By Thomas R. Dempsey, M.D. CCI.
I had the opportunity to fish Chile in early April. What a fascinating country. The mountains and glacial springs, the glacial waters are everywhere. The whole country is nothing but mountains and springs. It is an incredibly clean country. There’s no trash. People stop in the streets and pick it up. What a lesson we could learn in the United States.
We flew into Santiago and spent a day and then went to the camp. The first camp was called “Magic Waters”. It was about 2 hours from Santiago on the Simpson River. Simpson was apparently an explorer in the area many years ago. Our days were spent fishing in lakes, lagoons, and rivers. We fished primarily pontoon boats, 2 to a boat. Our guides were excellent with their knowledge of rivers, flies, and fly fishing in general. There are pretty much only 2 species of fish in Chile: Brown Trout and Rainbows. People go primarily for the big brown trout for aggressive and ready to eat although they are spooky. A tackle consists of mostly five and six weight rods with 2X and 3x tippet Flies were small terrestrials fished on top.
After spending a week there, we drove to the next camp 5 hours away called the Baker Lodge. This was on Lago General. This was a lake that was some 135 miles long. The same deal here…fishing from the boat with small flies on top.
We had the opportunity to fly to the next camp, which was only 45 minutes by air on a helicopter. We landed on a glacier and were able to take pictures. What a view! After fishing Baker Lodge for a week, we headed back to the U.S. We’ve got to make a book of Chile…we have tons of pictures. It’s a unique adventure. Try it!