Fall and Pipes: Made for Each Other
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Fred Brown - Oct 1, 2024
- 5 min read
Now that the gritty tooth of summer is loosening its grip a bit, the feel of fall is faintly signaling its changes just around the corner.
Warm days and cool nights, which begin in higher elevations, tell trees that the weather is changing (no, Pundit is not a meteorologist. Just an interested watcher of trees!).
Change in trees signals it is time to halt the production of chlorophyll. That’s the green stuff that gives tree leaves their color, doncha know!
Cooler nights work to close the veins in leaves, producing more red than green color, or something.
It’s like the legend Red Smith, sports columnist for several newspapers including the New York Herald Tribune and the New York Times, once sayeth: “Writing is easy. All you have to do is sit down at the typewriter, cut open a vein, and bleed.”
Trees author their own stories in the fall.
And that brings Pundit to something of a point here. Fall is for taking short walks (ahem, for some of us these days). A pipe in hand. Quick pipe puffing, ogling the beauty surrounding us. It’s free for the most part in neighborhoods. But big national parks are another matter these days. Charges have emerged for some visitors just arriving at a specific time! Money Ball!
Pundit loves this time of year with a good aromatic blend, or a sweet Virginia with just a touch of perique or one of those special blends that Jeremy Reeves cooks up for Cornell & Diehl. I especially enjoy his English blends, and always the return of Golden Days of Yore, an annual (pull for its continuation), and a couple of other of Reeves’ Small Batch productions for SmokingPipes.com. Such as Steamworks, a flake with old Red Virginias, perique, and some oriental tobaccos.
For a wonderful read on the versatile Virginia Red Flake, read SPC.com’s Chuck Stanion in his splendid story on “The Versatility of Red Virginia: Carolina Red Flake Sept. 20, 2024, in Tobacco Talk.”
The piece is a Masters Class on blending Red Virginias, with even a state of Georgia version. It is so well worth reading. Reeves compares the versatility of Red Virginias to variations of different teas.
There are so many great fall smoking blends that Pundit has a challenging time choosing what goes with a solid walk in the woods. At times, Pundit closes his eyes, reaches into the cellar, and picks out a batch of something.
Maxim at Pipes2Smoke has said it best:
Sept. 20, 2024
“On Sunday it will be the fall equinox, the sort of official start date. I like many others will start reorganizing my tobaccos. Fall means, to me, heavier and fuller tobaccos that smoke slower. English Mixtures, think Latakia, oriental tobaccos, and some full flakes with Latakia. And the pipe get(s) bigger to carry these more robust tobaccos. To me fall in the North East is the best pipe smoking time of year. No, death defying humidity so the mixes smoke far better in every way and we enjoy them more that continues till next spring. When it starts getting humid again. Not a big deal but it is fun to mark the passing of the seasons.”
For me, It’s all about enjoying nature, both with pipe and tobacco, and a stroll through the colors. There are interesting stops along the way, such as a mighty stream, rushing toward its ultimate connection with a larger body of water.
And just a quick note on the Madison River, one of Pundit’s recent trips to a beautiful legendary stream, and bucket list musts.
This was one of those five-star trips. Only, it had been years in the making and realization.
As Pundit has written before, I was a flyfishing-aholic! In my younger days, I waded rivers in Georgia, Arkansas, Missouri, Upstate New York, and the Upper Peninsula in Michigan. I even pulled off a float trip on the Snake River in Idaho, and a quick one-day fishing the Yellowstone River in Yellowstone Park, a true gold medal experience. But I kept a constant eye on grazing buffaloes. The great beasts were not particularly happy about my presence.
But as all the years flew by, I yearned to cast flies over some of the legendary streams: the Madison River in Montana, especially.
I got that chance in September when Guy Bartle, a dear friend and long-time flyfishing buddy, and the finest fly caster and angler I have ever known, invited me to join him in a float trip on the Madison.
If you are still with me, this is not precisely a pipe-smoking adventure. In the past years, I eagerly carried pipes and tobaccos with me to many rivers and stream banks. But not this time. Guy is not a pipe smoker, and the Madison River was not the proper place to pop out a pipe. Especially in 20-30 miles per hour blustery winds.
We put in at a place called the Palisades where the river rippled in white, curly waves. Spray whipped a bit from the wave crests. Our expert guide, Scotty Hall of his Big Sky On the Fly outfitters in Big Sky, Mont., says “I love stripping streamers!”
For you uninitiated fly fishers, a streamer is a longish flashy fly that is so attractive to large brown trout on the Madison River.
To say that Pundit was in a state of bliss is putting it too mildly. He was giddy with delight.
Now a Pipe Smoker of the Past: Niels Bohr, was born Oct. 7, 1885, in Copenhagen, Denmark, and died Nov. 18, 1962, in his hometown.
He won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922 for his theory in quantum physics. Bohr and Albert Einstein, another famous pipe smoker of the past, were friends and colleagues. They also conducted friendly debates over time about quantum physics, a wee bit over Pundit’s head.
If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet—Neils Bohr.
Fall is a time for pipes and a walk in the woods!
Written by Fred Brown
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