12 Years a Slave...to capitalism and it's inability to give us a local fly shop.

 First off, holy shit I'm writing in this thing again. Why?

 

   

But more importan...oh for fuck's sake none of this is important. It's a glorified girl's middle school diary where a fatman cries about fishing or some shit.. but.. Whatever.. On topic, just over 12 years ago I complained about the only fucking fly shop our shitty location can hold.

 

And now I want to complain about it again.

 

Because it's been gone for years, I don't even know how fucking long it's been gone but it's sure as shit not there anymore. I went to the Little Lehigh for the first time in I dunno, a decade, and there it sits.. the old Heritage Fly Shop. 

I regret not taking a closer picture of the front door where you used to step down into the steps now filled with weeds. The flower bed/rod holder is still partially there, but slowly rotting as is the bench and one last picnic table. 

How is this the best we can do, Lehigh Valley? How is it that there's nothing left but the empty shell of this place, which admittedly was doomed from the constant flooding, or we drive 45 minutes to Bass Pro/Cabela's? There's still a couple up north in the Pocono's, I recently discovered Classic Fly Fisherman in Lansdale but... the Lehigh Valley, the third largest metro area in Pennsylvania... Nothing.

Not only nothing, less than nothing. A string of failures.

Heritage, formerly Little Lehigh. Again, a labour of love but doomed by sitting on a fucking flood plain where everything is developed now and the waters run hard and high and with every rain. 

There was that shitty Orvis place with the shyster by Dorney Park. Charlie, should you ever read this: Fuck off. There was another Orvis store in Bethlehem in the old Orr's building once, too. And that, as far as I can remember, is it. 

The thing is, even though the Little Lehigh Fly Shop was run by a legendary curmudgeon (who, admittedly, was always nice to me and seemingly really liked my kids), it was dependable.  It was a labour of love by Rod to keep it up and running, and when Rod retired and moved off to go play trout bum and Dave picked it up it was the same thing.

 Those guys fought to give us something more, more than just an Orvis shop. And it was ours. 

And now it's all gone. And its sad to see it there just empty. I'd take it back under either one of those guys again, even if it was a slog to get through, kinda musty, and small. I'd like to have a place to sit down wither other guys who fish. Talk about dumb crap. Watch cute girls in jogging shorts. Etc.

Speaking of, I didn't remember the plaque in the picture there to the right, but evidently in the old image it was there. I was surprised that it was in that old picture in the old entry, but more than reminiscing on Al Miller, who's Al's Rat I still tie and use (using original brown monocord and muskrat bought from Rod at the original shop!)

But it reminds me of someone else. Ed Mauer, aka Heritage Angler on the various Internet forums, and general fixture (not unlike Al) at the Little Lehigh for a long time. Ed passed away when I was off and gone. I don't know the details, but I know the last few times I was out fishign this year, since I learned, that everytime I think of Ed.

He was a good guy. If it wasn't for him, I would never have kept at this. I'd never have met multiple famous names. I'd never would've had a chance to help others or myself, and now he's gone and I'll never get that chance to thank him.

We could all stand to be a lot more like Ed. I miss ya, buddy. I'm sorry we didn't have more time together, and I'm sorry I wasn't around when you needed folks.