Kharlovka 2017

Monday 17th July

The river had fallen a little, back to 40cm, and the temperature with it to 16.2c, and we were greeted by a cloudless morning.

We fished at Litza falls all day, and even though we were a late flight out, by about 11am I had landed 4 fish before Sasha moved me from the right hand side of the river to the opposite bank, where Mark had had nothing. 

He took me to a ledge on the cliff face from where he could see us both, and within 3 casts I hooked and landed a fish of 20 lbs, but that was followed by me hooking and playing for about 10 minutes a fish that Sasha said was about 1.2m long, and he estimated at over 40 lbs! I couldn’t really do that much with it other than hold on for dear life, even though I was on 17.5kg Stroft line.

I ended the day with 9 fish, which Vladimir found amazing at dinner, when Mark hadn’t caught anything all day. Sasha's scoresheet for my day below:

Most of the fish came to the Kharlovka killer, with a couple of the grilse coming to the Willie Gunn and a Garry Dog double. As usual, we returned to camp by about 7, for sushi, vodka & beer before dinner, which was again brilliant, being a beef salad starter followed by cod and mashed potatoes. - Fish caught to date by me total 16, and I had arrived hoping to get up to a dozen for my week. Here we are 2 full days into the fishing, and I already have 16 salmon!

Tuesday 18th July

The temperature of the water had increased to 17.6c, and fallen further to 38cm, and today we fished the lower Kharlovka stretch, comprising Julian’s Pool, Rock Pool and Barrel pool. Previous visitors to these pools had experienced poor catches, as it seemed that the fish had already moved through them, and I had one fish from the barrel pool and lost one early on in the Rock pool, and had a pull that came to nought in Julian’s. The weather was again warm but very windy indeed, making casting pretty difficult from anywhere on the river. 

Arriving back at the camp that night, it was apparent that catches throughout the river were much down on previous day, and my total catch to date stands at 17 fish. Mosquitoes today were absolutely terrible, as I was bitten on the eye overnight, and lip as we were about to board the helicopter to return to camp. 

Dinner was steak, cooked to our liking, which for most people including me as medium-rare, and very good too.

Wednesday 19th July

The water height continued to fall to 36cm, and temperature to 17.7c, and we were to fish Guy’s pool first, followed by Kharlovka falls in the afternoon.

What a day this was! - totally unbelievable, all good, big fish. We started fishing the same positions as when we left Guy’s pool, where in the morning I had fish of 11,12,15,17 & 22 lbs, the latter 2 coming from the left hand side of the river, then in the afternoon I started with a 12lb fish, followed by a 15, then changing to the Guideline rod, red floating line with a sinking tip and a huge Mikael Frodin Samurai fly, a 20, then a monster 23lb fish, both the last 2 coming within 20 minutes of each other.

We had great, even weather in the morning, but the afternoon brought a sudden change to cloud, then a huge thunderstorm, which soon quelled our appetite for holding a long carbon fibre rod, while standing under the only power lines within a 200 mile radius!

That brought our total for Mark & I to 38 fish, with my total coming to 26 fish, and Mark to 12. 

Dinner was Reindeer steak with green vegetables, with a late night with the Russians and a couple of bottles!