(English text after Swedish)
Jag har stått här flera gånger under veckan som varit. Här, i älven där det bildats ett litet sandrev vid sidan av den gamla trädstammen. Runt om mig vajar vattenvegetation i olika gröna nyanser över sand- och stenbotten. Vattnet är perfekt, kristallklart som vanligt. Det är svårt att inte bli för djup i tankarna. Detta är en av de få platser i världen där jag faktiskt känner mig lugn, helt lugn. Det enda jag tänker på är hur den ska hugga… Öringen som står där ute i strömmen och som flera gånger under veckan visat sig när den ätit från ytan. Idag var sista dagen på denna fiskevecka. Sista chansen att få fisken att hugga.

English version
The fish in the current
I’ve been standing here several times during the past week. Here, in the river where a small sand reef been built up beside the old sunken tree. Clear green Aquatic vegetation is dancing over sand and stone. The water is perfect, crystal clear as usual. I find it hard not to become too deep in my thoughts. This is one of the few places in the world where I feel calm and completley relaxed. My mind is focused into just one thing, how to get the trout in the current, that I’ve been watching for almost a week, to bite. Today is the last day of this fishing trip, last chance to hook the trout.
The place is river Lågen in Norway. A familiar place for me which I wrote more about in earlier blog articles. During the week that has past some of our fellow Norweigian fishermen had a magic fishing with a bunch of good sized trouts biting on dry flies. The menu was varied and there had been a lot of fly testing for each fish. Largest fish was a 3,5 pound trout. The same day as they had this great fishing, I stood half a mile downstream, wondering where the fish was. River Lågen can be a tricky where good places suddenly become hard to fish and bad places become good. But that only contributes to the trill of fishing here.
This place, with the sand reef, I found a month earlier when I met Øystein Enghaug Solstad. He is a Flyfishing guide in river Lågen and showed me the spot. Then, a month back, the wind stirred up the surface so that I couldn’t see the beautiful bottom structure. I got very excited now when I could see all the good places for a trout to hide underneath the flat calm water. Plenty of rocks and vegetation and a lot of feeding points for trout in casting distance… Even if the biggest one always seems to stand a couple of feets away from my casting ability.
I had been landing some smaller trouts at about one pound, but nothing bigger. And big fish is primary not what attracts me with fishing in Lågen. Most important, for me, is how it’s fished. To sneak up close to a feeding trout and present the right fly is what I need to get a kick out of my fishing trip. Some need crazy heights, others high speed… Kinda good to get a kick just by fishing trout in a river then.
The fish in the current might be about 2 pounds. But no of my fly presentations made the trout rise. I tried pupas, duns, emergers, spent spinners and a hole bunch of other patterns such as ants, bugs… With only a few hours left of fishing before we should head home I waded out a little bit further on the edge of what’s safe. I kept my boots on the right side of that edge and found myself standing in perfect casting distance from the rising trout. This time I tried a large mayfly, hoping that it would tease the fish to rise. The cast was good, the drift as well. The trout rised to the fly and SPLASH, I stretched the line.
I felt the fish was hooked in the other end of my line. The last Norweigian trout for this year. After a while I landed a one pounder in my net. Much smaller than I first thought. But it delivered the right feeling with a perfect dose of thrill, frustration and victory feeling to make me 110% satisfied with this years trip to Lågen. And even if size, or amount of fish not always is the key factors for good fishing. It dosen’t hurt knowing there are beasts at up to 7 pound and more swiming in the river.