Through the fog of sleep I could hear the door of the cabana creak open.  Then the metallic clank of the hatch on the little iron woodstove.  A soft rustling and a quiet “wuuuuf” as the kerosene and pine sticks were lit.  Quietly, my unseen guest left the cabin to warm.  Buenos dias, amigo.  Welcome to Patagonia.

It was still dark, and the Rio Quilquihue gurgled outside my window, swollen from recent rains.  The cold mountain air poured down from the first snows atop the Andes and washed over my face.  I lingered in the warm bed and began to wake from my dreams.  Only to find they’d come true.

I’d organized a publicity tour of the northern Patagonia region, where the mountainous spine of the Andes separates Argentina from Chile.  I had invited eight of the best fishing writers to join us.  To my delight, most had accepted.  Who wouldn’t want to flee the capricious ravages of late winter to enjoy the warmth of the austral summer?  Now we were here, at the lovely Cabanas Andina, on the shore of Lago Lolog, after much travel and to do.  Before us lay a week of fishing and exploration that we anticipated with schoolboy giddiness.

We shuffled, scratched and yawned our way to the central lodgehall, a beautiful creation of woodwork and windows that could be as easily at home in the Adirondacks.  The difference would prove to be the central grill & hearth; the parilla, a huge brick and stone affair – part firepit, part grill, part show - that would warm our hearts as surely as it put fear in the hearts of cattle across the pampas.  After a healthy breakfast, we crammed our gear and ourselves aboard the minibus.  

Our destination was the fabled Rio Chimehuin in Junin de los Andes, which is holy water in the pantheon of fishing destinations.  The water was up and off-color from four days of rain, yet we managed to find a few good trout, mostly prospecting with large, bushy wet flies.  In Argentina, trout become carnivorous early on and grow rather large due to the prevalence of the Pancora crab, a freshwater crustacean similar to a crawdad, but with an inferior tail section.  Any lure scuttled across the river bottom will mimic their feeble swimming.


 
I fished some lovely braids and deep pools knowing from previous experience what monsters can lurk in these streams.  I kept pinching myself, thinking, “I’m in Patagonia!” We lunched back in town at the Rio Dorado Lodge, where – under the heading of “It’s a small world after all” - we ran smack into Saratoga Springs, NY (my town) Public Defender Pete Sipperly, who declared us the most unkempt and raggedy outfit he’d seen in a long time.  We fed on delicious, fried red deer sandwiches and wickedly funny stories by Montana guide and author Dave Ames, (True Love and the Wooly Bugger, A Good Life Wasted). Dave was to become the lead storyteller and soul-daddy of the trip.

That night, the dignitaries from San Martin crowded into the lodge for a wonderful tango show.  It was a boisterous affair with much food, wine and dancing.   The hearth was banked deep with hardwood embers, and flames licked dozens of fragrant, sputtering steaks.  We offered toasts in our best Spanglish, and relished the lusty vino tinto and the authentic costumes.  It was a reminder of how exciting travel can be if you participate in the culture rather than squirrel yourself away with kindred American tourists.

Somewhat blearily, we shuffled into the morning minibus.  Our destination; the fabled Malleo.  A Battenkill-sized river with an equally big reputation, and an anticipated highlight of the trip.  Driving along the rugged, volcanic valley, Monkey puzzle trees stood out like giant pre-Cambrian dinosaurs.  And rising above this starkly beautiful landscape, the Lanin Volcano, a perfectly conical, snow-covered mountain that dominates the vista for miles.

The Rio Malleo looks like a stream in the American west, a meandering oasis set into a desert landscape, complete with cowboys.  On our drive along the dirt road, we saw a rider approaching, his horse putting up a plume of red dust.  He appeared like a vision from the past, a proud gaucho upright in an ornate saddle, dressed in the traditional serape, black felt hat, and large dagger tucked into his waistband.  His sheep dog pranced tightly by his side.  He squinted at us through leathery wrinkles and tipped his hat slightly as we passed.
 
A few years earlier, I had fished some of the lower sections of this fine river with my guide, Robertito, a precocious teenager and family friend, who I nicknamed “The Black Sheep” for his antics.  He had boundless energy and often scouted far ahead, looking for better water or perhaps just to see what was around the next bend.  From somewhere downstream I could hear him calling, “Juan! Trucha Grande!”  I found him atop a high cliff on the opposite bank staring straight down into the turquoise water.  He waved me across the boulders and tumbling waters to his perch.  Indeed, there was a fine big rainbow trout blissfully feeding in the shelter of the cliff.   Without an exit strategy, Robertito excitedly had me lower the fly in front of the monster, who ate it without hesitation.  The fight that ensued was more comic than sporting, but at last we landed the fish, snapped his picture, and revived him back into the cold stream.  Robertito called him “The Helicopter Trout.”

On this new trip, photographer Richard Franklin, author Dave Hughes, (Tactics for Trout, Handbook of Hatches), and I choose the upper reaches of the Malleo, the “Spring Creek” section, where the current slows and waving weedbeds house bugs and trout in profusion.  Dave and Richard continued upstream, while I lingered behind, working one section of the far bank, possibly 100 yards long.  There, under the volcano, the sun at my back, rising fish in front of me, I decided, was heaven on earth. The current was smooth and the bottom sandy.  The overhanging willows provided shade for the pods of trout lazily intercepting little pale mayflies with modest sips.  I worked progressively smaller patterns and tippets until hitting the formula in a #20 CDC pmd on 6X (translation: very tiny fly/very light line.)  I hooked and lost many of these 18-24” trout in the weeds before landing a gorgeous 18-inch rainbow that fought like a champ on the 4-weight outfit.  Back in the bus, we heard tales of Dave Ames’ eight pound brown trout that he took on a grasshopper imitation!

The rest of the days passed in what now seems like a dream.  I remain haunted by these shimmering trout and beautiful rivers.  The Malleo, the Chimehuin.  I hope I never fully wake up.