Recently, I was fortunate to be invited by an Argentine friend Cristian to pursue a fish that had been on my radar for some time, that fish being the Golden Dorado. The trip was an exhilarating experience for several reasons, and epitomizes why I am passionate about destination fly-fishing and the travel experiences that come with it. The trip also reinforces why I am so committed to the concept of Bucketlist Angler, which at its core seeks to open up doors to desirable fishing options overseas, at a reasonable price that makes it possible for the average person to make the trip happen.
As a little background, I was put in touch with Cristian by a total stranger that I met in an airport 6 years ago. This stranger was a woman that had a fly rod at a bar during a layover, and we started talking fishing. I mentioned one place I would like to go was Patagonia in South America, and she happened to have been there and gave me the contact info for Cristian. I touched base soon after, and fished with him for the first time the following summer season in Argentina. This breakthrough so to speak inspired me to be more outgoing and curious when it came to exploring far off fly fishing options, mainly because this trip was very affordable, was accomplished through word of mouth and didn’t require a fancy or expensive fishing lodge, and worked out so well
After that initial trip to Patagonia, Cristian and I stayed in touch and exchanged information regularly. When it came to Golden Dorados, Cristian spoke very highly of the fish and said he took a week off before his season officially began to chase these fish and get a break from his bread and butter trout fishing. Last season, after speaking for a while about this trip he asked if I wanted to come on his annual October trip to Northern Argentina near Corrientes. This was a no brainer for me as I thought when would I again be able to chase these fish with local Argentinian guys that could show me the place and country from their perspective. Below is a practical write up of the trip.
Getting There
Logistically, the trip was not overly complex. There are many direct flights from the Northeast to Buenos Aires Argentina that are 10hrs long and overnight allowing for you to sleep while you travel. Once in Buenos Aires, a short 1 hr flight was required to northern Argentina’s Resistencia airport (RES) which put you within a short drive of the fishing. Transfer was set up at RES to get me to the place we were staying. Total travel cost was around $1200.
GEAR
Despite fishing massive stretches of river for these fish, the gear required for these fish was surprisingly light. We fished 8 weights on floating lines with the leader setup consisting of a short 5-6 foot leader built with 40lb fluro as a butt section and tied off with a short 6-12” of 40lb wire to the fly.
The flies were not as big as I thought they would be either. Flies that are comparable to large Kelly Gallup style trout streamers were used, and in some cases even smaller. Deceiver/Zonker style patterns were the norm (heavy 2/0 hooks) with black being the go to color mixed with other colors like olive, red, purple, and other hot spot colors to add some attractor like appeal. There was a lot of casting, so the goal is a set up that throws nice and doesn’t abuse the arm over the course of the day and trip. In some situations I would have liked to have had a light intermediate line, but it was not required.
The Lodging
We split the trip up at two locations on the river we were fishing and I was glad we did so that I could get a sampling of the options that were available for future trips. The first place we stayed was a modest place, but it had good food and quality guides. My type of place. We fished hard at this place getting out on the water around 8:30am and fishing til dark, with a nice lunch prepared on the water each day. Argentinians take their food very seriously and are very much like Italians. I never went hungry.
The second place we stayed was a nicer set up with very comfortable lodging and gourmet meals for lunch and dinner. After 3 days of pounding the water hard at the first place, this was a nice change of pace to refresh ourselves and get a second wind for the back-end of the trip. I enjoyed seeing both and knowing there are numerous options for future trips that could be selected based on the budget.
THE FISHING
Going into the trip, my impression of Golden Dorados was they were an aggressive fish and not overly difficult to catch. In actually fishing for them, I’ll say they are aggressive at certain times, but the fishing is far more challenging than I had thought, and I appreciated that.
Northern Argentina has some of the largest Golden Dorado that can be found anywhere in the world with big fish in the 20-30lb class being seen fairly regularly. These fish sit along the banks of what is a very structure lined river with lots of hiding places. Each log looks like it should hold a fish, but you maybe move a quality fish every hour or so, with some smaller fish in the 5-10lb class showing themselves in-between. The better fish tended to show themselves early and late, and more regularly on cloudy days like many other game fish.
The challenge with these fish is the casting. The fly needs to be right on the bank or structure, not a foot off. Over the course of the day, you pound the banks repeatedly and both fatigue and nerves as you approach a prime spot drifting downstream make casting a real challenge. And when you move that big fish, strip setting rather than trout setting is not so easy. The takes are some of the most vicious strikes I have ever seen, but because the mouth of these fish is so hard you need to repeatedly set 3-4 times to really sink the hook on the “grandes” almost like you see with tarpon fishing.
Once hooked, pulling these fish out of the structure becomes the priority and you need to quickly mentally shift gears. I lost several very large fish being so enamored with the fact that I had one of these beasts on, that I failed to mentally adjust quickly enough before they had me in the logs and ultimately got off. Not easy.
Overall, I would guess that I landed 3-5 dorados a day on average, and lost at least that with many of the ones that got off being the better fish. The impressiveness of these fish cannot be understated and it would hurt to drop one because of one of the many challenges I eluded to above. Some of the better fish I lost were 35”+ and in excess of 25lbs. But I did get some quality fish to the boat as well, and this was enough to head home feeling satisfied.
FUTURE TRIPS
In short, the fishing I saw and experienced will bring me back. While there, I also spoke with several of the people that were involved in the fishing operations we used and plan to work with them to offer trips to Northern Argentina for Golden Dorados in the near future. I expect these trips to range somewhere around $2500 for 5 days of guided fishing and lodging with food included. I will keep Bucketlist Angler customers informed on this as details become more concrete and am excited to open up this option at an affordable price to those interested in this exciting game fish. Another interesting thing about this fish is that you can combine it with premier trout fishing if you are truly ambitious, with Patagonia being within reach as well. But at the risk of sounding insane, I’ll stop there.
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