At risk of luring more physical fitness geeks into waters I’d rather not share, there’s a secret benefit to fly fishing, beyond the mental benefits spelled out last week.

Fly fishing could be the best all-around workout that’s actually fun.

This isn’t the Norman Rockwell vision of fishing, not sitting on a dock, waiting. It’s about walking and wading; constantly moving. Many different level of physical activity come into play with fly fishing.

From the dexterity required to thread line on tiny hooks to working the body’s core by (carefully) wading across uneven streambeds.* Even fly fishing maven Tom Rosenbauer points out on the Orvis Fly Fishing Learning Center that wading a small stream, “…climbing over rocks and wading in the current, [he] could burn as many calories in the same amount of time as [he] could on the elliptical.”

Rather than spend my time extoling the virtues of fly fishing as exercise, I’ll let the folks over at explain it with an infographic. (You can find the more comprehensive article here.)

Source: Fix.com Blog

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*A reason why you should always use a wading staff.