Driving west across Colorado on Interstate 70, there was a specific quarter-mile where the public-radio and classic-rock stations I’d been grazing through all faded to static and were replaced by country-western and preachers. The exit for the town of Silt was in the rearview mirror and the Colorado River was off my left shoulder. I’d crossed the Continental Divide some 90 miles back and could have made the Utah border in less than an hour, but it was only then that I felt like I was officially on the West Slope where the airwaves are filled with pain and redemption with livestock reports on the hour.

We published a short first-person essay by fly fisher Peter Harrison in the March 2010 issue (page 18 of the “Short Casts” section) titled “Steelhead and Wind Knots,” which included an introduction by Fly Rod & Reel editor-at-large Joan Wulff. The piece brought some feedback… enough for a follow-up comment.

It’s often said that the weather never gets too hot for permit on the flats. Even in the high heat of summer, when most bonefishing is done early and late in the day, permit are seen tailing during the middle of the day, in weather that is too hot for many fly fishers—particularly if you come from up north and are not used to 90-plus temperatures and high humidity.