Andrés Touceda

Andrés Touceda was born in La Coruña in 1960, but nowadays lives in Vigo. Both cities are in Galicia, a region situated just on the North-West corner of Spain. Galicia is on the map above Portugal, the river Miño draws the frontier between the countries. To the North is the Cantabrian sea, and to the West the Atlantic Ocean. Being a very wet region, thousands of streams and rivers run across the land. So, he had the privilege of practicing fishing since he was a child. He started fishing at sea with his grandfather, who took him, for the first time, to go fishing at sea when he was 5 or 6 years old. He started fly fishing 20 years ago, after watching some videos and reading some books about fly fishing. His experience, by that time, fishing in rivers was very poor. To learn fly fishing techniques was not easy. He spent the first season fly fishing without a catch. He stopped fishing at sea as he put all his efforts and time in learning the new technique to fish in rivers.
His interest in tying started at the same time that his interest in fly fishing. Learn how to cast a line and how to tie a fly were his objectives from the beginning. He got into a fishing club were he was taught the first steps in both subjects. After some time, he had a lot of fly tying and casting books. He admired how fishermen tied their patterns so he spent a lot of time watching their imitations and studying their techniques to tie his own flies. The most deep he went into fly tying the most interest he felt. He spent hundreds of hours, after fishing seasons, at fields and public parks practicing his cast. Names as Dough Swisher, Carl Richards, Mel Krieger, Joan Wulff, or Ed Jaworowski, became very soon his reading mates. But it was Alejandro Viñuales, a fly casting instructor, who helped him to improve his casting technique. Casting, tying and the understanding of the aquatic environment are three necessary areas to cover for anybody who wants to become a complete fly fisherman.