Top of the Park - Ann Arbor Summer Festival 2016

Ann Arbor Summer Festival runs for the last three weeks in June. It actually runs through the July 4 weekend. While the festival features numerous paid ticketed shows at the Power Center the real meat and potatoes of the event are, I feel, to be found at the Top of the Park. There you'll find free music of various types from singer songwriters, country, intriguing bands that defy easy categorization, and rock 'n roll. Events for kids as well as other special events happen there too. There is also a wide assortment of food available. Music heard here includes: Magdalen Fossum, Annie and Rod Capps, Annebelle Road, RFD Boys, and Hoodang.

Ann Arbor Summer Festival Top of the Park views of the stage and the audience.

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The Cantebury Tales in West Park

 The Penny Seats Theatre performing in West Park. 

West Park hosts a variety of events in the summer. The Penny Seats Theater (penny's eats.org) are doing two shows this year. Now, and the weekend of June 30, 2016, they're doing a version of The Cantebury Tales.

Penny Seats Theater

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Muskegon River Fly Fishing Trip, June 2016

Almost sunset. I'm trying to remmeber all the things you need to do to make the best cast of my fishing line. Most often I forget to pull in slack.

It is the second weekend of June and I am finally joining Paul Haan and Eric Doyle with Eric's Friend Jamison for a weekend of fly fishing. This would , for Jamison and me, be our first fly fishing excursion and it quickly became clear   that we had a lot to learn as we tried to catch our first fish out of the Muskegon River.

 

 

 

Fly fishing is a more involved activity than you might first think. I am confident that there are scores, if not hundreds, of species of flies that one can use to try and entice various fish to strike and impale themselves upon a hook. The flies you use change depending on the time of year, what is hatching, what is turning from nymph to fly (I think) and what the fish are doing. You may try different flies at different times of the day ; you might try using more than one fly at a time; you might move you line in different ways to make a fish think the fly is more like a real tasty morsel than not. Of course, most times you will fail to catch a fish - it's a good thing we about catch and release and not trying to put food on our tables.

 

While I doubt I'll ever be an active fisherman, if for no other reason than logistics of getting to fishing holes, I did enjoy my attempt at fly fishing. I am sure there are other people with very limited vision who fish, taking advantage of welcomed help by those who can see and know what they're doing, and I'm quite happy I was able to join the fishing community.

 

A trip video on YouTube is here.

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