Highlights
A Letter from Terry Nab
Our fine client, Mr Terry Nab, sent us a letter to share with us his fishing experience from Russia and Iceland this summer. He fished with us, the second week of July, on the Ponoi River/Acha Camp in Russia and afterwards he went to Iceland and fished the Galtalækur, Varma and Brynjudalsa. Feel free to read his comments below:
“Although the water level in the Ponoi River was much higher than normal, maybe higher than it has ever been in July, the fishing was still very good. I landed 38 salmon and my friend Craig landed 27. My largest was somewhere between 18 and 20 pounds, and I had quite a few that were between 10 and 15 pounds. I had very few that were under 6 pounds. That was by far the best week of salmon fishing I have ever had. My only regret for the week was that I did not get to see the true nature of the water at low level with the water being so high. I am sure that there would be many more places to fish with normal water level and that many of them would be more fun to fish with more of the structure (ie, boulders, breaks, etc.) showing. See the river at normal level for summer is what will drive me to return to the river as soon as possible. That, plus being able to skate dry flies, which I really did not get the opportunity to do this trip with the high water. I tried to skate a muddler several times in the later part of the week when the water temperature had warmed, but was not able to raise any salmon to the surface. It seemed like they should come to the surface, but they did not, perhaps I just did not try long enough, or in the right place.
Our fishing in Iceland found pretty much the opposite of what we had on the Ponoi. It had not rained for more than 6 weeks before we got there, so you can imagine what the smaller rivers looked like when we arrived. The Brynjudalsa and Varma Rivers were so low that you could walk across certain areas without getting the tops of your shoes wet. The Galtalaekur, being a spring creek, had ample water in it. The Galtalaekur is one of the main tributaries to the West Ranga. The fishing in the Brynjudalsa was a lot of fun and very challenging. There are 2 beautiful falls pools, and there were several salmon in each of the pools. We both had many salmon move to the fly only to turn away at the last moment and refuse the fly. On one cast, I had 3 different salmon come to within inches of the fly, but they all refused.....one of them actually butted the fly with his snout, but did not open his jaws. I managed to finally catch a beautiful 5 pound sea trout in the upper falls pool and Craig managed to hook a nice sea trout in the lower pool, but did not land it. The Brynjudalsa is a beautiful spot to fish and I would not hesitate to go back there again hoping for better water conditions. I think the fishing could be very good there if there was some water in the river.
The Galtalaekur River is a beautiful spring creek that has some unusually large brown trout in it. I hooked quite a few large trout here on very small nymphs (size 18 pheasant tail and black nymphs). When I say large, I mean many of them were well over 5 pounds with more than a couple that are larger than 10 pounds. I managed to land several in the 4 to 6 pound range, a couple that were in the 7 to 9 pound size and one that was estimated to be 12 - 13 pounds....what a hog! The river is really a small creek that has several nice pools separated by small water falls and/or very steep rapids. The fish seem to know every obstacle in each pool ann know exactly where to go to break you off, which is not difficult when you are fishing with 5X tippet, such small flies and a 5 wgt. rod. But it sure was fun trying to land such large trout under such conditions. The trout were the winners most of the time, but when we managed to actually land one, it sure felt rewarding.
The Varma is another beautiful little stream that I am sure would fish much better with more water in it. I managed to hook several beautiful sea trout of between 5 and 8 pounds here and actually managed to land 2 of them, which is pretty good considering the size of the pools and the light equipment I was using. I also managed to catch several nice smaller sized brown trout on some very small parachute dry flies.
I wish I could say I was glad to be home, but I wish I was still fishing in Iceland or on the Ponoi. I returned to work on Friday and did not find any major problems there, so that was good. Well, must close here for now. I will stay in touch and will be talking with you more about returning to the Ponoi next season sometime in the next couple of months. Thanks again for all of your help and efforts with our plans and the trip.
Best regards,
Terry Nab”
