Part 1: A Year in Taupo: Spring
By Mike Sayle, with Photography by Jared Goedhart
'Mmmmmm........ok, let's go.' Such small words for such a big change. My partner and I had decided that a lifestyle change was in order, and Taupo was the destination. After an idyllic New Year's weekend spent at Acacia Bay, here, we decided, was where we wanted to be. The house came complete with a small fibreglass dinghy, and I enjoyed rowing out and around the point to cast under the overhanging trees in the hope of catching my first lake fish. I had brought a huge dragonfly imitation complete with spread tinsel wings and bug eyes. My thinking was that casting this under the trees it would appear to be a large bug that had crashed on the surface. This didn’t quite work, although it did cause an incident that set my heart pounding. I was casting happily, retrieving at what I thought to be a reasonable pace, when a large bullet shaped head surfaced slowly, a hand span behind my fly, paused for a second, then sank back into the water. I froze - not sure that I had seen what I just saw. Right then the spell of the lake and surrounding hills and mountains was burned in place, how could I not live in a place such as this?
It remained only to return to Wellington and start the process of packing up what we wanted to bring and selling, giving or throwing away what we didn’t. The landlord of our Lyall Bay flat proved unnecessarily difficult when approached to terminate our lease early, citing this clause and that penalty payment and inconvenience all round, in the end it was easier and cheaper to just let the lease run it's course ‘till it's expiry in May. As it happened, the lease expired on Friday, and I had booked the removal truck for Saturday. The landlord informed me we owed him one day's rent for the use of the house. Appeals for him to be a little bit reasonable resulted in threats to withhold our bond until he was paid the $32 that seemed so important to him. As anyone who has ever moved towns before will tell you, the stress levels run high and they threatened to boil over just at that moment. However, little men should not be allowed to stand in the way of big dreams, the day's rent was duly paid and the way was finally clear for the move.
It remained only to attend the BBQ in my honour at my soon to be ex-place of work at closing on Friday.Sausages were cooked, a beer nursed and a few hands shaken when suddenly all that remained to do was to climb in my car, turn the key and drive away. All I could think about was I rolled down the drive way was: "I'm free!"
The card I had been presented with, signed by my ex-work mates also contained a $20 cd voucher, and it was with a fitting sense of completion for the sometimes hectic if not actually shambolic job that I had left behind that I noticed it was only good at a certain music shop here in Wellington. I battled my way through rush hour traffic on Lampton Key to the shop in question, then had to pay the other $3 needed to cover the cd I wanted. It seemed appropriate.
Finally I was driving the small furniture truck northwards to the lake I could feel calling. The truck was noisy, unheated and the radio out of order although I could amuse myself with seeing how close I could edge the speedo needle to the red posted 90 kph mark without setting the strident over-speed alarm.
Sue had gone on ahead a week earlier to try and get a jump start on finding a job and I was alone with my thoughts for the 400km drive.
November of the year before I had discovered fly fishing. A friend taught me the rudiments of casting in a local school playing field and most generously loaned me his reel and 5 weight floating line to take away on holiday. Some ten years before, I had purchased a wonderful 4 piece 'Safari' fly/casting rod made by Kilwell. Seven and a bit feet long, it was intended as multi-purpose fold-away item for trampers and the like, and it had accompanied me all over the country on my travels. Up to now I had only ever used it as a spinning rod, something it did with wonderful ease. Coupled with a light egg-beater type reel and 2 kg line, it would flick a 12 gram spinner a most gratifying distance.
Now it was pressed into service for the first time in it's other role as a fly rod on the beach at Lake Kuratau, and on my second or third cast , I noticed my line disappearing into the lake's brownish depths. It took a couple of seconds thinking that this was a odd thing for a floating line to do before it dawned on me. I tightened - and sure enough! An obliging rainbow hen of about 30 cm's skipped across the surface, my Hamill's Killer securely pinned in the corner of it's mouth. This fly fishing gig is a doddle! I thought, as I played, landed, photographed and released the game little fish. I toyed with the idea of turning it into lunch, but the peaty look of the water convinced me otherwise.
Trout are sometimes saddled with the rather unfair nickname of 'mudfish', their flesh tasting of their current habitat. Taupo trout taste as they do because their environment is clean and mostly mud free, the rivers and lake are by turns stony or sandy. Lake Kuratau is a man made hydro lake set in the farm land of the southern end of Lake Taupo. Once a low laying manuka gully with a modest stream running thorough, it had been dammed and flooded in the 60's as part of the "Think Big" project, effectively land locking the resident population of brown and rainbow trout. They did quite well for themselves in their new home and the picturesque lake remains one of my favorite places to fish, but living as they do in what is effectively a flooded paddock, the name 'mudfish' is not far from the truth.
After this excellent start, I had high hopes for my career as fly fisherman, but four more totally fruitless days of casting soon taught me the truth of the situation. On the bright side, my casting improved by leaps and bounds, although not without it's sticky moments. For one thing, I rediscovered the law of applied kinetic energy. At only 7'3", my rod was about 2 or more feet shorter than it's contemporaries, this putting the line that much closer to me as I cast. A fly may only weigh a couple of grams, but attached to ten meters of thick fly line and powered along by the enthusiastic flailings of our valiant fisherman, the little brutes can hit with surprising force, and those little hooks are sharp! Happily, I didn't hit myself anyplace vulnerable, but it was a useful lesson in rod and line control.
As the trout were smelting at the time, I spent quite awhile casting little white swimmer type flies at various river mouths. A soft silicone item sold to me by pleasant shop owner with the reassurances that her husband had caught a large rainbow on an identical lure this very morning led me to expect great things. Nicknamed 'Pammy', not only did I totally fail to catch anything other than the manuka tree that became it's final resting place, but it also made the most unpleasant bullet like ziiiiip! as it zoomed past my ear. The fishing was hardly the doddle I had confidently predicted a few days earlier, but none the less the magic was undeniable.
It was my great good luck to meet Sue shortly after my return from this holiday, and it transpired that she had always wanted to learn to fly fish properly. True, there is excellent flyfishing to be had in Wellington, far better than might be expected or believed, but somehow the Hutt River just does not have the 'X' factor of a Taupo river, apart from which, from our house in Lyall Bay to the nearest trout was a solid 45 minute drive, more if the traffic was heavy or if you wanted to fish further a field. Some how the appeal just wasn’t there.
However, this was all in the past now, I was soon to be living in what some people call the trout capital of the world, and the same 45 minute drive would put me fairly in the middle of one of the world's great fishing rivers, the Mighty Tongariro. A 15 minute drive put me on the Waitahanui River, smaller but no less famous, the subject many a magazine article and fisherman's daydream. I had very little knowledge of the actual mechanics of fly fishing apart from the flailings previously mentioned, but if practice did indeed make perfect, I was commited to practising until I was at least in with a chance. The way I saw it, with so many people doing it here, some of it was bound to rub off sooner or later.
A cloudy day right after some line up or other of the planets. Some cheerful souls predicted this as the end of the world (again!) I wonder if it's the same bods that said the Millennium New Year was also going to be the end of the world? You'd think they would get tired of being wrong, wouldn't you? At 3 pm I decided to go fishing, tossed my gear into the Mighty Lada and headed off with no real plans. With the end of the season for most of the rivers here about, I thought maybe the Hinemaiai stream would be a go, the Taupo Times insisting that it hasn't fished this well in a couple of years. But with typical perversity I found myself heading for the Tauranga-Taupo River. Actually, it was more a case of not being bothered with the snags and sunken trees that, for me at least, characterize the Hinemaiai. A week earlier my partner and I had been fishing there, or at least I had been fishing there, she had been lazing on the bank enjoying the autumn sunshine.
To my mind, nymphing is the perfect refinement of fly fishing. If you are a little choosy about your water and positioning, you can spend long periods of time standing still apart from tracking the line with your rod tip. In this case, I was neatly placed on the inside of a bend facing a vertical back that bottomed out in a deep shady pool, a shallow gravel run pouring into it and a tangle of toitoi and manuka below. With my marker a comfortable 10 meters out I could fish nearly 180 degrees of water, then when the toitoi tangle got too close, a simple flick of the wrist send my line to the pool above the gravel run to float for a few seconds, then bump jauntily down to swirl into the head of the pool, to drift slowly and irresistibly to trout , I hoped, at the tail of the pool. The whole cycle took, maybe, 2 minutes, then with a simple flick of the wrist I would do it all over again. Very restful.
My serenity was ruined by a snag of some sort that snapped off both of my flies. Abandoning my pool, I started to work my way down towards she-who-must-be-obeyed, fishing as I went. Slowly rounding the bend, I saw another fisherman flicking a pair of Globugs into the tangle of fallen timber that filled the tiny pool below the boss's sun spot. She saw me get closer, reached into the weeds next to her and held up a good sized trout. It turned out to be a present from the fisherman, who had pulled it from the same pool, then losing a second and much bigger one to sunken timber.
Before me was a shortish stretch of water, perhaps 100 meters long in against a low bank of toitoi, blackberry and manuka, with a 90 degree bend at the top and a short gravel run below. The river here is narrow, maybe 10 meters or less in total, sloping sand and gravel that goes down to make a nice series of scallops against the base of the bank that are just made for fish to lay in. The only catch to this is that the scallops are formed by fallen trees, one in the river every 20 meters or so with more scrub on the far bank just dangling in the water, held against the bank by the current. I was fishing a double fly rig, a tiny pink and red globug above an even tinier hare-and-copper. It was perfectly still and overcast, like the whole day was on pause except for the river flowing low and crystal clear. I watched my marker floating less than half a meter from the far bank, bobbing slightly as it was pushed along by the current, paying out spare line from the loops in my left hand to keep drifting action natural.
Fantails hopped and squeaked in the trees and I watched to see if they were feeding. Sometimes you can see them swooping low over the water to catch Mayflies .Looking back at the tail of the pool, all my spare line paid out, I realized with a start I couldn't see my marker anymore. Even as my rod tip came up, I caught a glimpse of it crossing a patch of lighter coloured sand, speeding up river. Reeling like a mad man, I took in the slack line, and right in front of me, no more than 3 meters away a nice sized trout burst to the surface in a flurry of silver and for the first time I felt the electric shock-like juddering as it bolted for the far bank. Up to now my biggest trout had been barely legal in the old size, 35cms, some 15 years ago. This one was way bigger and much much stronger, as my 5 weight rod bent almost double I had to pay out line for fear of pulling the hook out. A second later it vanished into the sunken branches under the far bank and I felt the sickening steady pressure of a snag. I was dumbfounded, my rod bent over and pointing at the snag. The water was much too deep for me to wade in after it, and even as I changed positions, hoping to free it by pulling on it from different directions, I knew the fish was lost to me. The fleeting thought crossed my mind that I could strip off and dive in after it but that thought drifted away on the river. In the end I reeled as much line as I could in, then with my rod pointing straight at the snag, walked backwards and snapped the line.
The fantails danced and squeaked in the manukas, and as I regarded the snarl of branches that hid my fish, I hoped that it would somehow get loose of the nymph and the snagged line and swim free. It didn't seem fair that the beautiful trout should stay stuck and die slowly. It's odd how we attach value judgments to different animals. On the one hand I hoped the trout would get free to swim away, to breed and help populate the next generation of trout, while I thought of the recently introduced catfish as a pest to be exterminated without mercy, in the same manner as possums and rabbits.
So now darkness was falling, no sunset to be seen behind the solid overcast, just a steady falling of the light that produced no shadows from the trees and rocks. Once again I had forgotten my torch, and the Mighty Lada was a bit of a walk up river. I tied on a big green Parson's Glory and slowly fished my way back upstream. A dozen paces later a small trout gave my fly a shake without becoming hooked, and that was that for the night. On the way back I heard a number of splashes, the loudest from the pool I had lost the trout in. I hoped it was the big fish I’d hooked, finally breaking free. Up stream I could seen the torches of two other fishermen coming down the opposite bank, tiny fireflies in the dark. I consoled myself with the fact there would be other fish, but the little boy in me still yearned for the one that got away.
Part II - A Year In Taupo: Summer
Snags & Big Trout
on The Turangi and Hinemaiai
Depressed by last month's non-fishing, I resolved to get out more. In a fit of altruism I took a friend's 11-year-old son on a fishing trip to the Tongariro. He's a good lad, all the more so for listening to my garbled instructions on how to flick a fly, then somehow making sense of them and proceeding to launch a de-fanged mallard up and down his lawn with enthusiasm and some success.
Half-an-hour of this and then we aimed the Mighty Lada south towards Turangi and the river. Arriving at Admiral's Pool, we found the river high and very dirty and I didn't hold out much hope. However, we were there, so fish we would. I gave junior my only sinking line, a borrowed 6 or 7 weight lime green number.
We had stopped at a local tackle shop for a junior license and some flies they recommended, among them a big Green Orbit which I now tied to his line. He started casing with enthusiasm and good distance for his first time and after watching a couple of casts, I left him to it.
I picked a Red Setter and moved a short distance up river to prospect below a short but steep gravel run. The water was the colour of Latte, with bits of branches and other debris floating past. Maybe I'm something of a snob, but I like my water to resemble, well, water. This is a fairly common misnomer with the Tongariro, the trout are often very active in dirty water, feeding on the insects and other buggy deals being washed away in the rush.
This may well be so, but it was still a fairly unattractive proposition from an aesthetic point of view, and after a half hour or so of no action of any sort, I started to think about a venue change.
I worked my way back to junior and asked him if he had any luck? No, he didn't think so.
Then as a casual afterthought he asked me "what does it mean when your rod bends right over and shakes a lot?"
A short drive north brought us to the Waimarino River, a pretty little stream in the Taupo fashion, bush clad and usually gin clear. Today it was full and quite dirty, although not nearly as much as the Tongariro.
A bumpy drive through the bush brought us out at the beach, from there a short walk to the stream mouth. There were already a couple of fisherman standing in the water, heron patient as they cast and retrieved. There a clear spot on the other side of the delta, and with junior on my back, I waded across and deposited him on dry land on the other side.
Standing up to his maximum depth in his gumboots, paid his line away and drifted his trusty green orbit out into the lake as I waded a little off to one side and started casting myself. There is a certain satisfaction in this type of fishing, no trees to worry about, you can cast as far as you are able, then let the whole lot drift even further on the current, followed by a slow and thoughtful retrieve as you ponder the beauty of the lake.
It was approaching late afternoon by now, the lake perfectly smooth as the sun dipped towards the western hills and thought again what a good idea it had been to move up here.
Off to my left a trout leapt clear of the water and splashed back, just outside of my best casting range, and as I thought about this, another bulged the water somewhat closer.
Good enough! My next cast was in their direction and with some satisfaction landed my Red Setter right where I had seen the second fish and started a slow retrieve with expectation. Nothing.
More casts produced the same result, but the practice did me good I expect. By now the sun was half covered by the Western Ranges and the sky was a rash of colours, oranges and reds, purples and greens, lighting the lake in a breathtaking display.
We walked back empty handed to the Mighty Lada in the last of the light, stowed the rods and drove home in the dark.
August
A log-filled stretch of the Hinemaiai River, where I took a nice jack, has become my water of choice for the moment, and not surprisingly I find myself losing fewer flies as I get to know the resident snags. The odd fish comes my way, too, which pleases me no end. A little further down the river, it straightens out and becomes snag free, the lower part just before the bend where you can wade across to the track on the other side. Drifting down this stretch on my way home just on dusk, my line is given a rude yank and more flies were lost. Hmmm.... Tie on 2 more flies and cast in, a minute later, the same result. Wham! No flies.
This is silly! Tie on still more flies and this time nearly water ski up river for a full 5 seconds before the line breaks again. After that darkness descended once and for all and having no torch, that was that.
This little episode raised several issues. 1. Thou shall carry a torch. 2. Whatever it was that snapped me off like that, I want to catch one!!! And 3. I have my doubts about the 4lb leader I have been using.
After a slow patch at my stretch, I venture further a field and discover more oh-so-fishable water on the river - wider and shallower, with a clump of willows in mid stream. Between the willows and the bank in a Jacuzzi sized pot hole that yields a strike on about my 2nd or 3rd cast. The fish whizzes up and down the pool briefly and then, snap! Bugger!
Crossing to the gravel bank formed below the willow island, the main channel is hemmed by a long fallen tree trunk length ways on the far side. It's been there for ages, a nice crop of grass is growing on the top. Cast as far as I can up stream so my flies are washed along and down (and under) the log and oh yes! I have my 1st double header day, a nice if slightly lean 5 lb jack is followed 1 cast later by a smaller but much plumper hen. This I toss back in a fit of altruism, mother of future generations and all that.
END NOTE: Mike Sayle is writing a series of articles on fishing for a year in Taupo, just to remind the rest of us what we’re missing by not living in New Zealand.
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