Not everyone has the space to store a boat and trailer. This is especially true for folks who live close to the center of the state’s major cities. An apartment in San Jose, San Francisco, or Los Angeles may be great for a short daily commute and ready access to the city’s night life, but it is unlikely to have room for a boat, and even a kayak or canoe may be impractical. For many fly-fishing urbanites, high-density living often means limiting their watercraft to waders. Even if you have the room on your property or can park a trailer on the street without getting a parking ticket or the stink eye from your neighbors, there’s quite a bit of work involved in going fishing with a boat. This is usually not a problem if the trip is planned ahead of time and you have a buddy who can help with the myriad things that need to be done to ensure a safe and successful excursion. But what if your friend is busy doing something else, or you have only a few hours free? If there’s a wide-open bite, you may make the effort. But as we all know, such magical conditions are not exactly common. Getting a boat ready for a short fishing session seems like a lot of hassle for questionable reward. We rationalize that it would be better to do something else and end up cleaning the kitchen or watching videos of other people fly fishing. Sound familiar?
Fortunately, there is a solution to these trip killers — inflatable watercraft. Depending on your budget and needs, you can spend anything from $100 to $1,500 and get a reliable craft that weighs less than three well-fed dachshunds, takes up less space than a 60-quart cooler, and can be ready to fish in less time than it takes to cook a frozen pizza. This really is a case where less is more.
Float Tubes
I am not sure who invented the float tube, but would not be at all surprised if it was a Depression-era teenager who saw everything in life through the prism of angling. Why screw around with kids playing baseball or some other pointless
sport, when a piece of canvas and a belt could convert an old truck inner tube into a fishing Cadillac? Whether this person was a genius is a debate for more scholarly minds than mine. What I can say without reservation is that the float tube has made fly fishing lakes and ponds a whole lot more practical and effective.
My first float tube was little more than a 20-inch truck-tire inner tube covered in green nylon cloth. I got it in 1988, and I think it cost me $80. With a pair of boil-in-the-bag neoprene waders and some cheap boogie-boarding fins, I spent many blissful hours paddling around ponds and lakes chasing trout, stripers, largemouth bass, bluegills, and crappies. Modern float tubes have dumped the truck inner tube and use durable, lightweight plastic bladders instead. The original O-shaped floating donut format is still popular, but isn’t the only game in town. Float tubes are also available in three other “letter” formats: U, V, and H.
Some anglers swear by the original round (O) design. Lee Haskin, whose company and inquisitive mind I have enjoyed for over a quarter of a century, probably spends more time in a float tube than most folks spend in front of the TV tube. Lee prefers round tubes, because he can use the front of the tube as a leg brace, which allows him to “shovel” water with his fins, instead of flapping them like a skin diver. He feels this allows him to exert more power on his paddling strokes. This seems to make sense from a biomechanical perspective. Lee regularly fishes for stripers in San Luis Reservoir, which at almost 20 square miles is not your average farm pond (though much of its water does go to Central Valley farms). When you need to paddle long distances in a float tube, any increase in paddling efficiency is important. Lee probably understands that better than most tubers. If there is a downside to the O-shaped design, it is the spastic break dance needed to get in and out of the device. There’s simply no graceful way to worm your legs and posterior into or out of the tube when your feet are shod in the aquatic equivalent of oversize clown shoes. This probably makes the O-shaped tube less desirable for anyone who is unsteady on their feet.
U, V, and H-shaped float tubes provide a choreographically less challenging entry and exit routine. You simply plop your behind into the seat, slip on your fins, install the front bar, and off you go. These tube designs are a bit more hydrodynamically efficient than the O-shaped tubes, which may help compensate for the lack of a front leg brace. A number of open-front tubes come with elevated seating, which can be a help with casting, since the fly line will be a few inches higher during the casting stroke. You can, of course, address this with a longer rod, but casting with a longer stick can result in more strain on your wrist. Perhaps the best reason to get a tube with elevated seating, however, has nothing to do with casting mechanics. Unlike penguins, ducks, and frogs, your gluteus maximus and gonads did not evolve to cope with prolonged immersion in cold water. A couple of hours sitting in a lowslung tube chasing winter trout can result in a case of numb ’nads. Trust me, keeping these body parts above the Plimsoll line will make you a much happier angler. The downside to elevated seating becomes apparent when the troposphere starts moving. Anything more than a gentle breeze is going to push you around. But unless the wind is pretty stiff (and then you shouldn’t be fishing anyway), it’s not a serious problem. You simply compensate with some deft paddling.
The float tube is my go-to craft when I don’t need to cover too much water and the ability to hold a position for accurate casts is important. For bass fishing on ponds and for packing in to high-mountain lakes, it’s almost impossible to beat a float tube.
Pontoon Boats
While it is possible to paddle quite far in a float tube, there’s no denying that it can be a lot of work. Your legs may be equipped with the strongest muscles in your body, but they evolved to power upright walking limbs, not horizontally aligned rubber fins. To increase speed and distance in an efficient manner, you really need to get your legs out of the water and substitute another source of power for them. This is exactly what a pontoon boat does. I spend a lot of time fishing for bass on a 120-acre lake. It takes me 40 minutes of energetic paddling to get to the back of the lake in my float tube. The same trip powered by a pair of oars on my pontoon boat takes just 10 minutes. That translates into an extra hour of fishing time. But this isn’t the only option with a pontoon boat. If you don’t have the upper-body strength or stamina to row all day, just clamp an electric motor onto the boat and let electrons do all the work. A small, 30-pound-thrust motor and lightweight deep-cycle battery will give you hours of service and zip you across the water at up to five miles an hour. Try doing that with oars or fins.
The other reason to get a pontoon boat instead of a float tube is if you plan to fish moving waters. With the possible exception of slow-flowing waters such as Lewiston Lake, a float tube is simply too low and slow to be a practical or safe way to navigate a river. Many pontoon boats are designed to handle up to Class II waters, which covers a lot of seriously good trout rivers and streams.
Pontoon boats do have a few downsides, though most can be managed without too much trouble. Perhaps the biggest issue is dealing with wind. Sporting two fat pontoons, these boats have a lot of surface area, and little of it is subsurface. It doesn’t take much more than a puff of wind to get your pontoon boat figure skating across the surface. You can counter this with deft management of the oars, but that means you have to put down your rod.
There are a couple of options that provide arms-free control of the craft. A pair of fins on your feet can provide some control, but the best approach is to use a small anchor. Most pontoon boats have a simple, readily accessible clasp-based system for releasing and stowing a lightweight anchor, so the process isn’t particularly arduous or time-consuming.
The other minor headache is landing larger fish. With some designs, it can be difficult to get your hands close enough to the water to unhook a fish. Thankfully, there is a piece of gear that solves this problem — a landing net.
What’s the best type of pontoon boat for fly fishing? Actually, it’s hard to find a pontoon boat that won’t fish well. I could make all kinds of technical observations about metal-frame, folding-frame, or frameless designs, pontoon size and shape, and the all-important cup holder issue, but the answer is pretty simple. All you really need to do is identify a size/weight and price range that works for you and let your favorite search engine whittle down the options.
Kayaks, Boats, and Catamarans
What if you need a craft that can handle bigger or rougher waters than a float tube or pontoon boat? No doubt you have seen folks with neon-colored plastic kayaks venturing far offshore or sliding down the river, laughing their heads off. Clearly, kayaks are a great way to access fishing spots far away from the madding crowds, but for many years, the inflatable versions were very flimsy affairs — fine for kids paddling around the edge of a shallow lake in the summer, but definitely not something you’d want to take far afield or fishing.
Things are different now. Thanks to the low-dopamine, high-stimulus-threshold folks who brought us whitewater kayaking, you can now purchase inflatable kayaks that are rugged enough to withstand serious abuse. Several manufacturers have developed designs specifically for fishing. These kayaks feature a wide beam and rigid floor and are so stable that you really can stand in them while casting. Light and buoyant, they can even take you places where a hard hull may not be able to go. I recently took one down a local river that, thanks to the drought, has become exceedingly shallow in some spots. I had no trouble sliding through water that was barely four inches deep. Folks who hunt carp or trout feeding in the shallows will be able to access waters that others have most likely written off as inaccessible. I have plans for hunting carp in waters that are technically wetlands. No other watercraft would get me anywhere near these fish. (Inflatable kayaks worth examining include those from Innova, Sea Eagle, NRS, and Saturn.)
If you want something more stable than a kayak, there are a number of boats and catamarans that come in a blow-up format. Granted, these tend to weigh a little more and take up a bit more space, but most will still fit quite nicely into the back of a hatchback or wagon, and with the aid of a trolley, they can be moved around without needing to book a hernia operation at the local hospital. Powered by an electric trolling motor or a small gas motor, these boats provide almost all of the convenience of a hard hull.
Accessories
There are a few things that will make owning an inflatable craft easier and safer. Without doubt, the first order of business is to get yourself a life vest. Even if your surname is Phelps or Ledecky, don’t think about going on the water without a personal flotation device. Quite frankly, I can’t imagine a good reason (aside from a very limited budget) why anyone wouldn’t wear an inflatable life vest. They are so small and light that they won’t hinder your casting. You’ll quickly forget you’re wearing it, which means you will be able to focus on your angling.
Next on the list is an electric air pump that plugs into your car’s power outlet. While it perhaps is not necessary for a float tube, you’ll quickly grow tired of manually pumping the bladders on a pontoon boat, kayak, or catamaran. Most of these pumps are high-volume, low-pressure units, which means they will do a great job of putting air into the bladders, but may not quite get the bladders firm enough. A few finishing strokes with an efficient hand pump should make everything drum-tight.
Once inflated, pontoon boats, kayaks, and boats can be bulky to carry. To avoid a protracted bout of swearing, you need to buy (or make) a trolley or carrying cart to transport them from the car to the water. YouTube has videos showing all kinds of setups. I have one fashioned from two plastic wheels and a piece of two-by-four lumber.
Last, but not least, consider your clothing and eyewear. You are going to spend many hours under the sun, which means your skin and eyes are going to get blasted with ultraviolet light both from above and reflected up off the water. It only makes sense to wear a hat, buff, and long-sleeved shirt and pants that have a UPF rating of 30 or better. Wear sunglasses that protect against both UV A and UV B. The idea is to get fish, not cancer.
Inflatable watercraft make it so easy to go fly fishing, regardless of where you live and how much time you have, that there’s simply no excuse for having a clean house. Get one of these watercraft and go fishing instead.
