After a complete renovation of  its  infrastructure and services, Cuatro Soles reopens doors for outdoors sports lovers.

This 60,000 acres estancia is  the top duck hunting destination of Argentina and the ideal place for Dorado fishing.

This distinguished member of Ten Rivers & Ten Lakes is at 600 km north from Buenos Aires. Ten Rivers & Ten Lakes provides taylor made programs, including lodging, professional guides and options of private ground transportation or by choppers / private planes

Information and bookings

info@tenriverstenlakes.com

www.tenriverstenlakes.com

Te invito a ver las fotos de Nomads!

El Atmosphere 2, la embarcación de Nomads

Heli Fishing experience

Nomads: Almuerzo gourmet al aire libre

Recorriendo los fiordos en el Zodiac Hurricane

Montañismo en los Andes Patagónicos

Heli Ski en nieve virgen

Inolvidable experiencia….

informes y reservas

info@tenriverstenlakes.com

www.tenriverstenlakes.com

El Paraná es un Gran Río, es una de las grandes arterias de la Tierra. Su enorme cuenca cubre una gran parte de América del Sur, abarcando el Sur de Brasil, el Paraguay, el Sur de Bolivia, el Noreste Argentino.

Aguas recolectadas en las alturas de los Andes o en los bañados del Pantanal, aguas de tierra adentro

Este gigantesco río ha modelado el paisaje y tallado al hombre que lo habita a lo largo de sus costas.

 A la altura de la ciudad de Corrientes el Paraná tuerce decididamente hacia el Sur, a esa altura tiene un caudal de 15.000 m3 por segundo. La margen izquierda, la correntina está más definida por una barranca baja, mientras que la santafecina está abierta a una extensa red de bañados, lagunas, islas bajas y anegadizas. El Río manda. La vegetación de las islas son pastos altos y arbustos ralos, precarios. No hay tiempo para un árbol, las crecidas periódicas se llevan todo, hasta los ranchos de los habitantes ribereños.

 Bramando se viene el agua
del Paraná
creciendo noche y día
sin parar

Ranchada, barranca, tronco
se llevará
con viento y aguacero
el Paraná
………….

El agua vino bramando
pobre quedé
ni rancho ni cobija
he de tener

Así ha de llegar día
en que volveré
a levantar mi rancho
en Santa Fe

Canta el isleño santafecino con palabras de Isaac Aizemberg

 Y en los bordes más altos habrá un sauce o un  timbó, tan obcecados, tenaces y enamorados del Gran Río como el hombre que vuelve después de la crecida al pago de donde el río lo ha echado, a hacer de nuevo el rancho, porque si, porque es lugar de hombres.

 Yo nací en su cuenca y ahí aprendí a pescar. Mis viejos tenían con los tíos un campo en Salto, Provincia de Buenos Aires y ahí íbamos todos lo veranos, cuando yo era pibe. Y en Salto hay un río, un curso lento y perezoso de aguas tibias y amarronadas. Ahí yo pesque, no sé a los 10 o 12 años mi primer dorado. Ay!

Iba al pueblo a verlo a Gabella, que tenía un bolichito con anzuelos y boyas, para que me llevara a pescar, adonde él sabía. Y él me llevaba, un hombre 30 años más grande que yo, buen pescador.

En esa época usábamos una caña tacuara, de 3 a 3,5 metros de largo y una tanza del 0,50 del mismo largo. Vadeábamos el río en vaqueros y alpargatas y con esa caña cubríamos toda el agua, mientras caminábamos río abajo. Pescábamos con carnada e intentábamos arrastrarla sobre el fondo. Para eso usábamos una boya grande que se bancara la carnada y un plomo liviano. Cada tanto subíamos o bajábamos la boya según fuera la profundidad del río.

 Colgando del cinturón llevábamos una bolsa de arpillera a donde guardábamos los dorados para que se mantuvieran vivos y frescos durante el calor del día. Así hacía Hemingway, me enteré más tarde leyendo Two Heartred Rivers. Y como él cuenta con sus grasshopers nosotros hacíamos con los amarillitos o ranas que usábamos de carnada. Llegábamos al amanecer y dedicábamos esa primera hora fría de la mañana a cazar ranas y pescar un par de bagres amarillos antes de que el calor los empujara a sus agujeros en el barro.

 Los pescadores nos parecemos, no importa donde hayamos nacido o la lengua que hablemos. Hemingway arrastraba también una bolsa con truchas en el agua y hace siglos un japonés pescaba igual pero con una caña de bamboo, que después, de a poco como casi todo lo que ocurre en la vida, se hizo Tenkara.

Pero mi primer encuentro con el Río Grande fue en 1976. Yo estaba recién recibido de ingeniero y trabajaba en Yaciretá, una gigantesca represa. Me mandaron a relevar la superficie del río durante una crecida y ahí fui y me pasé una semana sobre un bote de madera recorriéndolo.

El Paraná.

Poco al norte de Santa Fe hay un pueblo, San Javier y unos pocos kilómetros al norte está Cuatro Soles Lodge, sobre el río San Javier, el brazo más occidental de los tantos que a esa altura tiene el Paraná, y que conecta el Lodge con ese enjambre de islas bajas, bañados y lagunas del que antes hablara.

Timbó, laurel, curupí,

lindos ceibales en flor,

pago de indio mocobí;

San Javier donde nací;

no hay otra tierra mejor.

 Canta Julio Migno, el poeta del pueblo.

 El Lodge está siendo construido sobre el viejo casco de la estancia Irupé, y es el lugar ideal para alojarse e iniciar desde allí el día de pesca. El pez? Dorado, el Tigre del Río.

Allá fuimos con Raúl (San Martín), mi hermanita Vechu y Coco a pescar y filmar. Raúl es amigo de hace ya muchos años y el decano de los guías argentinos, él no quiere que se sepa mucho pero ya van para 50 años que guía! Vechu es directora de cine y amante de la naturaleza así que mientras nosotros pescábamos ella y Coco filmaban y fotografiaban peces y aves.

 Los bañados están literalmente vivos, miles de aves y pájaros habitan estas tierras bajas y anegadizas. Flamencos, chajás, garzas, patos, teros … crean un fondo rítmico, sobre el que trazan sus melodías calandrias, cardenales, choros, horneros … En este lugar la cámara de fotos es el compañero ideal del viaje de pesca.

  El Dorado es un pez fuerte, acrobático, luchador, hermoso. Sabes que lo tienes desde el momento mismo del pique … tuc!! … un mordisco brutal y decidido. Sus fuertes mandíbulas con dientes pequeños y afilados hacen necesaria la utilización de un corto tippet de acero, al extremo de un leader de un metro y medio del 0,40.

 Es posible usar diámetros inferiores pero el dorado es un pez fuerte y a menudo clavas uno grande. Hay una tendencia en muchos pescadores a usar tippets delgados de baja resistencia, interpretando así que la pesca se vuelva más deportiva. No discuto si esto es así o no. Solo aporto otra mirada. Yo creo que un buen pescador no puede perder un pez ni tampoco matarlo. Y esto ocurre a menudo cuando el tippet es delgado. O bien el pez se va con la mosca en su boca, lo que no es bueno, o conseguimos sacarlo del río exhausto y ya con pocas capacidades de sobrevivir. Hay que sacar el pez del agua y hacerlo tan rápido como se pueda para devolverlo con su vitalidad alta al río.

Por otra parte el leader tiene la importante función de dar vuelta la mosca, que en este caso es grande y con tippet pesado y duro de acero. Un leader adecuado te ayuda en el casting, es decir en la pesca.

 La mosca es parte de este balance. A medida que la mosca es más chica el casting se hace más y más simple, y al final del día esto se siente. Yo percibo esto incluso en la caña, a mi me gustan las cañas de acción lenta en dónde el casting es también más lento. El casting te lleva a un ritmo y a mi me gusta ese ritmo un poco más lento. Me gusta poder olvidarme de que pesco, dejar de pensar de a ratos, sentirme parte del ambiente.

 Durante los meses más fríos de final del invierno y primavera temprana se utilizan líneas hundidas, pero a medida que la temperatura del agua aumenta el dorado se vuelve más activo y es común verlo cazando en superficie, entonces lo mejor es cambiar a una línea de flote. La caña debe ser una 6, 7 u 8 dependiendo sobre todo de la capacidad del lanzador para manejar las grandes moscas.

 Ver los dorados cazando es algo sorprendente. El agua se pone nerviosa y las mojarras, las morenas o las bogas huyen despavoridas. En esos momentos se puede probar con una mosca grande seca, un ratón o una rana. Yo todavía no he tenido éxito pero los he visto tomar un ratón de un amigo. Splash!

La primera pregunta que uno se hace cuando se enfrenta por primera vez a los esteros y lagunas de la zona es donde pescar esa enorme cantidad de agua. Y rápidamente uno descubre las diferencias y los ámbitos. Canales de corriente rápida serpenteando entre las lagunas, arroyos definidos por el camalotal, como el Laurel o el Tejas, que a su vez desembocan en lagunas amplias y quietas, desagües de agua negra, como se llama localmente al agua más limpia que lentamente desagota las lagunas. En fin un amplio espacio de aguas diferentes para satisfacer las más variadas expectativas.

 Al releer lo escrito tengo la impresión de no haber podido transmitir la experiencia adecuadamente. Es una experiencia que va mucho más allá de la pesca. Pescar en este inmenso ambiente dominado por el Gran Río, lleno de vida, de sol, de pájaros,  es un viaje a algo nuevo, distinto. Y cuando te cruzás con los hombres del Río o con los gauchos que cuidan las vacas no te sorprende encontrar en ellos su marca, su fortaleza.

 Yo, al volver de allí, también me siento más rico, más fuerte y mejor pescador, ja! Pesqué unos cuantos Tigres!

 peleando a la corriente
he de vivir

 Canta el hombre del Paraná, y yo me pregunto si es que acaso hay otra forma de vivir?

 Para mayor información contactate con:

 Claudio Oliveira

claudio@tenriverstenlakes.com

O conmigo

alfredo@el-aura.net

 Alfredo Zubiri es argentino y pesca con mosca desde hace 34 años. Es además el concesionario de Lago Verde Wilderness Resort en el Parque Nacional Los Alerces.

 www.el-aura.net

Segunda etapa de mi corto viaje a la Patagonia Norte: San Martín de los Andes y  Ten Rivers Lodge,  donde viví e hice mi primera experiencia en hotelería y dejé pasar de apoco, tres años especiales de mi vida. Cuántos recuerdos!. San Martín es un lugar especial; le nació el turismo allá por los ´70, de la mano del  Centro de Ski Chapelco, los primeros vuelos de Austral y el extinto hotel Sol de los Andes.

El centro de Ski tiene el particular encanto de sus bosques de lengas, sus pistas ondulantes entre los árboles y una atmósfera de amistades y familias.

Pero de a poco, la oferta al turismo se fue ampliando, a través de una revalorización de los lagos, ríos y montañas como destinos espectaculares para los deportes de verano, y para todo lo relacionado con el  turismo de contacto con la naturaleza.

Veranos secos y tardes interminables, con decenas de opciones a dónde ir y qué hacer  alrededor de esta ciudad que no termina de ser pueblo y  que no quiere perder los encantos de lo pequeño.

Van mis preferencias y recomendaciones:

Flyfishing en el río Malleo: Malleo “arriba”, camino al inminente Paso Tromen y a la vera del Volcán Lanín;  Malleo “abajo”, dentro de la reserva mapuche, hasta su agotamiento en el enorme Aluminé, por un camino casi huella, con condoreras al paso.

Y las estancias centenarias como Quem Quem Treu, descendiente por sucesión de Estancia Gente Grande, una de las propiedades más extensas que se recuerde en estos territorios. Y Filo Hua Hum,  refugio de nobles ciervos y buena pesca en su spring creek. Y Lago Hermoso, y los vericuetos del río “padre de la pesca con mosca”: el Chimehuin.

Y para las preferencias de otros, están esos circuitos de mountain bike y  trekking de variada dificultad en las huellas que rodean los cerros sobre los márgenes del Lago Lacar, las cabalgatas a parajes donde no llegan los motorizados….siempre rumbo al oeste, la  observación de aves en sus santuarios, las termas al pie de la Cordillera y el más urbano Golf, con una cancha excelente y otra en camino. Y las canoas, las flotadas y el rafting, y todo lo que la imaginación, el tiempo y buenas guiadas profesionales permitan experimentar en estos vastos territorios .

Y Ten Rivers Lodge, nuestro primogénito hotel, con sus exclusivas 4 habitaciones, que fue el punto de partida de nuestra Cadena Hotelera, y el fundamento de nuestra filosofía de servicios. Su misión está bien cumplida.

Claudio Oliveira

Ten Rivers & Ten Lakes

Akira Kurosawa: ¿Which are the most important things for men?
Clean air and fresh water

Yasuhiro Hamano: Here in Tokyo blue sky for “Little Spring Day”,
good day to tie flies for Patagonia summer.

Kumiko: Recipe for Kimuko´s sauce

1 of soy sauce
1 of sesame oil
1/3 of honey1 spoon of grated garlic
1  spoon of shiben toban san
Mix the soy sauce and the honey,
warm, then add the rest.

Kumiko is Hamano san´s wife, and she cooked for us during our five days at their house in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I was invited to fish with him and Ricardo, my partner, joined us. Hospitality is a word too short to express how they treated us.

Japan is somehow part of my tradition, its culture, its thinking, its architecture, the Zen, the poetry, the literature, the films of Kurosawa, the gardening, the Bonsai, its strong tradition of make things just good.

Kumiko and Hamano san are part of that.

Let´s see, Kumikos sauce, its was just perfect (as every meal she did), and the knowledge of that was not transmitted in an exact recipe, it was not 125 ml of this and 234 ml of the other. Kumiko´s recipe is only one step to the sauce. If you do not cook, if you have not educated your tongue, you will not be able to do it. Likewise, you need to be ready to fail sometimes, and throw away something you cannot eat.

Tenkara. One day, talking about vanishing things, Jim (Repine) instructed me on Japan´s tradition of fly fishing. In the first chapter of Jim´s book, Pacific Rim Fly Fishing, The Unrepentant  Predator, he describes a hypothetical moment in which a Japanese purist with a long bamboo rod gets his fish of the day with an imitation of one small fly, fished dry with a dead drift and thereby secured nourishment for that day.

Tenkara started in Japan 500 hundred years ago, evolving independently from England, so the opportunity of learning from a man which had the luck, the intelligence and the courage to be fed by both traditions is invaluable.

Hamano san and I had never talked about Tenkara, until the second day when Hamano san went fishing with his Tenkara rod. And I saw him fishing.

See the photo. He is fishing, just fishing. He is a predator after his fish of the day.

The Tenkara rod is approx 3.5 meters long and the line about the same length, so you fish just there, three meters from you.

With the new materials, technology and casting techniques it is possible to cast a far longer distance and, more importantly, to manage the drift and the presentation of the fly accurately. Consequence: we lost the fish that lie just there were we wade, as we are always anxious to fish the opposite bank. We approach the water noisily and abruptly. But if you fish with a Tenkara rod, in transparent water, you have to approach the fish as Hamano is doing, and as I learned.

The last day of our stay he gave me his Tenkara rod and line as a present, tied the line and made a couple of casts, that was all. As Kumiko did at the evening of that unforgettable last day, giving me as a present a bottle of  shiben toban san, expecting I would learn on my own. If you are not a fly fisherman, if you have not educated your spirit to desire things well done, then you are not ready to fish a Tenkara rod, as such purist did in the past.

You may say that such image is just fantasy, the dreams of an old man. And somehow they may be are. But I believe that it draws a path to follow, a direction to move. As for me, I believe that perfect moments really do exist, and we had and will have some of those. The tragedy is to fail to realize at those unique moments that we are in fact living them.

We fished the Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks.
Magnificent places. The Grand Teton imposes its presence all the time. At dawn the light of the sun burns the peak of the mountains which shine brightly through the clear and thin air. While at dusk they become a powerful and menacing darkness. In the still hours the lakes are transparent mirrors hosting the mountains in its deep waters. Some of those perfect moments are given to us through the experience of beauty.

“Literature does not make anything except  keeping  record of our encounters with beauty” Kawabata

Yellowstone is a sacred place. It has been the first National Park of the world, and I am full of gratitude to the sensibility of those men who in 1872 promoted and set a major conservation precedent.

The second was Banff in Canada and the third was Nahuel Huapi in Argentina. The third in Argentina was Los Alerces National Park, created to protect the last refuge of the Alerce, the Lahuan, the Grandfather as the native people called these 3000 years old trees. Lets share the effort of the National Park Institutions all around the world to preserve these sacred environments.

Hamano san with a big brown at Lewis River

We fished the Snake, Black Tail Spring Creek, Flat Creek, Hoback River, Lewis River … there are more places to fish than you can manage in a lifetime. I enjoyed the Hoback a lot, in fact we had the opportunity to repeat and we decided to fish it again. On route 191 and about 15 Km south from routes 191 and 89 junction there is a bridge over the Hoback. From 200 meters upstream to 500 meters downstream of the bridge you can find the perfect place for pocket water fishing. Big boulders are widespread in the current creating small pockets of water which can be fished only with a short drift. Behind the boulders a small eddy is created where the food coming from upstream is captured, drifting much slower than in the rapid waters. Some of the big fish are there, getting more food by making a lesser effort. The best way to fish them is to get close to the boulders wading from above and managing a short line which is cast again and again until you get a nice drift and finally learning how to cast for that individual pool. At each side of the boulder there is a line of fast bubbling water, where at a short distance downstream the fish actively rise to the floating insects. Fallen logs at the shore, deep channels in the rock bed … all wonderful water. Fish were not big, but many and on the other hand, the fish, the prey is not so important if you have such water for you.

I fished the Hoback with Hamano and Koichi.

Koichi lives in Tokyo but spends three months a year in Montana working as a guide and as a professional fly tier and designer. We used his flies, and the

Adams parachute. Although it was summer and terrestrials played a strong role, Pale Evening Duns and small caddies were hatching. Hook sizes from 16 to 20.

I love the Adams parachute, for me it is a top ten fly … and above all I love its white wings because I can see it all the time! I cannot fish a fly I can`t see and my 57 year old eyes are happy when I knot an Adams. Seeing the fly is extremely important in dry fly fishing and especially in pocket water because drifts are short and the moving water changes constantly. When you fish the eddies for instance, the drift is no longer than one meter as the water drives your fly to the adjacent lines of fast bubbling water. So you cast, watch a few seconds of drift and cast again, and again. So as you see your fly you ensure a better drift, and you try to have your fly in the water only when the drift is dead. You get more fish. Use flies you can see would be my advice, presentation and drift are more important than the fly itself.

Flat Creek is also difficult, technical water. The creek moves slowly and idle along the valley floor. Along the muddy and undercut banks the big fish hide, lazy waiting for food and rising now and then without noise. They have all the time they need in the transparent water to see the fly, judge it before it is gone, and the most usually deciding to reject it. In late evening Flat Creek  is a wonderful place.

Presentation and drift is even more important than in pocket water. I cast quartering upstream and let the fly drift dead close to the shore line, all the while feeding out line as the fly moved downstream. I did not succeed, but Hamano san got a nice and strong golden cutthroat.

And I saw a bear! And geese, elks, deer, a world of wild life in the forest.

I want to mention one other wonderful thing fly fishing gives us, friendship. And when being guests of Hamano and Kumiko san, one clearly feel that friendship and hospitality, and that they are more important than the fishing itself.

The only problem with a visit there is that you have to follow Hamano, who in his 68^th, year has more energy than the mortal people we others are!

We had the time to fish and the time to enjoy friendship. Minuro and Machi joined us three days after we arrived and fished and shared a lamb barbecue Ivon, Terry, Jessie and Melody made for us at Ivon`s house.

And as it always will be, Jim Repine was in our thoughts. One night Hamano and I walked under the stars to the Snake River shore and while I threw Kumiko`s flowers in the darkness of the night, Hamano poured some whiskey in the secret knowledge that Jim will enjoy it. We did not have Jameson as Jim would have liked best, but be sure he drank from the cup!

The Native People in the north of Argentina still have a high respect for the old and for those who passed away, and when they go to the cemetery they make a hole in the ground, above the place the head of the dead is buried and offer him coca leaves, tobacco and chicha. Life is hard, so death should be. And they give to the dead people something to make both life and death a little more easy.

We fishermen have our fishing, so I would like to have a new fly every now and then, to replace those which were lost in the bushes! That would make it easier. But that does not mean I will reject the wine and the tobacco!

Ryokan:  Like the little stream
Making its way
Through the mossy crevices
I, too, quietly
Turn clear and transparent

Hamano San                                                                               Alfredo (photo by Koichi).

Jackson Hole, August 2009.

For further information contact
alfredo@el-aura.net

Or Koichi Kawai
kaw_koichi@hotmail.com

Alfredo Zubiri is argentine and has been fly fishing for 34 years. He is the concessionaire owner of  Lago Verde Wilderness Resort’s in Los Alerces National Park- www.el-aura.net

Photos by Alfredo

Lets flow with the river (YH)

FLY FISHING TEXAS BAY WITH HARRY BRISCOE

By Alfredo Zubiri

I knew Harry at the lodge. We have a friend in common, a very dear friend, Jim Repine, who passed away in June. We miss him.

Jim was a Master of the Art. Jim fished all around the world; had a floating trip operation in Alaska, managed his own lodge in Chile, wrote books about fly fishing and of men around him. And that experience got deep inside him; he trained his hands, but he also thought deeply, and opened his mind to the unknown. Just for pleasure, just because he was that way.

Jim and Harry were close friends and they both love the Hexa, the wonderful rod Harry makes through Hexagraph Fly Rod Co. So Jim invited Harry to the lodge three years ago and we fished together one evening. Two years later he gave me an Hexa #5 (Jim would correct me and write Hexy), dedicated to me, which I have at the lodge, dressed with a Hardy Ultralight Reel and a yellow Rio Selective Trout fly line. Nice rod!

So last year, at the time of planning my fishing vacations, I called Harry to see if we could spend a couple of days fishing. Things matched so we were set and Harry planned two nights at Falcon Point Lodge at the shore of Matagorda Bay in Texas, close to Seadrift and Port O’Conner, and hired Scott Sommerlatte as our guide, who we met at 5:30 am at Charlie’s Baitfish Camp, on August 26, 2008.

Texas! The air was warm and humid and the sun weighed heavy over our shoulders, so even for me who usually wakes up really late, it was fine to wake up at night!

We were looking for Reds.

The water in the salt-marshes is warm, shallow, transparent and unexpectedly calm. The Mississippi  River transports huge volumes of sand to the Gulf of Mexico and, as the current in the Gulf is counterclockwise, the sand is deposited SW along the shore for hundreds of miles, creating a string of barrier islands which protect the marshes from the inquietude of the ocean.  We fished behind the barrier islands. Within that giant pool life explodes. Birds, cranes, pelicans, and in the salad water, crustaceans and fish make the water bubble.  They called the movements “nervous water”.

We used the motor until we got to the marshes, and there Scott climbed up on his tower, pole at hand. “What are we looking for?” I asked.

You can see the Reds while floating slowly through the marshes, but there are some fish which are special, and let me tell you, you want these ones!. A Reds goes very shallow to get his food, so shallow that you see half of its body out of the water, nervous, in danger, alert.  They root with their noses for crabs, shrimp and shellfish.

Our weather was very calm and hot. The water was very low and the fish saw us from a great distance. The tide was low and the water was shallow.  “Skinny water” they called it. Our presence created such inquietude in fish, that all of them run away, creating a cloud of dust which shadowed our vision. It was a difficult day.

Consequently I needed a long cast (with a big fly!) just on the fish nose, second chance not allowed. It took me time, but finally I hooked some. But Harry got not only the biggest, but also one of those I described above, those you see from distance and say to you: “I want THAT fish!”

We used a Shrimp Fly tied by Scott which I have as his gift.

Fly Fishing is a sport which combines many things and I love all of them.

The water, the fish, the mountains, the forest, the sea, those places where you have the feeling of being the first, that your footprint is the first in the just fallen snow.

The activity of the body, long days outside.

The casting, something we will never learn completely as we are always improving, learning the art.

The huge amount of tackle and stuff you can desire (and buy!) even when you do not need it.

The tradition, a knowledge you receive, enjoy, and pass on to others.

The solitude it offers to you, the opportunity to remember, think and feel.

And the fire and friends around, with some more wine than usual (just to mention an example!).

Mo gave me an article he wrote which starts with this statement of Aldous Huxley: “Experience is not what happens to a man. It is what a man does with what happens to him.”

Aldous Huxley and Hermann Hess! I read all they wrote at my twenties!

Evening at the Magic Theatre

For madmen only

Price of admission your mind

Claimed Hermann in the early 60s, while Aldous, living in the Mojave desert wrote, “The Doors of Perception”.

What do we do with our experience? Is the right question, clearly expressed? What do we do? Or, how deep do we let it come into us?

Do we have a personal experience, not in the sense that we are one self, but in the sense that we have something new?

Experience is what happens in our mind and heart, what we do with the things that our hand touches and investigates; experience is not a list of the facts that happened to us during the day.

I spent three fishing weeks, and fished Alaska, the Elk River in Canada and the Texas Bay, and met Mo in Los Angeles and John in Portland, in Oregon. And I realize now, after writing three short articles about those places that the experience cannot be separated completely, as it is the cord, the thread, that joins all together.

On a calm night the lake (Lago Verde at Los Alerces National Park, where I have my lodge) is sleeping and quiet; it becomes a mirror. The light of the moon is visible but the moon is still hiding behind the mountains. The stars are as bright reflected in the deepness of the lake as they are in the sky. And when you look at those stars in the lake you realize that they are at once there in the deep and also in the surface of your conscience.

It would be nice to reflect beauty as the lake does, with the light of the stars!

It would be nice to let the experience go deep within us!

The week before I fished with Harry I was in Alaska, fishing for rainbows. Life in Alaska is governed by salmon. At the time I was there, millions of red sockeye painted the water. And their eggs were the source of life for the trout. Imagine them, swinging close to the bottom, awake, moving across to get the eggs, manna (the bread God sent from the sky to feed the Jewish people in the desert), not coming from the sky, but from ahead. So what did we do?

Instead of a fly, you have a plastic egg, an imitation of the salmon egg in different colors which represent the different stages in its evolution.  For those who were raised in the old tradition it is not a fly, but none-the-less it is very effective. Approx. 50 cm from the fly, a small lead shot is added, a little weight that helps the egg to get to the bottom and drift like a real egg.  Thus, what is intended is that the drift is that of a dry fly, but on the bottom.  To ensure this, a strike indicator is applied above the split shot, at a variable distance corresponding to the river’s depth.

It is quite similar to nymph fishing. You cast upstream, mend and let the nymph sink and reach the bottom area.

When we discussed this with Jim he told me that the method was called “the ca-ta-plum” as the three points of your leader (egg, lead and strike indicator) make such noise when they touch the water!

From a casting point of view the cataplum requires different casting abilities than traditional dry fly, for casting a light feather is different than casting the cataplum.

In the open waters of Patagonia I am used to have 1, 2 or even three false casts, so that’s how I started with the cataplum, but quickly my guides corrected me, until I learned. Instead of the false casts I started to use rolls, as they recommended, and I learned a lot and my cast improved as I saw later on the Elk River.

Casting for reds is completely different; it is like hunting. You see the fish almost on the shoreline and have to present the fly, a big crab fly, right to its mouth. Challenging. As the day went on I started to do it better. The main problem is to remain calm; just cast, no thinking, no illusions, just cast. As I slowly became a part of the Bay, as a big heron looking for its prey, my casting improved until things just happened and the fly was just there and the Red took it. Victory!

Wonderful waters, wonderful fish, wonderful friends, wonderful experience.  Worth the price of the ticket!

For further information contact

Harry Briscoe

hexagraph@hexagraph.com

Scott Sommerlatte

vssommerlatte@hotmail.com

Or myself

alfredo@el-aura.net

Alfredo Zubiri is Argentine and has been fly fishing for 33 years. He is Lago Verde Wilderness Resort’s concessionary in Los Alerces National Park- www.el-aura.net

TRIP SUMMARY:

Hotel: Falcon Point Lodge, Texas

Date: August 26, 2008

Host: Harry Briscoe

Guide: Scott SummerdaleSommerlatte

Waters:

Texas Bay

Rod and Reel: Hexagraph # 8 and J. Ryall No. 8 reel