Explore and find your Eldorado

There are plenty of groups and pages for fishing in Facebook. I’m just talking about those which are in Finnish. There is one for fisherman, flyfishing, flytying, flyfisherman, fishing, responsible fisherman etc. It is endless list. I’m not saying is not good but there is other side of coin which is ruining something. Or maybe it is just me and me being old-fashioned and asshole.

Before social media exploded there was just internet and before that magazines and books. If you wanted some information about fishing areas or rivers you had to do some study. Then you decided location and off you go. When you arrived you talked with local people when buying fishing license and try to get some information about river. Then you go fishing and learn the waters and what kind of flies are working or then not. You are learning all the time. You learn to read different waters, watch around you and see what is hatching and what should work. You are observing and getting better with your hobby. That’s what I loved and I still do. Now you are wondering why not use a guide to help you out. Yes, exactly why not. There was a BUT…. In Finland 20 years ago there was not really fishing guides in the north, so you needed to do your homework by yourself. 

Social media is making people lazy and everyone is only after the BIG ONE. There is no adventerous anymore. You just log in facebook and ask. The whole summer there was questions like: I’m going in this and this region, is there any good rivers or waters to fish. Come on….. in Finland we have 187 888 lakes which are bigger than 500 square meter. Also we have lot of rivers and streams. Just pick yours and try. All of them have some fishes. And yes, you are right why not ask when you get info fast and easy. Like I told there is other side of coin. The same people are then fishing on those waters and then asking, I’m here but won’t catch anything or get only small ones, which fly I should use or where to go in this particular river. They are standing by the river and asking from people who are hundreds of kilometers from river what to do. There is always someone who is anxious to share their knowledge. You don’t know if there are really assholes or good guys, if they are killing everything or just taking some food with sustainable way. Some waters are more sensitive than others. 

BUY A GUIDE if you are not willing to do your homework or if you really want to boost your fishing. There was also one guy who wanted to have help with his fly-casting and fishing techniques. He was asking guide or instructor nearby his hometown. He got about 30 answers. Two or three of them were answers with names who could help him. Rest of answers were like, check this and this youtube channel, there is plenty of videos about casting and fishing. And this guy was saying that I have done all this, I need to have instructor to help me. 

Yes, I’m asking help also about new places. I either buy a guide for one or two days or talk with my colleagues and friends. That’s how I found one Eldorado which was not Eldorado during our stay but I know fishing is good over there. It was 8 years ago when I checked the map and found interesting looking river area in northern part of Sweden. I have friend living over there so I asked from him about that river. He didn’t know that water so well, so he asked from his friend. Answer was that river is home for one of biggest domesticated brown trouts in Sweden. But you need to hike 20 km oneway to get there. No problem, 20 km is not much with 4 days gears especially if there are trout up to 6 kg. So we packed our backpacks with my wife, we had tent, sleeping bags and fishing gears (waders etc) and off we went. Satu’s backpack weight about 20 kg and mine 33 kg. We had to make stop overnight on the way because it was not easy hike. Climbing on the mountain, going thru bushes… but there would be biggest trouts on earth waiting for us. Eventually we came to beautiful mountain river with crystal clear water. Awesome looking pools. We could see helicopter going and coming to take people more remoted spots. But that river was only for us. Perfect, yes and no. During two days we stayed there and fished the weather was changing about every 30 minutes, we had rain, sun, snowing, sun, rain, snowing and sun. Wind was turning all the time and we caught only two small about 30 cm trout but we saw some big ones going upstream. On the way back we had the night over by the nice lake. It was good looking lake with arctic char and there was small brook going down. I had amazing 2 hours with dryflies on that brook. Char were not big ones but nice around 30 cm anyway. Nowadays that river had private part of fishing with trout up to 6 kg and also lake and brook holds char up to 3 kg. How I know? My friend is fishing guide and he is using those waters nowadays. For us it was not Eldorado on that point but it will be when going back. Some photos from “Eldorado”.

Have a nice weekend. Mika from Finland

Ps. Afterwards I measured the hike and it was 36 km oneway.
Pss. On last Sunday it was reindeer work so it will be less fishing season now on.