Interclub Weekend Fly Fishing on the Tongariro

This weekend, some of the ILFF gents went down for a very informal interclub competition between the Northshore and Auckland fly fishing clubs. For the North Shore Fly Fishers Inc., it marked the river component of the Rod and Gun Trophy, which had been cancelled and postponed due to COVID. Auckland Flyfishing Anglers Club Inc. dragged out a hibernated cup that had been in their possession since way back in 2009 and after a briefing the friendly encounter began.

The Tongariro started out highly fishable and then became just high by mid-afternoon. The Auckland fly fishing club made the most of the fishable morning putting some numbers on the board and the North Shore guys squandered their morning chances but made a decent comeback in the milkshake later afternoon.

Fish were caught, a number of mid fight releases were made, and everyone was left with good yarns and tales to accompany some well-needed greasies and a few cold ones to wash them down. There were tales of cool icy swims and people filling up their waders, but everyone arrived back in good spirits. It was great to see and hear of some solid browns being caught and released and some very well-conditioned, hard fighting rainbows.

For the North Shore Fly Fishers, Johan Kok became defending champion after ending my reign last time out, so he went away a happy man with cms on the board going into the lake comp later in the year, and the Auckland Flyfishing Anglers Club managed to edge on the numbers per number of anglers, so they get to inscribe 2022 on the cup for this year. It was a memorable occasion and one both clubs intend to keep as regular!

The following day lead to some great Trout Spey swinging in the morning. The OPST Commando Heads came out and the Speyco Trout Spey reels started screaming. I even managed to keep a few fish on this day, which made things all the sweeter! This day was more fruitful and by the end of the morning everyone had fish landed and lost on the swing.

Thanks to Ross at the Tongariro River Motel, for the great hospitality as always.

Can’t wait to get back down!

Simon

Simon is a keen enthusiast for fly fishing, especially all things trout Spey and Skagit style tactics. He's a keen fly tyer, with a strong focus on tube flies, leech and Intruders style patterns. He has been with Iloveflyfishing since the early days and has been a key ambassador for OPST, Aquaz and Speyco as well as all of the ILFF catalogue. He is also a man-keen saltwater fly fisher and can often be found flicking a Crazy Simon fly around the Auckland region. Simon is a regular contributor to NZ Trout Fisher magazine where you can find his column "On the Swing with Simon"

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