well well well.....it was opening weekend , the weekend just gone and lets just say it was rather challenging. Fishing was tough due to conditions and the rainbows still have not totally arrived back from spawning. Plus fishing in the back country isnt about numbers for me its quality of fish..

Arrvied at an area which i cant name and treeted to heavy heavy snow. it wasnt snow on the ground, it was basically down pouring. We assesed the conditions and though we would at least give it a shot. So we got on the quad and started heading down into the wilderness in a WARM 0 degree tempreture. The battle of constant constant heavy snow falls while fishing was challenging as well as the fingers getting to freezing point. Fishing was hard, with limited fish seen in the monring and accounting for 1 measly 5 pound rainbow.

Around lunch we decided to get out of this weather and head down into the kind country. The kings country was alive, with sun out and may fly hatches happening. Unfortunately it was just to early to see an afternoon rise. We were gobsmacked when we came across this pool see the proaly the biggest rise and have not seen a single fish. We fished nymphs and picked up a few nice browns and rainbows to 5-6 pound.

The Sunday: We headed back up into the mountains to be treeted with grey skys, and gave a look to each other with sigh and said welll we are going to give it a shot. Arrived in the area, unloaded the quad bike geared up, checked the tempreture for a nice 3 degrees. Off we went for roughly a 20 mintue wuad bike journey down into the gully followed by a 45 min hike down a gorge, which to say can get very very interesting at times. We came across the cool little hut that was bult roughly 20 year ago... going to stay in it in the summer time!

We finally made it down the system (river) where we rigged up and hit up the first pool. As always each pool we get to, we spend a good 3-4 mintues just watching from a distance to see what is "happening" in the pool. Bang a BIG dark shape appears and i sneak down hiding behind a rock and launch a nymph in its path, it was a rainbow and definately double digits , it came for a look but turned its heads and into the depths it went. Slow drift fishing is alot harder then fishing for tropheys when they are in feeding mode and at the tops of pools closer to the faste water. i launched another cast into the rapid , did a few mends and let it swung out i was on on!! hoping it was the rainbow, unfortunately a little 6 pound rat came out. if the fish sturs up the pool jumping every where, it shuts down the pool and its time to generally moove on. These back country fish are alot more smater then your average spawning fish.

 The fishing here is really really difficult with multiple currents comming into the one pool making line management very teadiuos and i was how do you say a tad rusty. We came across some 'pocket water" that was holding a brown roughly in the 7-8 pound mark and i launched a cast and completely missed the pocket hitting another pocked, and with frustration i yelled out that F*** , only for the indicator to go down and a hook up to a different brown! we hooked three fish from there and missed a few more!

we headed up the gorge and kept fishing and i was slowling getting my form back in line management with a few more fish. We came across my favourite pool of the system. I call the "trohpey pool". We watched and noticed 2 fish feeding, which one we spooked as it was right out our feet. I launched a cast to prospect the far wall on the back end of the pool and hooked up to a nice 7 pound rainbow which luckly i mangaged to moove the fish towards the backend of the pool and not disturb the feeding fish. few photos , next cast and was probaly my best cast of the day and i saw a nice big brown rolll and bang i hooked up, 10 mins into we were playing the game  i get back line he takes double back....we were calling it for a nice 8-9 pounder after seeing it roll in the current... after a long battle with a few touch and go moments including falling down some rocks and managing to hold my rod up  and keep tension on the fish, we netted it and my guide all of a sudden said " oh brett" , once he said that i knew it was double digits. A quick high five, we got it in and put the net in a pool where the fish couldnt get out to keep him in the best condition possible and photos were taken. A few possible magazine photos shots were taken and it was released, fish went just a tad over 10.5... We had another shot at a nice 9 pounder but after changing nymphs about 10 times he caught on and wouldnt even look....

Going to be a ripper of a back country season this year i think as long as there is no major flooding like last spring. The dry fly will start in november and its looking amazing! over all we saw around 4-5 possibe trophies and there only going to get bigger within the summer as the revoer from there spawning runs! i hope you enjoy the photos and the report! All fish were released in good condition.

all in all numbers were 7 fish saturday and 5 fish sunday, which is OK considering the weather conditions. 

Unforuntately the best shot of the brown cant be posted here due to the possible addition into a magazine.

Rod used was a 6 wt Sage z axis and a Kiwel genesis reel. All photos were taken by Peter Fordam from All Fly or Brett Hallam and a copy righted for our use only. (sorry this needs to be added in).

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