since the last check-in i took some days off from fishing and did a little more driving/touristing around. i headed north and west from Reefton, reaching the west coast of New Zealand at Westport. i headed south just a bit to a couple very small towns and a nice beach side pub there. the drive to the coast was pretty sweet:
and the coast was fairly nice as well:
this is where i went to sleep that night:
woke up that morn and jumped in the ocean. felt amazing. not only as it was the ocean, but as it was the first bathing i had done in about 10 days.
i possed around Westport for a while, then headed north along the coast towards Karamea. the road there was narrow, windy and the road cut through a type of forest/jungle i had never seen before. this road isn't the highway but the scenery is the same:
the above road took me to day hike trails:
where i saw a couple sweet arches:
fooled around in the surf for a bit, trying to get a bite from a kahawai:
after Karamea, i made i cruised east again. as i hadn't fished for a few days, i was ancy to get back on a trout stream. after a frustrating day of failed access points and a very large river i couldn't tame, i got finally got on the water on a nice river outside of Murchison:
it had been a while since the 6 weight had felt a bend, so i fished with her that day. after half a morning of nothing, i was blind fishing a steep drop off when the indicator went down. it had been a good 4 days since i had last caught a fish. it was a welcome feeling. a great fish too, it would go 7 pounds. this one's for you Wilkie:
unfortunatley, the freedom beard is not to be seen in that picture. it's coming along quite nicely, by the way. i ended up stinging 5 more that day. 3 of them were quite small, though unbelievably crazy fighters. the other two fish were 4 and 3 pounds, and i dedicate both of them to mr. patrick lyons. here is one of them:
i guess that's about it for now. i'm going to head east towards a couple big lakes and the rivers that flow into them. we shall see how it goes. here are a few more pics from the past few days:
these birds are very annoying. they're some kind of duck. they fly back and forth in the rivers, constantly honking. but it's as if they're going through puberty because every 5th or 6th honk is a squeaking honk. they fly back and forth between the pools in the river because that's the only place they can land. quite annoying little buggers:
i think i'll go here...
hello there:a welcome sight after a day on the river:
i hope everyone's well!
yeah, new zealand doesn't look like that nice a place...sweet pics dude. keep em coming.
ReplyDeleteBroginator, this is exactly the post I needed to keep my late fall fly fishing spirits soaring. Sweet dedication, thank bro. Tried calling tonight, left a message. Glad you bathed...ha
ReplyDeletethank you for the fish my friend. you are looking more and more grizzly by the day. awesome. those speights in the river looked mighty tasty. i am sure the first one went down quickly after a long day on the river. keep 'em coming.
ReplyDeleteWow, this looks absolutely beautiful. JEALOUS.
ReplyDeletelooking forward to the next installment, beard, scenery, fish adventures etc, sure is fun following
ReplyDeletePS> How are the Ducks?
ReplyDelete