25 YEARS IN 2023 !!!
In 2023 (already a long time ago) GourmetFly.com was celebrating 25 years of success and pleasure. 25 years of unique friendly relationship with visitors coming from the entire world to enjoy the outdoors in France or Spain. Let me express my gratitude again to all of them !!!
You are here on the mobile compatible website. Along these pages you will find several links to the original GourmetFly.com website better read with a computer or a pad.
My name is Nicolas de Toldi, nicknamed 'Nick' -maybe after the Nick Adams stories by Hemingway- I am French, I was born in 1958 and I am a lifelong bird hunter -I love dogs- and fly fisherman. I am an independant 'Field adviser', not a fishing guide, not a travel agent. I have a network of talented guides, hunting grounds and welcoming accommodation, all over the countryside in France and in Spain. We live -with Marianne- in the country at 60 km from Paris on the way to Normandy. We have family bases in the Pyrenees, Bordeaux, Provence and Jura
Gourmetfly.com is the foremost provider of customized French countryside itineraries
Paraphrasing a famous British ad for waxed garments: People who know the country, know why they need GourmetFly.com
There is no country in the world with a more venerable tradition of fly fishing than France, and no more elegant fishing experience available than that provided by Nick. And in addition to fine fishing in beautiful countryside, I'll put Nick's streamside picnic lunch up against that of any other outfitter on earth.
Jim Fergus has been a Field Editor and monthly columnist for Outdoor Life and Sports Afield. His work has appeared in numerous sporting publications, including Fly Fisherman, Esquire Sportsman, and Gray's Sporting Journal. He is the author of two noted nonfiction books on the outdoor life, A Hunter's Road, and The Sporting Road, as well as two novels, 'One thousand white women' and 'The wild girl'
There are giveaways, tells to an outdoorsman. The way his eyes are searching, always looking off in the distance, the paced effortless walk, the attention to detail or at least the details that need attention, a treasury of stories and facts, grace around a camp and a contented heart. That’s Nick. He elegantly fits in the woods and on the rivers of France as much as woodocks and farios. Nick provides an outdoors experience not to be missed. He knows more about trout fishing western Europe than anyone else I know.
Mark D. Williams has written five books including the Trout Fishing Sourcebook and Freshwater Tips from the Pros, and has written on the outdoors, travel and team sports for numerous magazines and newspapers over the years including SPORT, Men's Health, Backpacker, ESPN and Dallas Morning News. He is currently finishing up his latest book, Where in the World to Fish: 1001 of the Greatest Places on Earth to Fish, for Harper Collins (and Nick makes a few appearances in the book, by the way.)
Whenever I am in France I make a point of fishing or hunting with Nick who has an impressive repertoire of facts relating to the French countryside, trout fishing and woodcock hunting. He hunts over a great French Brittany spaniel and is as charming as only a Frenchman can be. You will not be disappointed.
Guy de la Valdène comes from an old aristocratic French family but is a lifelong American sportsman who lives on a farm outside Tallahassee. He wrote a fantastic American game birds trilogy (with much poetry): 'Making game', an essay on woodcock, 'For a handful of feathers', on the bobwhite quail and 'The Fragrance of grass' history of the Hungarian partridge in America. Guy also wrote the novel 'Red Stag' (awarded by the Prix François Sommer in 2004) and his much awaited fishing memoir 'On the water' in 2015 . He also released with Christian Odasso, the amazing film 'TARPON', sort of 'fishing Easy Rider' on the beginnings of saltwater fly fishing around Key West in the 70's. Actors in Tarpon were his friends Tom McGuane, Jim Harrison, Richard Brautigan, and Jimmy Buffet, (who signed the soundtrack). Thanks to Guy, I have had the great privilege and pleasure to meet Jim Harrison (1937 - 2016) in Paris. Fergus, La Valdene and Harrison used to go on a trip together once a year to fish and hunt with their beloved English setters, Labs and Brittanies. They would camp 'into the wild' of the American West but there was always a case of Bandol Tempier in the campers to be served with the catches of the day. A field 'art de vivre' that is rarely seen these days...
As an obituary, I found this lovely text on a Canadian blog, accompanied by a superb picture of him with "Louis de Cornouaille", the 2nd Brittany puppy that I had shipped to him from France to Tallahassee in 2009.
Hélas ! No word posted by Ernest Hemingway ! Just a word about him... and me. This website was launched for the centennial of his birthday as a tribute to a great way of life, an amazing talent to find the world's outstanding places and a unique capacity to enjoy the simple pleasures of the outdoors everywhere. No one better than him knew how to just sit on a flat rock by the river and make the sharing of a refreshing wine sip a memorable moment. Hemingway would have been 100 years old on Jul 21st 1999.
Ernest M. Hemingway has written several books featuring fishing or hunting scenes in Europe. He fished the Irati near Pamplona in The Sun also rises, and shot ducks near Venice in Across the river and into the trees. Hemingway & son Jack (Bumby in the Moveable feast) were members of the Fario-Club created by Charles C. Ritz in the 50's. Most of his favorite places like the Cafe Iruña in Pamplona, Botin in Madrid, La Pepica in Valencia, the Closerie des Lilas in Paris or the Harry's Bar in Venice remain places of pilgrimage and emotion.
Most of our vistors originate from the USA & England, but also -more surprisingly as it is far ! from Australia. The full list of 'nations' that have fished or hunted with us is -to our great surprise and great pleasure- much longer including South-Africa, Canada, Russia, the United Arab Emirates, Poland, Kuwait, Japan, New Zealand, Iceland, Argentina, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, Austria, Germany, Spain, Italy, Israël, Greece, Scotland, Ireland, Cyprus, India, Lebanon & Mauritius. Thanks to all of you, Welcome to the next ones !