Spring provides a fresh start. A rebirth, if you will. Warmer days and greening of the landscape tells me hatches are on the way. For my home waters and countless other trout streams across the country, the blue-winged olive hatch is one of the season’s first, but it’s also one that provides excellent fishing from the top of the river to the bottom. Not all hatches provide this full-column of opportunity—where trout actively feed on nymphs, then emergers, and finally adults.

For a lot of landlocked, would-be flats anglers, the last year or so has made travel to the warm, sunny places where bonefish and permit swim impossible, ill-advised, or otherwise difficult. Like most, I have only been able to fantasize about a flats trip. But, with coronavirus vaccination rates accelerating and pandemic-related restrictions easing, those dreams are inching closer to reality.