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You can’t often legitimately use the word "adventure" to describe a guided fishing trip, but here’s an opportunity in Patagonia that just might qualify. Ivan Tarin of Salvelinus Fishing Adventures, who has been the subject of several reports in these pages for his trout fishing in Spain, has put together an "out-there" program in South America.
The trip begins at the Balmaceda Airport near Coyhaique, in Chile, but the fishing starts several hours south of there by 4 x 4, across the border in Argentina, at an unnamed lodge. That’s only for one day, however, as the real adventure starts after more driving and a ferry crossing to what Tarin describes as "a no-name remote village where we sleep three nights and fish some nice lagoons, spring creeks and fast-water tributary spots only accessible by boat and trekking. The quarry will mainly be brown trout.
The expedition will then head southwest for five hours on horseback where the group will fish a place called Lago Escondido from a remote camp. Tarin describes Lago Escondido as being, hidden in the wildest area I have found in Patagonia after five year of intensive searching for the most virgin waters. The local gauchos said we were the first tourists visiting that area. He goes on to say the fishing here will be in five very different rivers and streams, some large, some small, and in five lakes and lagoons. The average brown or rainbow trout in these waters is between 16 and 22 inches, he says, with some measuring upwards of 28 inches. We have only explored some of this water on horseback, by foot and boat, he writes. Who knows what we’ll find in the completely unexplored areas?
The price for this 10-night, 7 1/2- fishing-day exploratory is $6,800 per angler. More details are available on Tarin’s English web site, www.salve linus.com/fly_fishing. His phone number (dialed from the US) is: 011- 34-696-164810. If you go on this trip, please do file a report.