Call it the perfect escape.

Combining the thrill of sports with the sanctity of nature, fly-fishing creates a peaceful sabbatical from real-world strife and everyday drama. It’s the sport’s escapism that makes it one of the most popular leisure activities in the country.

But unlike conventional fishing, fly-fishing takes quite a bit of practice to master. And that’s where Stewart Gordon comes in. As owner and operator of The Green Drake, Gordon has taught hundreds the art of fly-fishing. He says with a little bit of patience and a willingness to learn, anyone can take up the sport — adding that “it doesn’t hurt to have a little bit of luck.”

Q. How did you get interested in fly-fishing?
A. My Dad is really the one who got me started. I remember when he was teaching me how to cast a fly rod — he made one cast and immediately caught a fish. I thought, ‘Wow, it’s that easy? I’ve got to try that!’ Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite as easy as he made it look.

Q. What is the theory behind fly-fishing?
A. Basically, you’re trying to get in the mind of the fish. When you’re fishing for trout, you’re trying to imitate a stage in the life cycle of an insect they eat. For example, mayflies — which they commonly feed on — have a life cycle where they live on the bottom of a stream for a while, then eventually come out and mate and lay their eggs. A lot of times trout eat them in one of those stages. The challenge is figuring out what stage in the insect’s life cycle the fish are feeding on.

Q. What basic gear do you need to get started?
A. You’ll need a rod, a reel, a pair of waders, a vest of some sort, and a few flies. That’s really it. You don’t need a lot of stuff to get started, but there are certain things that you can’t go without.

Q. What is different about casting a fly rod?
A. With a regular fishing rod, the weight of the lure pulls the line off the reel. Fly-fishing is almost the reverse because you’re actually casting the weight of the line. The fly doesn’t really have any weight at all. We teach a lot of folks how to cast, and the thing we always try to make clear is that you don’t have to use a lot of muscle. Just because you’re moving your rod really hard doesn’t mean your line is going to go much farther.

Q. What are some of the best local places to fly-fish?
A. For starters, you’ve got Stone Mountain State Park, which is just north of Elkin. Also the Mitchell River, which is pretty close to Stone Mountain. Both of those are easy to access.

For the die-hard fisherman, there’s the Smith River. It’s a difficult place to fish, so if you’re new to the sport, you’re not going to have a lot of success there. But it’s a good place to fish year-round because the water stays cool.

Q. When is the best time of year to go fly-fishing?
A. I’d say just about anytime! Really though, spring and fall are probably the best if you’re fishing for trout. In the summer, the trout season slows down, so we do a lot of fly-fishing trips for smallmouth bass.

Q. What type of trips does The Green Drake provide?
A. We can cater the fishing trip to whatever the individual wants. If they want to go out and learn the sport from scratch, we can help them out. If they already know what they’re doing, we can cater it to however they want to spend the day. We usually like people to book within a couple of weeks.

We also offer a fly-fishing school a few times a year where we provide all the equipment. That way, people can get a taste for [fly-fishing] and decide if they like it or not. That prevents them from going out and spending a bunch of money on stuff they may or may not want to use again. But my bet is if they do it once, they’re going to want to do it again.

• The Green Drake is in Stratford Place Shopping Center at 123 S. Stratford Rd. For information, call 336-723-9070 or go to
http://www.thegreendrake.com.