A wet, windy week at Patagonian BaseCamp, Chile in mid-March

Part 1 of 6: A wet, windy week at Patagonian BaseCamp in mid-March.
Preamble: This adventure to Chile had a long gestation, enduring several twists since its inception in 2018-2019. The initial plan was for 6 of us, long-time friends from fishing the St. Joe River in Idaho and Rock Creek in Montana, to travel to Kamchatka in summer 2021 for a weeklong adventure drifting a river there for big rainbows. Booking through the Fly Shop in Redding, Tim had done a similar Kamchatka float trip previously and wanted to share this unique adventure with us – fishing mouse flies to huge rainbows. Then, early in 2020, COVID hit and shut down all travel. The Fly Shop decided to push their summer 2020 bookings to summer 2021 and our summer 2021 booking to summer 2022. But travel was still restricted when summer 2021 rolled around and they repeated the process. Thus, we were scheduled for summer 2023 at earliest. Then, that little kerfuffle broke out between Ukraine and Russia and none of us wanted to travel to Mother Russia under the circumstances.
So, we began to consider other options, such as Alaska in summer or New Zealand or Chile / Argentina in our winter (their summer). These Southern hemisphere options became more viable for me when I retired and could travel at will in winter. We researched various opportunities and decided on the Patagonian BaseCamp. It was highly recommended and offered diverse fishing options. The only time frame that could accommodate a group of our size there was in March, at the end of their season (typically, from after Xmas through mid-March). One original couple had already booked a Caribbean cruise for this time window and had to drop out. But Tim’s brother, Tom, decided to join us. There would be five fishers in our group.
During the long gestation of this trip, members of our group had suffered a) substantial lower back problems, b) sleep apnea, c) diabetes, d) a heart attack, e) a replaced hip, f) a pulmonary embolism, and other health issues. To some extent, our thoughts were “go now while we can…”. It also helped that at Patagonian FishCamp, much / all of the fishing can be done from boats, limiting the need to wade (back and hip issues…). And here we are.
We received a detailed list of items to pack from the Fly Shop. The fly list was heavy on large nymphs (e.g., Pat’s stoneflies, prince nymphs),

streamers (crystal buggers),

and foam flies (Chernobyls and their offspring).

My initial visions of wet wading in shorts and a rash guard on a warm sunny day (you know, Idaho and Montana in summer) casting to big rising trout changed radically as I focused on the weather forecasts for early March in the region. Shit, it would be cold. And as the departure day came closer, the local forecasts were for rain, lots of rain. So, lighter shirts and a fleece vest were replaced by thermal undershirts, heavy rain gear, and a full fleece jacket – wise moves it proved.
Four flights and three days after departing Seattle, I arrived at Patagonian BaseCamp on the banks of the Rio Palena for a week of fishing a remote location.




The lodge’s location just off Hwy. 7, the major road running N-S through Patagonia, provides access to a number of rivers and lakes. The lodge lies in a north-south valley between two sections of the Andes. [We should have been able to see glacially-covered mountains west and east of the lodge, but the low clouds all week blocked any view of the peaks.]. This is one of the narrower sections of Chile (already a narrow country) with the ocean only 40 miles to the west and the border with Argentina about 60 miles to the east. Multiple rivers and lakes drain from the mountains.


The Patagonian BaseCamp prides itself on providing their guests with the opportunity to fish a different location every day. In addition to floating rivers or fishing lakes, there were overnight options too. Normally, some fishers will be assigned to fish one of three remote “fish camps” on the upper stretches on the local rivers. Here you would float / fish you way down to the camp the first day, stay overnight at the comfortable camp with food already prepared by the cooks at the lodge, and then float / fish your way out to a takeout point. But the crappy weather – rain and wind removed the camps as an option for us.
As the week progressed, our fishing options were increasingly limited by rain and wind. Rain itself is a pain, but it doesn’t prohibit us from fishing, especially with quality rain gear. But heavy rain increases the flow in rivers, especially with the steep slopes in this section of Patagonia. The river levels quickly became too high to fish and the visibility dropped so much that it really wasn’t worth fishing. And the wind made casting really hard and puts you, your fishing partner, and your guide at risk of an inadvertent piercing.
The week ended up being a series of adventures, not necessarily the ones that we had originally envisioned. Let me take you on some of these adventures. My conclusion after two weeks back home: yes, I would certainly go back, but perhaps earlier in the season…
Steve

 

[Cabezon]

Part 2 of 6: Fishing, Day 1, Lower Rio Figueroa float with Tom and Ben.

For Monday - our first day on the water, the winds would be reasonable and there might be some showers but not a hard rain. The previous two days had been relatively dry and the rivers were dropping – things looked promising. While we were eating breakfast and gearing up guides parked the trucks towing the various floating options for the day in the large gravel circle in front of the lodge. Departure time would be 9AM.
To some extent, this whole operation is quite complex. Those folks fishing lakes could return to their boat launch and the jet boat could return to its launch as well. But the rafts floating down the rivers needed their vehicles to be repositioned at the take-out. There are no shuttle services except what the lodge provides for its own fleet.
Tom and I would be guided by Ben to drift the lower section of the Rio Figueroa into Lago Rosselot.

There might be a few minor rapids, but nothing huge. Once Tom and I were kitted out in the dry room, we carried our gear to the vehicles and met Ben. Ben was one of the Bozeman “gang” [Five of the six guides work in Montana from April to October.]. After loading our rods and other gear into the truck, we climbed in and Ben headed us south on Hwy. 7. Just after the boat launch at the junction of Hwy. 7 and the Rio Rosselot, we picked up another lodge employee who had shuttled a vehicle that had dropped off a raft near the outflow of Lago Rosselot; these fishers and their guide would be floating the Rio Rosselot from the lake down to the Hwy. 7 bridge. We turned east off Hwy 7, passed Rio Rosselot, and turned off at a small gravel road to our “raft launch”. This “launch” ended with a 30+’ slope to the river. After loading lunch and various bags into the raft, Nico and Ben slid the raft to the river. Nico would drive our vehicle to the launch on the Lago Rosselot where it would wait until we were ready to take out at the end of the day.

At the raft, Ben indicated what we would both be starting with dry / dropper combos. I strung my Redington 6wt. with a floating fly line and Tom did something similar. Ben adjusted our leaders to what he wanted. The dropper was a Pat’s stonefly on a 3’ish leader. The floating fly was a tan chubby Chernobyl whose body he marked with a black magic marker.

I (a lefty caster) took the bow spot in the raft and Tim (righty) took the stern. Ben would be in rowing seat between. There are no gauges on these Patagonia rivers and assessing flows is difficult. I say the Rio Figueroa was flowing about 6000cfs that day. There were very few exposed gravel banks.


The name of the game was to cast the fly combo as close to the shore as we could, especially if there were submerged logs, boulders, or ledges. But not so close to the shore vegetation, or submerged logs or boulders such that the dropper would be hung up. We mostly fished river left, which wasn’t the best side for either of us as we were both casting over the center of the boat. Fortunately, we only tangled a few times and not too bad. Ben advised us to twitch the Chernobyl fly periodically; this would stimulate the movements of a terrestrial bug trapped at the surface.
Tom picked up the first fish, a nice brown that took his dropper.

He had a few fish lead, some of dropper and some on dry, before I hooked and landed my first rainbow. We both began to pick up a few fish, a mix of surface takes and dropper takes and a mix of rainbows and browns.

We fortunately cast few flies into the trees and Ben successfully recovered most of them. During one such retrieval effort, Ben found the carapace of a female Cantaria beetle (a type of staghorn beetle), a major focus on the trout in the summer.

This female was about 3” long and the males are even bigger due to their long jaws. These beetles live in the riparian vegetation and hit the water with a splat when dislodged. That rings the dinner bell for the larger trout.
Ben rowed us over to the right side of the river to a calm spot for our own lunch: soup, chicken-salad sandwiches, a slice of cake, and home-made cookies.
After lunch, we switched positions, with me in the stern and Tom in the bow. Tom also strung up a rod with a sink-tip line so that he could strip streamers, one of his favorite ways of fishing. I kept with the dry / dropper combo. Frankly, there was more stability (a wider platform) in the bow; the stern position had a much smaller platform.
We had three unexpected adventures during our float. In the first adventure, we were floating our way down the left bank when we heard the sounds of wood snapping ahead of us along the bank. A 50’ tall tree broke free from its base and smashed down along the bank and into the river maybe 50 feet in front of us. So, if a tree falls in the forest and there are two clients and a guide, it makes a sound, a shocking sound.
Our second adventure occurred as Tom hooked a big brown just before the raft entered a minor rapid. As he was fighting the fish from his position in the bow, he lost his footing and he fell sideways and back into the float section adjacent to Ben’s rowing seat. That knocked me off balance and onto the same side of the boat. And the raft was going sideways down the start of the rapid. I have this vivid memory of Tom lying on his side on the pontoon, but still holding his rod and with that brown trailing along off to the side of the boat. Ben managed to keep the raft from flipping and rowed us through the rapid. In the quiet water below, Tom and I were able to regain our feet. The brown trout was still there and Ben netted it. An exciting fish

As we headed downstream, Ben positioned me to cast from the rear into large back-eddies where rainbows were suspended below the flotsam to pick off drifting insects. I missed the first fish because I had too much slack in the line (a hazard in these squirrely currents), but in the next two eddies, I hooked and landed quality rainbows.


Our third adventure (sorry, no pictures) occurred when we were 9/10th done with our float. In a relatively calm section, Tom moved right and the raft moved right. Next thing, Tim is falling over the side of the raft, rod in hand. He landed with a splash right by the raft and popped right up to the surface. Because the bottom section of the rod was separated from the top three, he was initially concerned that he had broken his rod during the fall. But the bottom ferule had simply separated. Ben was able to row the raft and Tom to a shallow where we were able to assess the damage and get him back on the boat. Tom wasn’t too wet and claimed that he wasn’t too cold. But it was a reminder to be careful in future. [Coincidently, his brother Tim also fell out of the raft on the same float near the same spot the next day. Marcel (owner of the lodge) and the guides insisted that they hadn’t had anyone fall out of the boats in years and here we had two cases in two days…]
Once we reached Rio Rosselot, Ben rowed us over to an island where an outboard engine had been stashed for us previously. After a few splutters, the engine carried us across the lake to the launch near the end of the lake.
All in all, a solid start to our Patagonian adventures. Tom landed maybe 9-10 fish, with one 22” brown, two 20’ish browns, and the rest a mix of rainbows and browns. I ended up with 6-7 fish, including two 18”ish rainbows, one 16” brown, and the rest rainbows.
Steve

 

[Robert Engleheart]

Very nice, can’t wait for the next installment.

 

[Cabezon]

Part 3 of 6: Fishing, Day 2, Lago Yelcho with Tom and Nick.
The forecast today was for showers and winds in the high single digits with higher gusts out of the northwest. Tom and I would be fishing Lago Yelcho with Nick as our guide. One of the farthest fishing destinations from the lodge, this lake is the next major drainage north of the Rio Palena watershed. The lake is fjordlike.

A major contributor to Lago Yelcho is the Rio Futaleufa, a world-class white-water river (class II to V+). There are several fishing lodges on the lake. We would be fishing out of a 16’ aluminum Lund with an outboard and oars. The outboard would move us from site to site while Nick would control our drift downwind via the oars.
The prevailing northwest wind direction and the orientation of the lake creates enough fetch to build white-caps easily.

Therefore, we stayed tucked as best we could along the western shore where there was some cover from the waves. However, it did not provide much cover against the wind while casting.
For most of the day, we targeted the edge off an underwater shelf off the reed beds that line much of the lake shore. [Note the wind waves during one of the squalls in this “protected” location.]

Tom was at the bow of the Lund and I was in the stern with Nick rowing in between. With the bow pointed into the wind, this should have left both of us (me a lefty and Tom a righty) casting over the stern and bow of the boat – minimizing crossed lines or hitting your fishing partner. But the wind was stiff enough and right on Tom’ right shoulder that he was having a hard time getting a cast out. However, I was in the sweet spot because the wind pushed my flyline/flies away from me and over the motor.
We were fishing a dry – dropper setup. The dry fly was a chubby Chernobyl foam fly. While earlier in the season, there might be a chance of a trout grabbing the surface fly, we had no strikes at the dry fly; it was essentially a float. The dropper fly was an olive Pat’s stone; Nick said that any fly would work as long as it was olive... Along the reeds in mid-summer, there is a substantial emergence of dragonflies that the trout target.
From my stern position, I could drop casts 20-30’ off the side of the boat to the dropoff as Nick controlled our downwind drift with oars. At his instruction, I periodically “popped” the chubby to provide some wiggle to the dropper fly. It worked like a charm. I had a day…. I ended up landing over 20 rainbows, all on the dropper. The best rainbow was over 20”. Two were 18-20”ers and the balance were between 14-18”. Nick, like the other guides, was VERY careful when handling the fish that we caught. Fish were kept in the water while cameras were set up and then the fish was out of the water for a minimum time.]

[This picture is part of my rainbow trout juggling series…]
[Note the overall grayness in the pictures…. A theme for the trip.]
When the wind allowed and Tom could drop a cast outside the footprint of the boat (or his body or Nick), he was able to hook up about 10 fish. His initial landing success was not stellar as he tried to horse these fish in and they broke him off. But once he adjusted his fighting tactics (“use your reel dude!!!”), he started to bring some nice fish to the boat.


For a change of pace, Nick motored us to several creek mouths which we probed. These were productive too. In fact, Tom hooked and lost a really nice brown at one of these creeks. But all things come to an end and we motored back to the gravel ramp by the Hwy. 7 bridge and the start of the Rio Yelcho that drains the lake. [Yes, that is a patch of blue sky on a predominantly gray squally day.]

All in all, a very fun day for me and solid day for Tom.
So, we returned to the lodge in high spirits. But that changed to concern and disappointment for the next few days. First, the forecast for Wednesday, the next day, was horrible: heavy rain all day and winds in the teens with gusts in the mid-20’s. While the situation would be assessed the next morning (forecasts are forecasts, not infallible), it looked like no one would be fishing on Wednesday.
And a member of our group who had developed a runny nose and a sore throat tested positive for COVID that evening. An older gentleman who had a runny nose for several days prior also tested positive. Another guest (out of nine guests) tested positive for COVID on Wednesday morning and another member of our group tested positive on Thursday. [A third member of our five-person group later tested positive for COVID back in WA. I took a COVID test when I arrived home and tested negative – whew..]. So, infected folks were semi-isolating in their rooms with meals delivered (or eating at the farther corners of the central lounge/dining area of the lodge) and we were all concerned who would be next.
Steve

 

[Kenneth Yong]

E.P.I.C.

I'm going to bed now, knowing I'll wake up tomorrow with an adventure to follow. Can't wait!

Thanks much for sharing,
Kenneth

 

[Cabezon]

Part 4 of 6: Fishing, Day 4, Laguna Guacha with Billie.
As Wednesday was a total washout and the rivers were blown today, options were limited on where to send the fishers who were well-enough to fish. I drew Billie as my guide and Laguna Guacha as our destination. This small lake (red outline) is just east of the much large Lago Rosselet (and on the way to put in on Monday at Rio Figueroa). It is tucked in a narrow valley between steep mountains.


After a very wet Wednesday, there were multiple waterfalls pouring from the cliffs around the lake.

The inputs from the lake have no glacial source. Therefore, the water color is “tea-colored” due to the plant tannins staining the water. Most of the shoreline is covered by reeds.

Patches of submerged aquatic weeds extend to the surface in shallow-enough depths offshore of the reeds.

We rigged two rods. For trolling, I put a type III (6ips) sink-tip line on my Hardy 6wt. and Ben tied on an olive wooly bugger. I had a floating line on my Redington 6wt. Billie tied a tan chubby Chernobyl as the initial dry fly. [Clear evidence of its success.]

As Billie explained in the drive to the lake, we were unlikely to catch very many fish, but there was the possibility of some very nice fish on the chubby at the surface. We were unlikely to have many (any?) strikes on the bugger tied to the sink-tip line, but it gave us something to do while he rowed us to the upwind (northwest) end of the lake.
We followed a rickety, narrow wooden walkway from the true lake shore out into the reeds/riparian shrubs where a drift boat was tied off. When Billie and another member of our group had fished the lake on Tuesday, the lake level was several inches below the walkway. As a result of the rain on Wednesday, the walkway was now under a few inches of water (and covered with a layer of floating reed fragments). Not being able to see the walkway clearly, I made a nice minor face-plant off the walkway; fortunately, the only victim was my “dignity”, not a commodity that I cared much about.
Once settled into the drift boat, Billie rowed us through the reeds and onto the lake proper at the downwind end. We trolled the woolly bugger the length of the lake without any action (not surprising). I suggested to Billie that a fish-finder might be a useful item to assess where the fish might be holding in the open water. [Back at the lodge, I mentioned to the head guide the advantage of a fish-finder and perhaps having an anchor hold position on a windy lake to the head guide. From his reaction, you might have thought that I had suggested adding a chunk of earthworm to the hook of a fly… Ah well…]
Once at the upwind end, it was a numbers game: throw as many casts as possible covering as much of the surface of the shoreline in the hopes of finding a few fish willing to strike a surface fly. Billie at the oars controlled the position of the drift boat along the shore as we were pushed downwind. Over the day, we made two laps of the lake.
As the guides on previous days had suggested, Billie wanted me to literally “pop” the fly. I felt that I was fishing for bass or bluegills… Later in the day, he actually switched out the chubby (briefly) for an actual popping bug. But the popping bug wasn’t making as much surface commotion as the chubby and he switched back. While the reed-line was the major focus of my casts (and strips back to the drift boat), Billie also wanted me to make casts into the open water adjacent to shore and to the edge of any offshore weed beds. Passing squalls with gusty winds and rain swept through periodically.
The day was simple: cast, strip, strip, strip, strip, recast, etc. It was relatively zen-like, like steelhead fishing – long periods of repetition punctuated by explosive strikes. In the end, nine fish showed some interest in my fly, some vigorously and some half-heartedly. I hooked five and landed all of them, all rainbows in the 14-18” range. They fought well and were healthy.



But none of the really large monster trout that live in this lake were willing to play. We had our best success at the downwind end of the lake, as you would expect with the wind conveying food to this end.
Finally, we ran out of time to keep trying for that monster. I successfully navigated the submerged walkway to the shore. But in keeping with this trip, nothing was simple. The left rear tire was flat. The gravel roads are death on trailers and truck tires.

After a long day of casting in the wind and rain, I was very happy to be the “client” in this situation and let Billie deal with the flat tire. As my contribution, I positioned myself down the road to flag down passing cars and trucks that were bombing around a blind corner to where he worked on the tire. [In a week, we saw two wrecked cars on the side of the road. Passing on double-yellow lines and blind corners is a common occurrence here...]
Steve

 

[Cabezon]

Part 5 of 6: Fishing, Day 5, Lago Yelcho with Tom and Nick.
On Friday, the main rivers were still blown out. And the weather was still nasty with wind in the teens and higher gusts in squalls. So, those who were not under the weather due to COVID were to be sent to the lakes to fish. Given the limited options, I happily accepted the option of returning to Lago Yelcho with Tom and Nick. [I should have known that you can never go back again…]. But the day was even windier than Tuesday when we had been here last. The center of the lake was covered in white-caps.
Nick decided to fish some coves on the east shore of the lake that might offer more protection from the wind. So, unlike Tuesday when I as a lefty had the favorable wind direction, Tim as a righty had the easier time. From my position in the bow, I either had to catch a float / dropper combo over Nick’s head (something he wasn’t too keen on in the gusty conditions) or cast this awkward combo backhanded. That quickly grew frustrating. But we ground it out…
Tom did quite well today. He earned the nickname ST Rex (Salmo trutta king) as he landed some nice browns over the week, including several today. We all remarked at how few spots this brown had.

And he picked up several nice rainbows too.

These coves consisted of rocky cliffs with submerged logs or logs extending into the lake. It was a mine-field for casting and you knew that you had to be close to this structure to attract the attention of fish.
In the end, I landed one quality rainbow and one nice brown trout for the day, nothing like the day I had on Tuesday.


We quickly covered the coves and Ben motored across to the northwest end of the lake to try our luck at the drop-off by the reeds. But the gusts were too strong for Ben to hold our position. [Hmm, maybe an anchor might have helped…]. We even tried the two creek mouths that we had fished on Tuesday, but we never had a sniff.
The one silver lining for me (Tom had a very successful day) occurred during lunch (hot soup, couscous salad, cookies) when we were pulled into a sandy beach to eat (and pee). I noticed small, very thin fish dimpling the surface right at the water’s edge. These were common galaxias (Galaxias maculatus) a native fish found across the cold-temperate Southern hemisphere (excepting Africa and Antarctica).

This species is amphidromous. They spawn in the estuarine regions of rivers in the fall. The larvae are carried into the ocean where they grow for several months. Juveniles migrate back into river and lakes where they continue to grow. I asked if Nick if the guides used patterns that mimicked the galaxiids; he indicated that only when the common galaxiids form spawning aggregation do they see the trout attack them. Populations of these fish are under threat from introduced predators (aka trout) and overharvest. The juveniles are scooped up in dip nets during their return migration. We were served “puyes”, these juveniles sautéed in oil and garlic, as a traditional Chilean appetizer as part of Monday’s dinner.

Steve

 

[Flymph]

Thank you!

 

[Cabezon]

Part 6 of 6: Fishing, Day 6, Rio Rosselot and Rio Palena.
For our final day of fishing, Mike and I would be guided by Billie. The forecast was for squalls and some sun breaks. The original plan was to fish the Rio Rosselot from its start on Lago Rosselot and pull out just upstream of the Hwy. 7 bridge (to the east).

We were cautioned to NOT wear waders today, only rain pants; waders can fill with water if you are dumped out of the raft (though mine are typically filled with me…). This river section includes a long rapid that is normally categorized as class IV.

The only safe path requires the raft to enter the rapid on one bank of the river, the guide to row diagonally across the river, and raft to exit the rapid on the opposite bank of the river. We would be wearing life jackets and white-water helmets before entering the rapid.

When we crossed the Rio Rosselot on Hwy. 7, a marker log that Billie uses to measure river height was completely underwater. We picked up Nico, our shuttle driver, just over the bridge. When we reached the launch site, the cement boat launch at the downstream end of Lago Rosselen was 3/4rs covered in water.

Tom, Ben, and I had used this launch on Monday to take out after floating the Rio Figueroa and the water level was several feet below the bottom of the cement ramp. On Monday, there was plenty of space below the ramp to drive a truck and trailer onto the gravel beach to load a Lund aluminum boat that another group had used to fish to lake. So, what would that rapid look like today? There was no way to scout it without being on the water. Was it worth risking our lives on that rapid? No fuxen way. What was a plan B for fishing? Billie drove us back to Hwy. 7 where there was some phone reception. In consultation with Marcel, the founder and owner of Patagonia BaseCamp, we would float from our original take-out point on the Rio Rosselot and float to the west to where it joined the Rio Palena and then take out several miles downstream. VERY large trout had been caught in this section of the Rio Palena previously. Billie had never been to the new take-out spot, but with Google maps, he was able to visualize it. And Nico promised to position the truck in a prominent position so that we wouldn’t miss the take-out. Onto plan B. And it seemed that the environment was signaling a possibly good day when we saw a stonefly fluttering on the water right where we launching (false signal as it turned out…).

High, but not too cloudy.
So Mike (righty) and I (lefty) geared up with a chubby floater and Pat’s stonefly nymph dropper combos. We would mostly be fishing river left. I started the float in the stern position and Mike at the bow; Mike could cast over the open bow and I could cast over the open stern.
The game was to land the flies as close to shore or any underwater cover as close as we could. And we fished it hard. But with the water level so elevated even at the bank, it would require a trout to come far off the bottom to reach even the dropper fly. We had NO action as we drifted down the Rio Rosselot. After a mile or so, the Rio Rosselot flows into the Rio Palena. We could see a clear mud line where the waters of the high Rio Palena met the clearer Rio Rosselot; once their waters, visibility (and fishing) would be seriously compromised.

The river valley opens up at this point. Before the mixing point, we encountered a series of minor riffles on the Rio Rosselot side. There was soft, calmer water inside these riffles. Mike started to pick up some smaller rainbows 12-14” that were suspended in these quiet pockets. I finally got on the board with one rainbow myself.
But once the waters mixed and the combined river flowed straight, it was basically casting practice. The water was too dirty and too high to expect any reasonable trout to see, let alone attack, our flies. But we persisted because what else would we do – casting practice. After lunch (soup, macaroni salad, cake, cookies), Mike switched out his dry/dropper combo for a mouse fly; one of his goals for this trip (before the monsoon hit) was to catch a large trout on a mouse fly. We cast relentlessly through sun and squalls without any indication that anything with fins cared in the least.
Sunny Mike

Damp Mike

After hours of mindlessly drifting and casting, we finally saw the white Toyota Hilux truck parked by a gravel bar. We pulled into an inside eddy to prepare to take out. And at that moment, a trout took grabbed Mike’s mouse fly. But Mike was distracted by the end of the float and missed the grab (or the fish missed the hook) – either way, no sale. And a signal from the fishing gods if I ever saw one
We unloaded our gear and unstrung our rods while Billie pulled the raft onto the trailer and tied it down. We were done and headed back to the lodge.
No, we didn’t end the trip on a high note. We (guests and guides) made the best of the conditions that we had and knew that no one could control the weather.
Steve

 

[Cabezon]

Bonus: Part 1 of 4, Patagonian BaseCamp Lodge.
Marcel Sijnesael started hosting guests at Patagonian BaseCamp 22 years ago. Originally from the Netherlands, Marcel chose this pristine location to establish a world-class fishing lodge on the banks of the Rio Palena. The philosophy of the lodge is to provide its guests with a quality, diverse, comfortable fishing experience. The staff were universally helpful with any request.
Access to the lodge is via an unassuming, unmarked gravel driveway off Hwy. 7. The road leads through a copse of evergreen forest and past several paddocks for horses and sheep. Then you see the lodge and a large gravel circle.
Each morning, the guides assemble the various vehicles and water craft in the circle for the day’s adventure.

A side road to the right leads to the boat yard and the acommodations for the fishing guides and other lodge staff. A side road to the left leads to a “honeymoon building” in the woods.
The main lodge building has three sections: the guest rooms to the south wing (right side of image), the kitchen and dining area / lounge in the center, and Marcel’s quarters to the north wing (left side of image). [This view is from the high bank above the Rio Palena.]

The lodge limits its capacity to just 12 anglers. Most guest rooms are off long corridors off the first two floors of the south wing. A single guest room with a king-sized bed is tucked into south end of the 3rd floor of this wing. This room has a large picture window overlooking plum and apple orchards to the south of the building. Rooms on the first floor also access a long deck on the river side. Rooms like mine on the second floor have small balconies overlooking the river.
During our visit, at the very end of the season, there were only nine guests. As a result, I ended up with my own room in spite of the original plan to share a room. My room had two single beds.

I used one bed to sleep and another to organize my fishing and camera gear. I had a full bathroom for my own use. There was a small sitting area with chair by a large window that overlooked the river.

and closets for organizing/hanging clothes. This wing is heated by a wood stove by the spiral staircase between the first and second floor.
A dedicated Dry Room at the far south end of the lodge serves as a prep / storage area for waders, wading boots, rain jackets, and anything else that may need to be dried out from a day on a river or lake.
The Dry Room has its own gas heater. There are also spare jackets, waders, wading boots, and almost any other gear that you might need. I found a spare wading jacket that I wore over my thin rain jacket for the week. Fishers can access this room via a wooden walkway around the building; this keeps wading boots and other wet foot-ware off the polished wooden floors in the guest wing.
The heart of the lodge is the central lounge / dining area. It is a massive open space three stories high.

At the center of this room is a tall exhaust tube to collect smoke from the open hearth. While this may be more decorative in summer, it was a great source of warmth for us in early fall. Comfortable chairs and couches are arranged around three sides of the hearth. There is also a fly-tying area on the south side of the room. The north side is dominated by a massive rectangular dining table. In good weather (wonder what that’s like..), guests can eat at an outside table under a covered porch, but that wasn’t an option during our time at the lodge… The lounge also had a small refrigerator stocked with soft drinks and beer, a collection of spirits, and an excellent collection of Chilean wines.

The kitchen connects directly to the dining room table area.
A wooden boardwalk that starts at the Dry Room and leads south through and orchard to end in a sauna and wood-fire hot tub on a deck overlooking the river. After a long day of fishing in the wind and rain and cold, a soak in the tub was rejuvenating.

The lodge sits on the high bank above the Rio Palena River. The Rio Palena starts in the mountains near the Argentina and runs in an inverse Z pattern for 150 miles before emptying into the Gulf of Corcovado. Its average flow is about 4,600cfs, but we didn’t experience average…. At the lodge, the Rio Palena runs N-S in a valley between the mountains of the Parque Nacional Corcovado (from the river to the Gulf of Corcovado to the west) and the peaks of the Reserva National Lago Palena to the east. When we first arrived, the river was dropping into fishing shape after some weekend rain.

But with rain (light and heavy) during our window, it ran high and dirty most of the week.

Steve

 

[Gyrfalcon22]

Loving the reports ! Will patiently await the full fauna report...has to be some birds in the mix I am guessing : )

 

[Cabezon]

Bonus: Part 2 of 4, Patagonia BaseCamp Meals
The lodge prides itself on locally-sourced ingredients in its meals. The milk and cheeses came from the neighboring farm. While lodge-bound on Wednesday due to crappy weather, I watched one of the Chilean staff carry in a lamb carcass into the kitchen, a lamb that lived its entire life on the property.

The meals, prepared by two cooks from Peru, were excellent with rich flavors and presented artistically.
The schedule for the day started with breakfast at 8AM, with coffee available starting at 7:30AM. We would eat lunch in the field with our guide for the day. Back in the lodge after fishing, there would a snack (sliced fruit, crackers and cheese or a spread, etc.) in the lounge area in early evening. In addition to the open bar, sometimes there would be a carafe of the Chilean (and Peruvian) national drink, a pisco sour (kind of like a margarita, but with alcohol fermented from grapes). Dinner was served at 8PM; on two evenings, dinner was served at 7PM because either no one was able to go fishing or everyone was back early due to the conditions.

While breakfast conversation typically focused on the weather and the fishing adventures for the day, dinner conversation was a bit more diverse, albeit dominated by comparisons with other fishing experiences. The other four anglers had fished everywhere. One of the guests that overlapped with was Jack Porter, the South America Program Director for Yellow Dog, a fishing travel company; He was wrapping up a tour of Chilean destinations so that he could make better recommendations to his clients (great job…). I really enjoyed a quiet evening conversation between Marcel and Jack about the business from both of their perspectives.
The breakfast set up was pretty standard from day to day. Lu, our server, laid out the table each morning with plates, bowl, glasses, and cutlery. She brought in a plate with local cheese and sliced cold-cuts (ham, turkey, or salami), bowls of granola, bowls of yogurt, bowls of sliced fruits (apple, banana, melons, etc.), a plate of savory and/or sweet rolls, carafe of mixed fruit juice, and carafes of water.

I typically ate a bowl of fruit, some slices of the local cheese and cold cuts, and a roll. After everyone was started, Lu would ask how guests wanted eggs prepared and whether they wanted a slice or two of bacon. As a non-egg consumer, I would ask for two slices of bacon and make a sandwich with one of the small rolls.
Each guide packed our lunches in a hard-sided or soft-sided cooler. We had been provided with individual aluminum water bottles when we were greeted at the Chaiten airport; I ensured that mine was packed in my dry bag before the start of every day. In addition, lunch included any specific soft-drinks that we had requested – ginger ale in my case. Around 1PM, the guides would find a spot to beach the boat on the river or lake; this provided a bathroom break as well. Lunch began with a bowl of a pureed soup; while not necessary in summer, it was a great warming start to lunch on the cool, wet days that we experienced. The main course varied; it might be a rich chicken-salad sandwich, a cold couscous salad, a pasta salad, or quiche. Dipping the quiche into the soup proved to be a great combination. Dessert might consist of a piece of pie or cake. There was also a container of home-make cookies, but I typically reserved my share of the cookies as a pick-me-up for the drive back to the lodge.
The dinner menu was handwritten on a chalk board by the kitchen door.

As requested by guests, bottles of Chilean reds and/or whites were opened. Glasses were kept topped up as requested. The menu consisted of an appetizer, a main dish, and a dessert. For example, the appetizer for Sunday night was a flower of avocado with peach and almond slices.

The main course was wild-caught (supposedly…) Atlantic salmon with creamed peas (and crispy skin).

Dessert was a deluxe chocolate cupcake with a sweet sauce.

One of the more unique appetizers that we were served was a bowl of Puyes (see day 1), sautéed local fish. They were not my favorite – a bit too fishy, but I ate half my bowl.
Another new fish dish for me was fried “conger eel” with a quinoa “risotto”. I looked into this a bit more and the fish isn’t a true “conger eel” = Anguillidae. In fact, it is most likely red cusk eel, Genypterus chilensis in the family Ophidiidae (which also includes brotulids). This is an elongate (eel-shaped) bony fish with a large mouth that inhabits the bottom from Peru to Southern Chile. It has mild white-meat flesh. In addition to being served fried, this species is often served in a fish soup (Caldillo de congio); Pablo Neruda, Chilean Nobel laureate in literature wrote a poem to this fish soup.
I celebrated my birthday during this trip. I received a cupcake with a single lighted candle at breakfast. And the cooks prepared a special birthday cake that was served as dessert that evening. I was very touched with their thoughtfulness. After the guests ate a piece, the cake was delivered to the staff dining area for all to share. And just to be clear, I was NOT exclusively responsible for the large section of cake that is missing. Although evidence of my large slice is incontrovertible based on the image…

We had local lamb several times. On Wednesday, it was a delicious leg of lamb with creamed asparagus and mashed squash.

On Saturday, the last dinner for our group, the cooks prepared an “asado”, a barbecue with lamb as the main course. The lamb was cooked on the barbecue outside and was quite delicious. Interestingly, this Chilean lamb lacked the gamey aftertaste that one often experiences with the lamb sold in the U.S. (presumably, New Zealand lamb).
Steve

 

[Jim F.]

Thank you very much for sharing, Steve!

 

[troutpocket]

Thanks for sharing your adventures! Looks like a nice little corner of the world…

 

[Cabezon]

Bonus: Part 3 of 4, Patagonian birds
As @Gyrfalcon22 pointed out, I am an avid birder too. My binocs, camera with telephoto lens, and a local field guide accompanied me south. And I added the Southern South America section of the Merlin app on my iPhone. While I could do some birding on our drives to/from our fishing sites and some birds on the water or in the riparian vegetation, the major focus of the trip was NOT birdwatching (maybe in future). In fact, several of us looked into taking a day to whale-watch and see Magellanic penguins, other marine birds, and sea lions offshore, but the same weather that sucked at the lodge killed that option. [I had advocated extending our stay on either side of the trip, but I couldn’t get anyone else to commit the time.]
On our trip south to Patagonia BaseCamp, we did spend a night at a lake-front hotel in Puerto Varas, on the shore of Lago Llanquihue. A flock of 10-15 giant grebes dove close to shore.

Brown-headed gulls in non-breeding plumage were doing what gulls do everywhere: begging for food and investigating every opportunity for a freebie.

I also spotted a black vulture on the beach (no picture).
One of the most common birds that we saw in pastures at the lodge and on our drives was the noisy Southern lapwing (no picture). In the same fields, we often saw flocks of black-faced ibis.

The local flock appeared to roost near the Rio Palena at night. We would hear their strange trumpeting calls at first light and at dusk by the river.
When the wind and rain cancelled any fishing trips on Wednesday, I exploited a relatively dry window between showers in mid-afternoon to do some birding and photography around the lodge. A challenge is that not only are their new bird species in Chile, but there are new families of birds that I have never seen before (and most of them have stripes for some reason). So, I will try to give you NA equivalents too. Right by the guest wing of the lodge, a cluster of wild Chilean rhubarb plants (Gunnaria tinctoria) had flowered in the summer and produced a huge crop of tiny orange fruits just outside the guest wing (see plant bonus section). This plant was a major bird attractant.
The most obvious bird species around the lodge itself were a “family” group of several dark-bellied cinclodes. Though related to ovenbirds, they acted much like thrushes; they probed the grass for insects and ate the tiny orange fruits of the wild Chilean rhubarb (which is not a rhubarb).

Another species feeding of the rhubarb fruits was the Patagonian Sierra finch. These are related to tanagers (though much smaller). Like tanagers, they feed on seeds, fruits, insects, and nectar.

Exploring the rhubarb fruits were the very cute thorn-tailed rayodites, wren-like or chickadee-like birds. They have the most amazing tail feathers with stiff extensions. According to what I have read, they are insectivores, but they were also interested in the orange fruits of the rhubarb plants, perhaps for insects that might be attracted to the fruits. The tail extensions play a role in mate attraction.

Ignoring the rhubarb plants entirely were the fire-eyed diucon birds. The “fire-eyed” part of their common name is obvious once you’ve seen their eyes. They are New-world flycatchers, like Say’s phoebes, the various woodland flycatchers, or pewees. They occupied prominent perches that provided good locations to intercept passing insects.

Foraging among the shrubs was another smaller flycatcher, the white-crested elenia. They feed on both fruit and insects.
I heard many strange bird songs/calls while out on the lakes and rivers. But without binocs with me on the rafts/boats, it was hard to see the birds clearly enough to put names to them. Yes, there appeared to be local thrushes, but I don’t doubt that there were many other types of birds as well in these riparian habitats.
While fishing on Lago Yelcho, I identified a pair of great grebes with their juvenile (bad cell-phone picture). They swam past us both days we fished there. They resemble a red-necked grebe in size, but the males have a dark head and crest.

On our float down the Rio Palena on the last fishing day, we encountered several large flocks of ashy-headed geese stretched out along the gravel banks. More closely-related to Old-world shelducks, these “geese” show strong sexual dimorphism and very distinctive wing patterns. They were skittish and flew off if we approached too close to shore

What other birds did I see? I was able to put names (but not necessarily pictures) to 22 species. These included Southern caracara, variable hawks, Chilean mockingbirds, black vultures, ringed kingfishers, Austral thrush, tufted tit-tyrant (looks like a titmouse), neotropical cormorants, American kestrels, eared doves, among others. My wife and I are planning an Antarctic cruise in winter 2026 and we will probably include time to explore more of Patagonia, even if I don’t have an opportunity to fish there in future.
Steve

 

[Yard Sale]

Great adventure! Looks like you took on tough conditions well. Thanks for showing us.

 

[Gyrfalcon22]

Outstanding reporting as always, Steve ! Really appreciate all the detail and photos you share, and especially on these big-time adventures.

I knew something was up as it got a little quiet without your bird reports! Haha. Had no idea you were you off the continent. Well done !

(If I go missing it is because I am most likely lost in the Olympics somewhere, not on some cool foreign trip)

 

[Cabezon]

Bonus: Part 4 of 4, Patagonian flora
Botany is one of my weakest area; my wife is a very accomplished botanist and I typically rely on her. However, a friend turned me onto an app, PlantNet, that uses some flavor of pattern recognition to match an unknown plant in a photograph to species. It provides an id probability based on its match of features and with the likely plant species at that location. It worked out quite well in Patagonia.
The forests in this region of Patagonia are a mix of local conifers and evergreen angiosperms. The primary forest had already been logged in areas that I visited; there are some remnants in isolated high-elevation areas. One example of these evergreen trees is Dombey’s beech, Nothofagus dombeyi. These trees can reach 150’ in height and they are important shade trees in riparian habitats. [Note the flock of American turkeys in the background.]

Their flowers form an orange nut in fall.

Another striking member of the riparian community is the prickly myrtle, Rhamphthamnus spinusus. This fast-growing species reaches a height of 15’ in the wild. It has prickly stems to deter herbivores. It produces small pink flowers in the spring that develop into purple fruits in late summer/fall.

As I mentioned in Part 3, one of more distinctive plants that you see everywhere are Chilean rhubarb plants. They are not true rhubarb plants, but they can be eaten like rhubarb. These perennials dominate the roadsides and other disturbed habitats.


Long stalks support massive meter-sized leaves that shade out other plants. The stalks and leaves have spikes; when I first saw them, I thought “devil’s club”, but I don’t think that they are related.

Thousands of tiny flowers emerge in summer from long, conical spikes.

These develop into orange fruits.

A single plant can produce 250,000 seeds per year. The seeds are dispersed by birds. The plants can also spread via rhizomes and rhizome fragments. In several parts of the world, they have escaped ornamental gardens and become invasive pests.
One striking small shrub that was wide-spread is the hummingbird fuchsia, Fuchsia magellanica. Even in early fall, these plants were producing a profusion of red/purple flowers.


Steve

 

[Cabezon]

Outstanding reporting as always, Steve ! Really appreciate all the detail and photos you share, and especially on these big-time adventures.

I knew something was up as it got a little quiet without your bird reports! Haha. Had no idea you were you off the continent. Well done !

(If I go missing it is because I am most likely lost in the Olympics somewhere, not on some cool foreign trip)

Thank you.
And my wife and I arrived home in the wee hours of Monday after a week of natural history immersion in Anza Borrego State Park, the Salton Sea, and Joshua Tree National Park. Like Patagonia, we ran into rain in the desert and snow in the mountains of San Diego!!!
I have 3100 images from the week to process. The first quick perusal Monday indicates that there are some real gems that I will share with the forum. But it may take a while to grind through them all.
Steve
P.S. We've talked about a joint trip and we need to make that happen. Name the time and place and I'll be there.

 

[Yard Sale]

I like the way you broke this report up. Usually when I see somebody break a single trip into "parts" it just means they are dragging it out.

I gotta admit that after reading the fishing parts I was wondering how you traveled down there and didn' talk about the other stuff. To me thats most of the story.

Really cool how you made those their own part of the tale.