Rena week 32 – 2017

Like last year a week planned for dry-fly fishing at Rena drifting from pontoon boats. This year I was joined by Henning, Anders, Gunnar, Inge and my wife Lise and we all had pontoon boats. We stayed at Rena Fishing Camp where the plan was to fish, eat drink and have a lot of fun.

Rea is a beautiful river but a lot of places it is hard to wade fish and that is one of the reasons we are very fond of drifting down the river. it also adds variation to the fishing but when you do not anchor up you only get ones shot at a fish.

 

We fish to fish that feeds at the surface but we also blind fish with dry flies and that can be quite productive when you have learned where to do your fishing. The trouts are wild thoiugh some fish are stocked and they are marked with the fat fin cut off. I have now caught probably more than 200 trout and still haven´t seen any stocked trout. The largest trout are caught at nighttime but we did not fish in the dark so for us nice fish are in the 35 – 40 cm range.

 

Here Lise has hooked at trout

And presenting the fish before release

 

I normally fish primarily for trout but when I see a grayling I go for that as well. The average size for grayling is very good as it is around 45 cm. You may kill one grayling and one trout per day and they must be in the 30 – 40 cm range.

 

The fly I used most of the time was Dyret or the Animal.

 

It is an imitation of a sedge or a stone fly, not anatomically correct but it works fine.

 

 

When you want to release the fish and want a photo I seem to end up with two kinds of photos. One in the net..

 

or one in the hand. When sitting in a boat alone and  wanting to release it as fast as possible I end up with a bit boring photos.

 

 

There is a 5 km stretch that is only for fly fishing and no boat fishing. This is part of the fly zone that is very promising

 

 

We typically drifted 10 – 12 km so a bit of logistics were necessary everyday. We managed to transport all 6 pontoon boats inflated on two cars and a trailer.

 

Inge managed to find a handful of big very good-looking and tasting Karl Johan, one of the best edible mushrooms and we had a fantastic starter one night.

 

Everyday we started out with freshly baked bread. The eating is an important part of the trip.

 

  One day Lise was the master fly-fisher as she caught the two largest fish of the day here presenting one of them. We all used my stripping basket but they probably felt that they had to 😉

 

There are also many birds and we all also saw beavers so always a nice experience in the nature.

 

‘    The best fish on the trip was this 1,5 kg trout that I got in the afternoon after Gunnar promised two free flies to the biggest fish of the day.

 

It was taken on a Dyret like most of my fish.

We were lucky that the wind was very calm almost all the days and only one day rained away. We got a lot to drink and eat and had some nice fishing and a lot of laughs. I only paused one day du to my shoulders so that was Ok and I am sure we will come back next year.

 

 

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Frederica 25-26/8 2013

A weekend dry fly fishing for carp near Fredericia with Simon. We should fish in a big mill pond with many carps and as the carps were not that big we fished witn #4 equipment and dry flies. As I had never caught a carp on a fly I looked forward to this weekend and as the weather cooperated nothing could go wrong – I thought.

Simon was ready when I arrived and we started to fish immidiately as the carps were showing. According to Simon they are normally not that difficult to catch but after I had presented the fly to a LOT of carps without any reaction I realized that this was about being persistent and keep fishing until a carp grabbed the fly for unknown reasons – a bit like mullet fly fishing.

Simon – later named the Carp King – hooked a fish the first evening

 

and here it is – a nice 3 lb. carp

 

Here presented by the King.

Simon got two carps the first evening while I was not even close despite I used some of Simons flies. The next day Simon got two more and once I had a carp that kissed the fly but that was as close as I got.

 

Sunday morning Simen got another two carps and then I hooked this one. It was hooked between the eyes so it was not a proper take but I got a taste of what we were there for. I ended actually with one carp that took my dry fly but I broke the leader so I lost it due to my own fault and that is not easy to swallow.

We had a very nice but also frustrating weekend and I hope to come back another time but I also hope that the carps will be a bit easier next time.

 

 

Alvdal week 26 2012

A week fishing in Alvdal in Norway which means in Glomma and in Folla. We were 8½ persons if Olivia (4 months old) counts as a ½. Besides Olivia it was Inge, Augusta, Henning, Harry, Anders, Gunnar and my wife Lise. Most of us wanted to do dry-fly fishing from our pontoon boats as this earlier has been very succesful and very entertaining.  Here we mainly fish for grayling but trouts may also be around but in smaller numbers. The weather forecast was more or less awful with lots of wind and low temperatures.

Lise entering the pontoon boat for the very first time – something you need to adjust to.

On her second trip Lise was quite familiar with the boat and could focus on the fishing and not without pride she called me to take a photo of her first grayling on a dry-fly.

Here presenting the fish – a grayling around the 15½ inch mark.

That night we had smoked grayling for dinner.

after 4 days we finally got some warmer days with less wind and the fishing then really improved as there were more insects hatching and it was easier to see the fish and to cast for them.

One day Henning was hot as he got lots of grayling and also this 19 inch brown trout, which turned out to be the biggest on the trip

Soon after his trout Henning also landed this 17½ inch grayling so everything went his way this day.

That day we brought back a nice basket with fish for dinner and lunch despite we only killed a very limited number of fish of the fish we caught.

The largest grayling on the trip – a 20½ inch fish. The dorsal fin has fantastic colours that looks even better in the water when the sun is shining.

The last day was quite cold but there were many small mayflies and many fish showed to this buffet. That day I got around 15 fish with 2 in the 18 inch range and many  other good-sized fish.

Inge despite being norwegian and a fly-fisher had never fished for grayling before as they are eastfish to him coming from the northwestern part of Norway. But here he presents one of his graylings in very nice surroundings.

After a week fishing we were content and had our share of the action. I got more or less 100 graylings and two trouts.  I also three times saw beavers and one otter and a crane. I was also very happy that Lise caught fish on the fly and really enjoyed the fishing and the rafting in the boats so there may be another pontoon trip next year.

Hardangervidda, 11/7-16/7 2010

 After the pontoon trip in Alvdal I headed for a trip to Hardangervidda – the high mountains with Inge and Agusta. They had been out for a week and I had to hike 3½ hours before meeting them and as a Dane, my genes are only programmed for walking below 172 meters above sea level, I worried a bit about this.

On the 6 hours drive from Alvdal to Tinnhölen you had to be quite aware as the road was very uphill, downhill, curved or full of sheep.

The track was in most part easy to follow and the landscape was beautiful.

Both my feet had blisters after the initial walk probably due to too thin socks as I used the same boots as yesteryear.

After meeting Inge & Agusta we walked for another 1½ hour to our camp site, here presented by them. Inge wears his characteristic high mountain suit bought at a flea market.

Most of the trout caught was quite small and were fried. Inge texted me on the way begging me to bring meat as they were very tired of fried trout. The beer was bought in a cabin – 70 crowns which is like 12 USD – welcome to Norway 🙂

As were above the tree limit the cooking had to be based on gas. Here Agosta tries to cook behind a shield of rocks and stripping basket as the wind most days were very strong.

One of the better fish we got. This year a fish on 30 cm was considered a big fish. One night I jumped a +2 lb. trout  and that was my only chance of a “trophy” fish this year. The knot to the fly broke, so I can only blame my self.

There were a lot of stone flies hatching here seen next to an artificial streaking caddis on Inges telescopic Banzai rod for fly and worm fishing.

There were also a lot of this to us unknown fly. We only saw it around “our” part af the stream but they were numerous and the fish liked them.

Inge with one of his better trouts.

The last night we managed to find enough wood to make a fire. Good for the ambiance and we could also get rid of our disposal.

Despite a lot of wind and quite a lot of rain we had times with fantastic weather and in the mountains this really can produce nice views like this sunset.

 One night we had a rain storm that lasted more than 12 hours. My new tent and my new sleeping bag stood the test perfectly, but as there was absolutely no reason for getting out of the tent, I stayed in untill noon. With no books and none to talk with and only this view it was BOORING.

We had some cold nights and the days were also quite cold. Here the thermometer on a hut when we came back to the civilized world. The time of day is after noon. No wonder that I thought it was cold when you combine this with 12 m/sec. wind it is not what you hope for when going dry-fly fishing with 4 weight rod.

To summarize we had a trip with two days of nice weather and most days with too much wind. We got a lot of fish but no big ones though we had chances. The company was great and the scenarios were fantastic and the hiking out was tough just like you expect.

Hardangervidda 21/7-26/7 2009

My first trip to Hardangervidda which is the largest national park in Norway. We were a group of 10 people of whom I only knew one beforehand. That was Inge who I met in Los Roques in January earlier this year. Hardangervidda is a high mountain area where you are not allowed to use any kind of motor, so trekking is the way to move around. After a three hour car trip from Oslo we went on a 45 minutes boat trip and we could start walking to our destination.

Inge – also known as Dr. Rasmussen – in his out of the ordinary trekking suit, not like most Norwegians.

 

The area has some fantastic views, here you can see an ice cap in the background. The group was a very mixed bag as there was an evenly distribution of the sexes in contradiction to the normal fishing trips, which was nice and a mix of four nationalities.

 

The Flamish twins – Agusta from the Netherlands and Afge from Belgium

We started walking uphill first in a forest and later we ascended above the tree border to the plateau. As I am not used to trek I have say that after 5 hours of walking in rough terrain with a 23 kg back pack I was worn. I think everyone else felt the same. The first night we stayed in a hut Lagarås 30 minutes from our final destination. Next mourning we walked the last part and put up our camp close to a hut of stone with an oven inside which should prove very useful as the weather was quite cold and wet most of the time.

Our main fishing spot was located a mile from our camp and was a very nice stream between two lakes. The stream was with some heavy current and then 5 -6 pools. Places where the streams enters and leaves the lakes should be hot spots especially in the evenings but we did not see or catch anything in these places, why I can not figure out. Further away we could fish another stream between lakes but this was a typically dry fly stream and unfortunately the weather conditions were not for the dry fly as no insects hatched except for a few short periods of times.

 

We caught quite a lot of fish, but most were very small in the 20 – 25 cm range.

 

A days catch – many small fish but very nice for the frying pan.

 

There were also bigger fish and my very first fish – the only one on the first day- proved to be the largest on the trip. It was a very nice 1.33 kg (Morten brought a digital scale) app. 48 cm brown trout taken on a black woolly bugger with rubber legs.

I am too big (195 cm) for fishing pictures, they always look small. Or I simply do not catch big enough fish 😦

 

On day two Morten got this 900 gram trout. Morten is a convinced spinning fisher, but I think that he will admit that on this trip the fly was more efficient than the lure.

 

A 41 cm 800 grams brown trout in the net. As most fish it was taken on a streaking caddis. It was fish number 19 on an evening trip to the stream where all the first 18 were small fish.

Some of the bigger fish were graved and that was very delicious.

 

Others were pan fried – also a delicacy

 

The last day we could fish with dry flies and Klinkhammer proved the be the pattern of the day as many other times. Inge celebrated the dry fly day by wearing this special bow tie! When do Simms come up with something like that in Goretex?

Morten, Inge and I were the experienced fishermen in the group but everyone wanted to try fishing and everyone actually caught several trouts so in that respect it was a success. The weather could have been nicer to us especially to the dry fly fishers but we all had a great trip despite or because of the hard work we had to put into the trekking so maybe next year we will come back and get the really big ones.

Gudenaaen – Åstedbro 7/6-09

A short trip to Gudenaaen hoping for some dry fly action.

From the start I could see that the sea gulls were having a ball eating mayflies, so I did not have to worry about the hatching.

Close up photo from the main character of the day. Like last time I was here there were mayflies but not much action at the surface. Though this time I actually spotted a few fish that occasionally feeded at the surface. I got two of the fish – both brown trouts, one around 25 cm and one at 34-35 cm. Both were released as I always do in the streams in Denmark as the fishing pressure is too big in relation to the number of fish in the streams.

Omme Å 29/5-09

After two weeks in China as a tourist I needed to go fishing and I headed for some dry fly fishing. I started in Gudenaaen at Aastedbro and saw some mayflies – both the big Danicas and the yellow Sulphuria. There were not o lot of flies but it should be sufficient for some activity at the surface, but after two hours at the stream I had not seen any activity at all. Then I moved to Omme å near Filskov but here there were almost no flies. After an hour I saw a fish and made some casts for it and actually I got  some takes here by blindfishing. Not my prefered way of dry fly fishing but I had to do something. I ended catching five greyling and one brown trout but most were fingersized. I had one nice greyling around 40 cm which made my day on this boring day with almost no surface activity. Better luck next time.