the standard for steelhead fishing, and it's what allowed him to make a name for himself and join Lamiglass. At that time, everyone was making fiberglass rods, except Fenwick, who had hit on a trick, but had major breakage problems. At the time, Gary heard that carbon was being used in Seattle itself, in the Boeing factories. For 3 days, he planted himself outside the factories, asking guys passing by if they knew anyone working with carbon. At the end of the third day, he came across a team of engineers who invited him to lunch. They hit it off, and explained to him how to work with the material, where to buy it and everything else he needed to know. I got this story from Gary Loomis himself, who told it to me in Woodland, live.
Gary by training is a machinist, someone who builds machine tools. So after trying in vain to convince Lamiglass of the relevance of using carbon for fishing rods (they didn't believe in it), he created his own brand of fishing blank and rod. He built his own machines, and enjoyed worldwide success with his firm, G.Loomis.
.In 1995, Gary was diagnosed with cancer. Doctors give him little time to live, he's doomed. He sold his company to the Shimano group, in order to organize his succession properly. Then he takes one "last" trip to Africa with his wife. And there, as with all legendary characters, incredible things happen. The story goes that he meets a sorcerer, who gives him some kind of remedy. At that point in his life, why not give it a try? More than 20 years later, Gary has passed the test. The wizard's remedy obviously worked...
Gary worked well with Shimano for two years, then their views on their ways of working proved too divergent, and their collaboration soon came to an end. Gary was denied the right to use his own name commercially for years, and after incredibly costly and time-consuming trials, finally got it back. He then set up his own blanks firm, North Fork Composites, in 2010, which is the current Gary Loomis brand and which we've been distributing since 2011.
In the blanks industry, he's a Guru, he's been around from the very beginning, through the evolution of processes, materials and resins, he's trained dozens of people and knows everyone.
[caption id=""attachment_1705"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""720""]
And here I am in the lobby, in Woodland, and I meet the legend. To describe him to you, the animal is extremely simple, jovial, easy-going. You'd expect a star like "I've got my schedule like a minister, we've got 10 minutes, mate". No. I feel like I'm being groped, and I'm still laughing, but that's just the way it is... You don't say hello to Gary, no, he hugs you! He grabs you, he squeezes your arms, he pats your shoulders. I wasn't particularly stressed, but it felt really good, no observation round, no je ne sais quoi, in two seconds I felt like a piece of bamboo and that Gary was a panda, he was incredibly human, lively, facetious. A pure joy to meet.
Then it gets a bit informal, we chat in his office, in the meeting room, Alex and Jason arrive, leave, come back.
[caption id=""attachment_1707"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]We talk about lots of stuff, he tells me about his career, we talk technique, what makes a good blank, a rotten blank, etc. There's this funny moment when we're talking about thorns and nerves, and he says to me, "I have no idea what a thorn or a nerve is on a blank, but I do know which side to mount the rings on". Which is something I've been saying for a long time, "thorn against thorn", I don't know, if the blank bends like this, makes a kind of round shape, then mount the rings inside the round shape, for God's sake. And so I ask him if he wouldn't mind making a little video, and no worries, we do. It's in the baby box, and I was in the room.
Lunch is done the cool way, NFC operates a bit like a start-up, communal kitchen and rotating, everyone eats with everyone else. I even have to defend my plate from Gary Loomis, who is after my fried chicken.
It's a Dantesque afternoon, as I pass through the factory, from station to station, solo and "doing my blank", taking part in every step, from cutting the patterns and topping plan, passing the iron over the mandrel, rolling the sheet around the mandrel, cellophaning, baking, de-cellophaning. What I remember about all this, without playing carbon engineer - it's not my job and it never will be - is the number of human interventions, and the time spent on each blank. At every stage, experience, know-how and time are essential. Here again, I meet all the employees, talk quietly with them, I have the afternoon for that.
[caption id=""attachment_1714"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]
[caption id=""attachment_1713"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]
I asked Alex and Gary beforehand if they wouldn't mind if I filmed, photographed. Laughter from Gary and Alex, who explain that all the machines here are created and optimized by Gary, "they can try to remake them".
Making a blank in North Fork Composites factory, WoodlandHe shows me his flatbed machine, which is used to roll the carbon sheet around the mandrel, it's called "big Rollin helen", it's the one used on the big One-pieces, where the machine for making small strands, fly rod type is called "pee wee", little bit of cabbage (yes, yes, there are multi strands in rodbuiliding, it's just that we like it a little less). It's a machine entirely designed by Gary, which allows you to adjust the pressure inch by inch, which he says is essential. In a corner, he shows me some machines gathering dust, the common machines that everyone uses and which are the ones you see in a bunch of videos on blanks. Okay, they're ahead of the game.
I also meet a totally delirious character by the name of Al Jackson. He's the man in the Grayling, the Smoking Man. He's as well known as he is discreet in the blanket industry, and here again, he knows everyone: who does what, for whom, where, how, Al knows. It was he, for example, who created Carrot Stick, and so many other rods, he's a monument to the industry, now working at NFC in support of Gary.
. [caption id=""attachment_1701"" align=""aligncenter"" width=""800""]NFC, they're pure Carbon Geeks. They order a lot of stuff everywhere, to see how it's made, to see if they're still ahead of the game. I've seen them put their finger on a Rod and say "look at the irregularities, they've got an autoclave oven, they don't even know how to use it". I promise I won't say who. I've also seen them say good things about others: "Yes, they've got real know-how, they do amazing things, we know each other". Again, I promise I won't say who they were talking about! Usually when he pays a compliment within half a second Al says "But I can do much better, lighter" No worries Al I believe you.
I also spend a long time with Khiem, who is the boss of the operation, and who has clearly been in permanent training for 7 years, with Gary from the start, then with Al. We're going to have to keep up with him, because trained by Gary, trained by Al ... he's going to know a lot about Khiem. Among other things, we talk a lot about rings, ring ramps and their structure. Rings are really my obsession in rodbuilding, so we trace a few straight lines on a table and spend a while exchanging ideas, and now it's my turn to show Khiem a few tricks, whose trade is clearly more focused on blanks.
.We finish late. A l'Américaine, Aleks is the last to leave, and we close the factory. We talk, talk, talk. My time in the US is running out now, so I'm turning into a chatterbox. We drink a few draft IPAs in a cool bar by the Sea bass, and break bread. We're projecting into the future, talking about what we're going to do, because really, the trip's over, tomorrow I'm on a plane.
.Fuck it. It's late, but we're not stopping here. Aleks stops on the way home at a supermarket that's open until late, grabs two bottles of good California wine, and invites me to his place, "you'll be sleeping at home."
We're laughing late, his wife joins us on the terrace, we haven't talked about blanks, fishing and industry for a while now. Aleks and Veronika, you know that the return match is being played at home.
The next day my trip comes to an end, back to Seattle, return car, board plane, route Bretagne.
I'm not very good at goodbyes, so I won't be very good at this ending either. What did I take away from all this? I'll remember that the guys at Batson are fishermen, fucking fishermen, it's in their blood, they live for it, it's their way of life. Without being as sharp as them, we're similar in that respect, we live the same way. The guys at NFC are absolute blank geeks, tekos, blank nihilists (check dude). If you want the latest thing, the latest techno, it's clearly at NFC. They've got the history, the legitimacy, the future.
Now, at moment T, I've remembered people, meaning that when I think of them, those people are alive in me. Smiles, tones of voice, moments. A lot of them. So I hope that some people out there laughingly remember this guy with the totally implausible French accent, and if they don't, I promise, I'll be back.
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