How old is your hat

[RBTraditional]

Lovely hat mate......but a cracking beard.......you can't beat a nice beard, for once us bearded ones are the height of fashion, so I'm lead to believe by my local post mistress!!!!

[Wallys-Cast]

My granddaughter thinks I'm practicing to be Santa this year. Bless her little cotton socks, she's "only" 18

Wal.

[MGs]

I do still have a straw boater, which I bought in about 1980. It still gets the occasional outing

[Woodytia]

My Christies light felt hat is around 18 years old now, still going strong, keeps the rain out and the sun off.

[Reedling]

My old Regatta hat which has seen a lot of water flow under the bridge, must be 20ish years old by now... and still going strong...

[Lea Dweller]

Very fetching Wal! I don't remember the whiskers either! I have amassed quite a few hats and caps, especially since I have become "Thin on top" None of them are more than 10 years old, but in the summer I have to wear something on my head all the time, so it helps to ring the changes. When I visit my daughter in Australia, I take a "crushable" woven panama type hat and a similar style kangaroo skin "Hat in a bag" both light in weight but effective in keeping my face and head protected!

[Chubman]

my old tweed ghille hat is over 30years old and im not sure it would survive a trip in the washing machine

[The General]

Hats? I think I have almost as many as I have rods. They include bucket hats, flat caps in tweed and moleskin, tweed deertalkers, both the fancy ones with earflaps, which really are great on a cold day with the ribbon tied under your chin, and those without earflaps, known here in the Highlands as "fore and afts". The hat in the picture cost me the grand sum of £3 in a charity shop. It was then ages old, at least twenty years, maybe thirty, and was probably worn day in and day out by a Highland crofter who bought it when he was a boy. They really do not make them like that now.

Two weeks ago, on the last day of the trout season, I went to a favourite loch high in the hills, to conclude the season with a new-to-me, 1930s 9 foot split cane fly rod, with a gorgeous slow action right through to the handle. The day started badly with a flat calm. A few small fish came to hand, there aren't any large ones in there that come to the fly. I stopped for lunch and lit the Primus stove (bought in 1968 at a sports shop in Glasgow), set up my deck-chair and table, brewed some tea and settled down to my sandwiches.

All of a sudden a breeze blew up sending a nice ripple from south to north. Then it stiffened at little. Then blew and howled until great white-capped waves rolled across the loch. Not to be daunted, I left my sheltered nook and walked to the loch-side. Casting was hard, but almost every cast that managed to be on target brought with it a fish. Then a gust took my hat from my head and whirled it out across the loch on to the water. A quick, cast, probably the most accurate of the day, and the hat was hooked, gently fought and landed. It was none the worse, but rather the better for the ducking; it dried cleaner and tighter. It is now back on its hook beside three others, and will be my choice for the first grayling trotting outing in December.

[Paul D]

Fine hat General, not sure I've had the pleasure? Welcome to the forum

[The General]

Thanks for the welcome, I am a new member but have been reading the forum posts for a long time.