Hidden Treasures in Poland

Time flies like an arrow, and a year has already passed since our first visit to the San River in Poland. We were raring to head into the river, to slosh through its cold water and to place our flies gently on its crisp film of well-oxygenated water.

Last year, the San taught us a lot. We hooked a lot of fish, but we found it rather challenging to catch fish bigger than 16 inches. We knew, however, that beautiful black grayling and starkly coloured brown trout in trophy sizes were there, and that they still had to be there as we headed back this year – much better prepared!

Prior to this early September week, when we headed to the San again, we’d been super-busy tying nymphs, dries and streamers. Our fly boxes were teeming with neatly tied realistics and inducers, but we other cards up our sleeve too. Through social networking, Vlado had become friends with Michal - a polish guy. He knows the San as the back of his hand, just like we know our local Váh River. He helped find the best stretches of the river for us and he also advised us on the most successful fly patterns. So far so good!

On our way to Poland, we traditionally stop at whatever fishing tackle shops we come across. We spent at least an hour in each one, which meant we ended up being quite late. Late in the evening, we finally arrived at our private apartment, which was situated about half a mile from a power plant. Imagine having a drier for waders on your porch! That’s all inclusive!

The next day we woke up to the immediate ambience of a beautiful, foggy, autumn morning. The sun was doing its best trying to peek through the fog and once again, I was in such a quandary about what to do. Should I fish, or take snaps, or shoot a film?

We began fishing, French nymphstyle, in the stronger currents first - and the fish didn’t let us wait for long. The first brown trout and grayling were soon trembling and shivering in our landing nets, but size-wise they were nothing special. Around noon the fish started rising, so we moved into shallower and slower water, where we found the fish at close range. We often had fish right in front of us but especially the grayling were really picky and finicky. The small olive CDCs were the most successful for dry fly fishing and the brown trout trustfully inhaled some of our carefully tied scuds, nymphs, cinnamon sedges and palmers.

You probably know how fast time flies when the fish are biting – and soon the first day had come to and end. In the evening we sat in the cosy kitchen and tied some additional samples of the flies that had proven successful during the day. Michal joined us, and being a professional fly tyer, he had some great fly tying input for the upcoming days.

The next day, instead of buying a licence, I devoted my time to taking pictures and shooting the short movie “This is San”. Meanwhile, Daniel chose to attempt one of San River’s elusive Danube salmon. He did so using a six-inch long streamer, because the fishing rules don’t allow the use of smaller streamers during this time of year.

During our visit last year, we saw Danube salmon hunt 20inch long rainbow trout, so it was more than natural to give these exciting fish a chance. In the end, Daniel managed to land only a rainbow trout on his streamer. He did, however, come in close contact with a couple of Danube salmon – which instilled in him some confidence. Hopefully, when we come back next year, we will manage to land one of those trophy 40inch Danube salmon that terrorize the river.

Later in the week, we moved to a stretch of the river known as the “pit near cottage”. There are some really beautiful fish hiding in there – many of them bigger than 20 inches. Daniel caught a few brown trout and grayling on nymphs, and then it was Michal’s turn.

He came to the front of “the scene” after losing a couple of fish, and was finally awarded with a beautiful rainbow trout. The rest of the guys were hunting for big brown trout, which were greedily picking mayflies off the surface.

It was very interesting to watch all the life along the river each day. Every day a different kind of insect hatched. We also saw huge number of spent spinners drifting down stream. There had to be at least 20 per square meter, and the trout and grayling proved more and more selective as the hatches intensified. As a result, if you didn’t have exact imitations in your fly box, you didn’t stand a fair chance.

On the third day we started out in the “pit near cottage”-spot again. We persuaded a few smaller brown trout using French nymph-tactics, but other than that we didn’t do so well. We did receive a call, however – from Martin, who, apparently, was battling a big grayling. We obviously scurried along to see what all the fuss was about, and when we arrived, Martin was picking up and immaculate 20inch grayling. What a beautiful fish! After a few pictures it was back in the river again, and we all celebrated the catch of a real San trophy grayling.

On the last day, we moved a few miles down river to a place called “under the wires”. There, we met a couple of Czech fishermen with whom we chatted about the fish activity in the different stretches of the river - and after testing each other’s fishing rods for a while, we began fishing.

The clear weather finally persuaded me to put the waterproof case on my camera. I took a few pictures of Daniel posing with a decent-sized brown trout he tricked on a long nymph-drift, and the rest of us caught smaller grayling and brown trout. After it got dark, the fish started to pick micro flies off the surface.

The activity was intense, but even though we tried almost all of the dry flies in our boxes, we couldn’t persuade a single fish during the evening. That’s how challenging the San can be.

We finally bid the river farewell, and came back to the apartment, exhausted, to pack our bags. However, in spite of all the exhaustion, we were already planning a date for our return. The San River might be a little apprehensive and miserly, but it holds dear treasures for the persistent, clever and adaptive fly fisherman.

For more info, please visit: www.fish.pl

Click to watch the video: The San