Adventures of fly angler in Poland

The last day of our fishing trip. In the morning we went to river Sana again. I asked to drop me out at the bridge, where I caught 2 big graylings day ago. I liked this place, it's the most spectacular area on the river Sana. We started earlier than usual, at 7, and it was very cold and foggy. I arrived to my favorite pool with fast current in the head of the pool, and big eddie on the side.  I had a high hopes for this place. There should be big fish in it. I fished the fsdt current in the head of the pool, the current seams, the eddie. I spent about a hour on this pool . Time to move to next section.  Upstream from the big pool, there's very good medium depth run, from knee deep to waist-deep. Should be ideal for graylings. I fished it over few times, with no contact. Above this run, there's small island, where river separated to two arms: small and big (main current). My attention caught small arm, where fast flow joins the small pool.  I made a few casts to this curre...

 This time our guides decided to show us different river, Sana. Ribnik is tributary to Sana, both rivers join near the village Velje. After the confluence, Sana carries twice much water than Ribnik. It's pretty wide mountain river in some places. There are some very deep holes, which potentially can hold the queen of Balkans mountain streams - the huchen.  But it wasn't our goal, we were targeting mainly graylings with rather light gear. Fly rods in classes 2-3-4 and 7X or 0,10 mm tippet. In such very clear and low water, like it is now, thinnest tippets and smallest flies on hooks 18-24 were preferred.  The river section featured few deep depressions and pools, so it was natural choice for contact nymphing, or euro nymphing.   I didn't have a proper fly rod for that, so I used my tenkara rod, Daiwa Expert LT36 for such method.  Colored level mono line slightly less than rod length, tippet ring on the end, and tippet. The whole rig is about 1,5x of the rod ...

 On the next day I arranged a meet with Tomasz, who agreed to show me a river Muszynka, a small stream which is tributary of Poprad. It joins main river in the town Muszyna. Early in the morning I came to Muszyna downtown. The town is center of tourism. The central square is very neat, and has a lot of flowers. Tomasz arrived, and we headed upstream to the river. Our first stop was a concrete weir and basin under it. There was some trout stocked in these basins.  We fished nymphs. Few small chubs were caught. Tomasz also had trout.  I saw a brown trout chasing my fly when I pulled it for the next cast. But the fish missed it.  Below the weir, there's quite big and wide pool.  But except such places, the stream is quite small and narrow. There's some wide and flat sections of water. I switch to wet fly in it, because nymph snagged the bottom very often. I've seen a lot of small chubs in such flats. Then there was another weir with pool below it.  It doesn't ...

 I was planning 3-day trip to Slovakia for fishing tenkara on small streams. But, for financial reasons the plans changed.  The potential expenses exceeded my budget for fishing trip.  I decided to go to Polish rivers in Podhale region, because fishing in it is "for free" to me.   Well, not really for free, but I have yearly license for Nowy Sącz angling association waters, paid for the whole 2024.  First I came to Dunajec river. It's a big river with wide open space. I didn't catch anything in couple of early hours. Also the wind became stronger, and I was struggling with the casts. Tenkara and wind don't go well together.   Why continue to suffer, if I can go to another stream? They are on the same license, and in the vicinity of 30-40 km.   I jumped in the car and headed to Biały Dunajec. In 50 min I reached my destination.  The river was at low level, 100 cm and 4,1 m3/s flow. The first spot I've chosen is a deep long pool under...

 The heat decreased, and we got fine weather for fishing: +22 during the day, +14 in the night.   I decided to go to Raba early in the morning.  This river is in 30 min of driving from my home. The water is very low and moderately clear. 222 cm and 3,7 m3/s. At sunrise time I was on the water. Short walk to my favorite hole from 2022. There I got some nice rainbows and biggest brown trout on Raba.  The river was calm. No other fishermen spotted. I rigged the euro nymhping rod with two nymphs: small brown noname with 2,5mm bead and hook #16, and pink "parkinson" (silicone worm) on #10.   First two walks through the run from the tail to the head of the pool produced nothing.  There's snag in one place, I lost couple of flies in it. On the third approach I got a fish, and it was a big fish!  When I saw it, I decided it's not a trout. Silvery body and orange fins. Is it big chub? No, it's a nase, or pigfish. Pretty big and fat one.   Th...