28th March

A fresh came thru last night so we headed off to the Matukituki mouth to see if there were any salmon schooling getting ready to run or brown trout but to no avail. It was off on the hunt for rainbows in the mighty clutha - this proved quite successful with 5 fish taken and 2 lost (all on nymphs)one of which was a trout around the 8lbs mark. with all the rest coming in at between 3 and 5lbs but in the big water worked us hard like fish twice the size.

Apparently the salmon are schooling off the Dart mouth at the moment so that could be worth a crack next up.

The Autumn weather should be starting to create some good mayfly hatches on some of our southern rivers.

Easter Guiding

Based at Mavora Lakes saw 4 great days of fishing. One on the upper Oreti with fish sitting in riffles and taking either h&c nymphs or off the surface with Para Adams. One day in upper Mararoa with fish willing to come to surface and take black nats and similar terrestials, one day up in Windon with good fishing and again terrestial going well with good fish action. Last day on Oreti but lower down and a bit harder with cloud cover making spotting difficult but good fish found in backwaters and could be tempted to come to the surface with small dry's. All in all a great Safari trip for some good end of March fishing.

Back in the Whakatipu

Great to be back home after a very successful trip up north. I had a chance to chase some snapper and also some kingfish in the Coromandel on the fly with mixed success but lots of enjoyment. Snapper for dinner one night!

The weather is starting to cool down in the South as Autumn is approaching but the fishing is still great. On the Oreti river yesterday with no wind and early cloud cover burning off provided some great fishing. Trout sitting under lips and taking nymphs were enticed easily with accurate casts and later in the day fish started coming to the surface taking dry's and provided some more sport. All in all 5 to the bank and lost 3 so not a bad day!

As we move more towards the end of March and into Autumn we will start to see some great mayfly hatches on some of our rivers while the mountain rivers will conitnue to provide great sport right up until the end of May. The brown trout have had a great summer and are coming into awesome condition as the season drifts towards closing of the lowland rivers at the end of April and the back country rivers the end of May. From now to the end of the season is one of my favourite times to be on the river, big strong fat fish and awesome weather, scenery is pretty good too!

In The Coromandel

Well I am guding in the Coromandel right now with a group of three from the USA - been thru Hawkes Bay prior to arriving here. Spent sometime at a 10 yr celebration of the Te Angi Angi Marine reserve as we were invited by friends of mine from the local Maori community. It was a dawn ceremony with full maori customs - very pleasant to be there. We also spent 2 days after this with the local Maori comunity learning there ways - very intereting for us all. We also got to eat plenty of kiamoana (seafood) especially crayfish. We then had three days at 2 days at a HB farm and left them getting the first decent rain for many months - I think they liked us!

We then flew to Akl and drove down to Coromandel and settled in at our accommodation at Matarangi and have spent the last two days on the beach, relaxing, sightseeing and 2moro we have a charter boat to take us sightseeing from the water and a spot of snorkling and fishing along the way - should be great - up date coming soon.