The world has become smaller. International fly-fishing has now grown to a point that people wanting to explore “far off” places encounter an almost cookie cutter market for now well-known destinations for specific species. Gt’s in the Seychelles along with permit that have some yellow fins. Golden Dorado in Bolivia in some trendy bohemian camp that feels like a cross between the amazon and Brooklyn to attract the anglers that are metropolitan or well off folks with enough money to pay for it. Permit in Mexico with the sell being your wife can come to Tulum too. Mythical places that you heard of and hoped were true are now like cruise-line packages sold by numerous competitors that show the same tarpon jumping in the mangroves and some pygmy boy hanging with the flat brim bro at camp for some cinematic sense of immersion at the Fly Fishing Film Tour. How many times can you see it though? Seeing these places become almost domesticated takes away the adrenaline and desire to go there if you like to actually hunt for what you kill. So pushing things further becomes required.
It doesn’t feel rewarding catching the same 10lb rainbow in the same discernible bay 500 other people have shared via social media on Jurassic Lake before you. That’s like proposing to your girl at Times Square at midnight. It’s unoriginal and feels like less of an achievement. Any truly rewarding experience needs to have true risk, a real chance that you may not get what you want, but on the flip side the chance at catching a fish you never expected to catch, let alone see in your lifetime. Which is why I love New Zealand- the place has no limits and a lifetime of water. But many barriers to entry. Leaving the question- How do you get there?
What i say isn’t macho bravado, its true. Proof being the general knowledge that the biggest trout in the world are in New Zealand, yet there is a lack of in your face 2020 level advertising to come there by fishing outfitters. Why? While there are several well known fishing lodges in New Zealand, the reason it is not as well advertised by the Yellow Dogs of the world is because the fishing is beyond intense there and there is no way around it. You have low fish counts as low as 50-100 fish per mile, but the fish are big if not huge. You can’t use a boat and luxurize the experience. The fish can sense if you took a piss in the woods 500 yards away, let alone are floating down a river. It doesn’t work. That leaves wading and hiking several miles a day of stream and tough terrain to find maybe 10-15 shots a day at tough (huge) trout as the only option to realistically target these fish. Because the fish are incredibly spooky and sensitive, it forces you to make the first cast count on most occasions. This situation is sure to not please or attract the older/richer/mediocre caster that pays for cruise line fishing packages- so the cruise line luxury fishing outfitters avoid as well in favor of south america where they’ll send them to a Patagonia lodge instead, float them down 5 rivers in 5 days, do a rack of lamb shore lunch with local wine included for a nice touch, and catch 18″ carbon copy rainbows on hopper/droppers and be just as happy. But the truth is an 18″ rainbow doesn’t make a lot of seasoned anglers happy at all, and upper 20’s resident brown trout are a fish of a lifetime to anyone. The conditions posed by NZ therefore attracts only a dedicated group of outdoorsman that frequent the place for the experience, challenges, and opportunities posed.
Carrying on, and focusing on accessing what NZ has to offer, a benefit that I learned a lot more about on this recent trip was that Heli fishing is not as hard as it once was. Traditionally, pilots ran through the lodges, so getting into remote areas was difficult and expensive because you had to stay at the lodge and pay the premium to even get access to the Heli only accessible streams. Not the case anymore. Heli tours and programs have become more extensive now, where you can on an independent basis set up trips where you and your fishing buddy get in and get dropped off, fish upstream and camp as long as you want, and click a simple button to be picked up. You can go to any river you want to, and literally can point to a place on a map you want to go and the Heli pilot will take you there, providing a SAT phone that allows them to track you and be notified when you want to be picked up after a day or days of fishing. It’s truly that easy. This increased access allows for the ability to explore rivers with 25-30” fish with no one in sight the entire trip, and at a reasonable cost. We oddly saved money because when you are in the woods for three days with no need for gas, lodging, food, the cost of the help flight was largely offset. A week’s fishing in NZ in this fashion is do-able all in including flight for under 3k. And if you look at a map of the South Island alone, there are hundreds of rivers where no road or little access provides the opportunity to Heli in and find large browns that have not been spoiled by anyone, particularly in the early season leading into the New Year.
Acting on this new knowledge, and with high water this year, I took advantage getting dropped off in a remote area I had found on a map and looked into before arriving to NZ, and hiked a 10 mile stretch of river we were dropped on for two days while camping to experience it myself. When it came to the fish we found them. Monsters actually. The factors that played a role in catching them were entirely different to what Im used to on technical tailwaters, with absolute stealth and a delicate cast upstream cast being far more important than fly or presentation. Sounds easy, but it wasn’t. First, spotting the fish is fun but a real challenge. Its wild how well these large browns can hide in crystal clear water that makes you initially feel like you’d see anything that swims at first glance when you look in. Spotting and strategizing on how to approach each fish is challenging but exhilarating and half the fun. The visuals of the fish you do see are simply unreal and things you will not see anywhere else in the world. Sensitivity wise, these fish could hear you breathe, to the point that you half expected each fish you saw to be gone by the time you let your first cast go. You also often have to throw from very odd positions hiding behind large rocks, trees, and throwing upstream in tough currents trying to make that first cast and drift work. A unique and different challenge.
When they didn’t spook, the takes were mind blowing. Fish that took a fly as if they have never seen a person, because maybe they hadn’t. Not to mention seeing a brown the size of your leg take a dry fly like it’s a 15’’ fish is a scary sight.When you hook the fish, and see how big it is, there is also the wild realization that THAT fish is on your line. A fish that defies all realities of what you ever thought you would land while trout fishing. The diversity of the water offered there is also astounding. You have crystal clear streams that are 20-30 feet wide and hold 30″ trout that seemingly appear out of nowhere, large rivers that almost look like Alaskan glacial streams with large browns tucked away behind little soft pockets and rocks, crystal clear lakes where large browns cruise the shoreline and provide an almost flats like experience to target them, and every size and style of stream you’ve ever seen in any magazine all in one place.
I’ve been fortunate to experience a lot of fishing moments, but the ones that stand out are the trips where the entire experience was memorable, not just the grip and grin. There its something very rewarding about the grit and grind of tackling new zealand for a few trophies in a truly pristine and wild environment, and it changes your perspective. Its a drug, and makes you want to repeat the feeling that you found a place where a truly wild animal was, and not only found it but caught it without assistance. In a world that is getting smaller, New Zealand is perhaps the only truly unspoiled trout fishery left on earth thanks to its unique and inconvenient location and challenges posed by the fish that live there. As for me- I’ll be there once a year til I’m dead.
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