Norway, August 8th
More rain greeted us this morning as we ate breakfast from the same buffet. The monotony of the food is almost laughable. Joe doesn’t mind what sort of food he puts into his mouth, which means he enjoys more variety than the rest of us. Pickled herring, mashed fish, caramel cheese, etc., etc.… The rest of us are sticking to scrambled egg, toast and fruit juice, washed down with a cup of coffee. The dining hall is filling quickly every morning and although it can seat 200 people, the toaster can only take two pieces of toast! The queue is somewhat reminiscent of that found outside the ladies toilet at half time in a major sporting event.
We had another long drive of at least two hours to reach a productive river that practically screamed fish when we saw it for the first time. The length of drive however re enforced how lucky we Tasmanian’s are to have so much great fishing in such close proximity to one another.
Joe, Staggy and Craig spend all of their travelling time playing a game called, “Candy Crush Saga”… a mind numbing, senseless experience where you apparently have to blow up “jubes and freckles” to advance to the next level. There is a great saying about small things and small minds!
Today, we decided to fish very small sections of the river and try numerous techniques in the same area. This enabled us each to select a 100 metre section of water at random and fish it thoroughly as if in a competition but without time restraints. If yesterdays river was called “The Dessert”, then todays river should be called , “Liawenee Canal in May”.
The action was terrific for every one of us and the fish numbers caught were astronomical. All bar one of mine would have been a counter (over 18cm) and my largest was 33cm. The others had similar stories. I have never known wild brown trout to behave in the same manor as these fish. Their willingness to eat the fly is remarkable. Oh to be a guide on this place!! As is the case with most rivers over here, it ran slightly blue due to the snow melt. The surrounding hills are still covered in snow and we are into the Autumn months. The water is cold and boulder strewn with sand and gravel making up the rest of the river bed. This afternoon we had a hatch although catch rates were so high already that I don’t think this affected anything. This sort of fishing is NOT what we are going to get in the competition. If the rivers we are to fish are half as good as this one, there will be plenty of fish caught (even in the 5th session) but alas, it is not the case.
Finding water that is similar to the competition water is still proving to be a problem. We are doing the best we can but to find another river as large as those we are fishing would mean we driving over a mountain range and fishing the fjord next door. The only way to do this is probably by helicopter.
In one way, the day could slightly confuse matters as all flies used worked well. It did not help us narrow down the selection. What it did do was give us confidence in what we are doing and how to fish the water if we find water in our beats similar to this.
We dined out again at a local Italian Restaurant that was later frequented by the teams from Canada and Luxemburg. We retired to our fly tying / meeting room in the hotel for ‘official’ duties before heading off to bed.
Tomorrow I am hoping that we will travel to the only venue I am yet to see. The rest of the guys saw it on the first day they were here and managed to spend some time fishing downstream of the competition beats. It is rumored to be the toughest of all the sectors.
Just to show that time does not heal all scars, the Poms and the French are back at it again! Again, this is rumor, but it appears as though there have been some ‘goings on’ that are not quite legal. The English went down to the look at the venue on which we are to hold the boat session. This is a large lake, the bottom half of which will be sued in the competition. The top half is known as the ‘official practice water’ and is only allowed to be fished on ‘official practice days’ (Monday and Tuesday next week). Outside of that time, it is totally out of bounds. The competition part of the lake is out of bounds at all times! When the English arrived, they found the French team fishing the ‘official practice water’ in boats! They were outraged and approached a local man who had a boat moored on the edge of the lake to ask if they could use it. The man agreed and two of them went onto the lake to join the French in practicing, complete with a verbal altication. The remainder of the team members fished off the shore. Getting wind of what had happened, the Norwegians took action themselves and organized and used boats on the lake the following day (again in the official practice water). I expect that no action will be taken by FIPSMOUCH as these sorts of incidents and accusations have gone without punishments in the past. Two wrongs don’t make a right and we will not be fishing this lake until the official practice session.
We have our guide, Bent, with us for the last time tomorrow. He has been very helpful and the information he has given us has at least made us think that we are prepared for what is to come. We will be on our own after that until Sunday when the opening ceremony takes place in Mosjoen followed by two days of official practice. The competition then gets under way on Wednesday (two sessions) before having one session on Thursday and two again on Friday. The closing ceremony and presentation will be on Saturday. Most teams including the Australians will fly out on Sunday.
We received news later this evening that the event is being televised in Australia! We always knew that it would be on in Europe but perhaps someone can try and find out if this is true? It is supposed to be FOX I think? It is certainly a pay TV channel if the rumors are true.
On a personal note, I am getting my appetite back which is helping me tremendously as my course of antibiotics ran out this evening. It is bad news for the team kitty though as one pizza cost around $60 last night. Australia is sounding better by the minute.