Fishing.
I have enjoyed fishing for most of my life. As a toddler, my partents often
took me out with them on a small fishing boat, and let me hold the rod.
As I grew older, I often went fishing with my father.
Years later, I again took it up as a sport when I was living on a California beach. While in California, I experienced the peaceful pleasure of trout fishing in the mountain streams.
Once I moved to Austin and got a boat of my own, I again dipped my line in the water - this time going for bass. Each place I fished was different from all the others in so many ways, but I've thoroughly enjoyed them all and hope to do more fishing in the years to come.
When I was a kid, my family owned a small travel trailer, and we used to go camping and fishing often in the summer. A popular place to camp and fish was at the French River. This beautiful river is loaded with freshwater pearch, sunfish, catfish, pike, pickerel and even sturgeon. The lakes are all shallow and rocky, and the forrest is easy to walk through. I used worms or minnows as bait, and light tackle. Sometimes I would also use a canoe. Most time you would be alone, and it was very peaceful. Pike were a lot of fun to catch as they were strong fighters. They were all tasty!
When I lived in Pacifica, Northern California, I fished almost every weekend. My appartment was right on the cliffs overlooking the beach, and it was just a short hop over to the huge Pacifica Pier. I caught Ocean Pearch, King Fish (sometimes two or three at a time on the same line), Flounder, Salmon and Striped Bass. Most often frozen anchovies were used as bait, but Salmon and Bass went for large "Mickey Finn" lures, and live anchovies were needed to catch Flounder. Note that for surf and ocean pier fishing, very long (12 foot) rods and heavy reels and test line were needed.
Eating healthy freshly caught fish fish - fillet them, dip into egg, crushed corn flakes, pan fry in butter. YUM!
When I lived in California, I occasionally went on a tenting and fishing weekend into the Sierra Nevada mountains, and Yosemite Valley in particular. Incrediby beautiful. There were some wonderful trout stocked rivers, and it was very pleasant to fish them. I fished with regular light tackle /fesh water lures and salmon roe as bait. I always wanted to learn how to fly fish, and it is still on my "to do" list.
These days, I occasionally fish Central Texas off my boat in Lake Austin, and in Lake Travis. The gulf coast is only a few hours away, and also offers wonderful salt water fishing. The most popular style of fishing in Central Texas is Largemouth Bass fishing, using light tackle and lures.