Friday, Rio Chimehuin

Friday, November 21
Rio Chimehuin

Today we drifted 40 km… 9:00am – 8:00pm… on the Chimehuin River for perhaps 30 km until it joined the Collon Cura and another 10 on that (we had drifted this section on Wednesday on the tail end of that drift). The Chimehuin is a smaller river (Cowichan-size), very narrow in spots and very fast. Fishing is to the bank with short casts, a couple of quick retrieves and back again. Much of the bank is lined with willows. The fishing is tough but it’s a fun drift, almost a combination of drift fishing and river rafting as there is some good lumpy water, with 3-4’ standing waves… nothing dangerous but good fun. It runs through another beautiful valley, most of it seeming to belong to one huge ranch (estanza?). We saw deer (there are 1000s of them here, they graze in herds of 50 – 100 amongst the cattle and horses along the highway), and, more interesting, a great big wild boar running along a narrow path on a cliff above us.

Of course, there are back eddies and side channels here and there along the Chimehuin as well and that’s where we had the most fun, casting small dry flies to rising trout. Though we didn’t catch as many fish as we did on Wednesday, we still had a very productive day, with more than half on the dry. (Mike, you would have been proud of me… I got my first fish ever on a classic “Burr creep”… we slithered across a sand bar on our bellies and I cast lying prone to a 1.5lb ‘bow in a crystal clear side channel. It was great.) You certainly can’t beat sight-casting to rising fish. My #3 rod has been perfect for this trip.

The wind began to pick up by about 11:00am and continued to increase in intensity all day. Some clouds rolled in late in the afternoon and it became quite cool. The wind must have been gusting to 35-40km/hr at times, making for some tough casting, but Gustavo is a terrific guide and knows the river so well he could always find places where I could get a fly out there. We had to haul-ass in the late afternoon in order to make it to the pullout before dark; there were sections when the wind was so strong that we didn’t bother to fish.

So it’s all over but the lyin’… ha, ha, ha… Tomorrow it’s back to Buenos Aires to try to gather the energy to be a tourist for a couple of days. Then the long journey home. It’s been a really fantastic trip. I definitely want to come back to Patagonia. The country is beautiful, the people warm and friendly, the food terrific, and hey, the fishing is pretty good, too. It’s a very special place. And so uncrowded… at least at this time of year. Uncrowded and unspoiled… how long can it last?