Biography of Leon Links
 I
was born in 1953 in Dordrecht, the oldest town in Holland.
Today I live with my partner Jenny and daughter Christa in
Zoetermeer, close to Amsterdam and Rotterdam. It is here
that I earn a living as a teacher of Dutch language and
literature.
I was introduced to fly fishing for trout for the first time
in Norway during my long summer holidays in the mid 1960s. A
French fly fisherman, Monsieur Lascouche, from Marseille and
his son Michel took me along into the mountains where they
showed me a simple but productive technique for fishing
small streams with a spinning rod, plastic floater and
flies.
Catching my first trout with flies was a miracle; something
I will never forget.
Monsieur Lascouche himself used a real split cane fly rod
that impressed me a lot. I can still recall the image of
Lascouche standing in the river casting and casting …
From the mid 1970s, I started travelling south into Belgium,
France and Spain where I took up fly fishing again … after a
period in which (chasing after) other beings than fish
distracted my attention. Especially in the south of France
and in Spain, I sometimes met with extremely difficult
fishing. High temperature in the daytime, massive fly
hatches in the evening and small populations of shy fish
made me learn the hard way.
In the late 1980s, I met Hans and Ina van Klinken who
re-introduced me to fishing in Scandinavia after some twenty
years. The contact with fly fishers in Scandinavia - Hans
and Ina in the first place – and the beauty of the natural
surroundings influenced me a lot. The passion for fly
fishing got hold of me more and more. I started collecting
fly fishing books, writing articles, corresponding with
friends, designing my own flies and shooting fly fishing and
fly tying pictures.
I have been a member of the editorial staff of the Dutch fly
fishing magazine De Nederlandse Vliegvisser for some ten
years, and I have written for magazines in England, Belgium
and Italy. In September 2002, I wrote the book Tying Flies
with CDC published by Merlin Unwin Books, England and
Stackpole Books, USA.
My favorite waters for trout and grayling fishing are found
in Scandinavia, Belgium and Slovenia , and for coarse fish
and pike fishing, here at home in Holland. (With flies, of
course, but that goes without saying). |
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