Annual Guest Newsletter

The process of developing this new program began three years ago when Trout Bum Rio Pico head guide Rogelio “Rocky” Casal  went off to Mexico after our season down here and started looking for tarpon.  He had a vision – the Tarpon Bum program – and he spent two whole seasons up there looking for it and sorting out the details.  Well, he found it!

 

By the time I got there he was ready to put me and a couple groups of our favorite repeat guests into the fish.  It’s a program we’ll be running only two to three weeks a year from now on, with a maximum of six guests per week, but it all came together perfectly, all the way down to the Bum Catalog price point.  Click here for a full program description and details.  And click here for a trip report from Roger Bertsch.

Mongolia.  Just the name of the place sends shivers down my spine and makes my feet start to itch and beg for a set of stirrups.  I’ve seen quite a bit of the place over the years, but for me the country is one of those places I will never get enough of.  There is always more to learn each time I find myself on Mongol water or soil.  Add some Taimen to the mix (not to mention Lenok, Grayling, and Pike) and it’s a blast no mater what.

 

Back in October of last year I hosted two groups on the Eg Ur river in Mongolia which we’ve now added to the catalog and can be seen by clicking here.  The first week was on the lower stretch, and the second on the upper.  We’re in the process of adding several new programs in Mongolia (including the Onon and other rivers – (click here for a trip report on that one from Jim and Rosemarie Aronitz) and will have those in the catalog soon.

 

But our own Dr. Chad Agy wrote a whole feature piece about his week with me on this most recent trip, and it is well worth the read, plus full of beautiful photography!  That one can be seen here.  We’re currently planning several options for the 2026 season in Mongolia and would love to have you all along.

When most anglers think about destinations for trout, Slovenia is not going to be one of the countries that first comes to mind.  But it should be.  And we’ve developed a whole program there which turned out to exceed our expectations by a long shot.  This trip report from long time Hemispheres guest Dr. Cameron Clark on his recent experience there pretty much tells the story of what kind of surprises that tiny European country and its rivers hold.

 

One of the greatest beauties of Slovenia is found in its contrasts, ranging from rivers running through what looks like wild enough country to be on a frontier, to five pound plus fish in streams running right through the middle of idyllic ancient villages.  From large predatory Marble trout to Native Browns, fat Rainbows, Grayling, and Danube Salmon, the Trout Bum Slovenia program offers a wide variety of waters and experiences to any angler any season of the year.  Check out details and pricing on our website by clicking here.

Ducks!  The quality of hunting in Argentina is well known around the world, however most of the focus has for many years been on Red Stag and Doves.  But lo and behold, it turns out one of the best waterfowl destinations on Earth is only a van-ride or short flight North of Buenos Aires, and an easy destination to combine with any trip to Patagonia.  The owners of this operation are folks we have worked with on other programs they run for over a decade now, and both the service and the hunting (not to mention the nightly ducks on the table) are simply spectacular.  We’ve proudly added this one to our catalog (click here for full details), one of only two hunting programs we represent, and Hemispheres collaborator Ryan Sparks, editor of Safari Magazine, published this piece after we sent him up there to check it out

Some of you may have heard about (or been there for) the big blizzard we experienced two seasons ago down on Jurassic in the second week of May.  The fishing was incredible as always, but towards the end of the first group’s stay snow began to fall and simply did not stop.  By morning there was four or so feet of it covering everything between the lodge and the asphalt which those who have been know is quite a distance to begin with, but also the asphalt itself.

 

Now, if you’re going to get stuck someplace for a few days after a blizzard, there are worse choices than the lodge we run this program out of.  Accommodations in May can certainly have their glitches like frozen pipes or lack of laundry service, but the kitchen is still cranking out five-star meals, the woodstove is still warming cold hands, and the mouth of the river with a thousand monster rainbows fighting over access to flowing water is still only a few hundred yards from the door.

 

So for the group that got stuck there, luckily all retired guys with nowhere in particular they had to be, three extra days of fishing and eating and good wine were just a bonus!  Not the same though for the group that was to follow them – those guys were stuck in Calafate for more than half their scheduled trip while the road crews worked on the asphalt and our own hired machines dug the estancia roads out of what by that time looked like tundra.  We did finally get the second group in for a bit of fishing, and the third and fourth weeks went great, but despite the fact that this is the first time in anyone’s memory such a thing had happened in the month of May, we also learned some lessons about being prepared.  And I am now happy to report that a system has been put in place to have all necessary resources available at a moment's notice so that the machines start running back and forth along the roads before the snow gets too deep.

 

And as for the group that got shorted?  They got a free week this last season to make up for it – courtesy of the lodge.

Having spent the last sixteen years running this program myself here in Chubut province, if there’s one thing I can say it is that after that very long walk I did back in 2007, I chose the right spot to move in and learn a fishery.  Has it changed over the years?  Absolutely, but oddly enough not at all in the way I expected it to.

My experience with most of the “new” fisheries in the world is that once they gain some attention and start to get pressured, the quality of the fishing changes in predictable ways.   Fish get spookier, their habitat starts to suffer, and trash starts to show up here and there on the land.

 

None of these things have happened on our home waters, the majority of which can be seen from the peak of Cerro Desnudo just West of town.  That having been said, the fishery continues to change in ways no one seems to be able to predict!  Lakes where we used to catch one massive fish on average every two trips are now filled to the brim with three pounders (not what we call massive fish down here), and we put thirty or more in the net each day.  Other waters which used to be small fish fisheries have done the opposite, somehow morphing into the “new” spots to go look for the really big ones (See Chad’s feature piece from Virginia Sportsman Magazine by clicking here for a glimpse of this – Monster Brookies and Massive hatches included).  That one he wrote after a back country camping trip to a lake we rarely fished until just a few years ago!  Same with many rivers, and same with many streams.

 

I’ve asked some of our resident biologists as well as guests who were down on vacation from their jobs in the fisheries management or university departments up in the states (like Gino Lucchetti whose recent trip report you can see here) why this is the case, and the answer seems to simply be that even after a hundred+ years, the ecosystem these trout were introduced to simply still has yet to find its final balance with the new species, forage of that species, and everything else affected by the change.  And it’s apparently not likely to anytime soon.

The good news there is that it gives me and all our guides a very good reason to do a lot of early season fishing and scouting each year on our own, and also that even guests who have been down to fish with us double-digit numbers of times can always have new water and new experiences to look forward to.

Getting ready for the 2025/26 season now though and the calendar filling in fast; get in touch right away if you’d like to see what’s new in the landscape around Vasco’s Lodge!

This year we are launching our first ever beta-test of the new Trout Bum Trevelin program.  Trevelin is a very different fishery than Rio Pico in almost every way, with access to Los Alerces National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site complete with 2000+ year old trees and a diverse range of floatable rivers, plus a much wider variety of non-fishing activities for those who want to mix things up a bit.

 

The town itself is considerably larger and more “civilized”, being a Welsh settlement dating back to 1891 when it was originally settled by John Daniel Evans, and has multiple museums and a variety of excellent restaurants and other cool things to visit, including a fire breathing dragon on the plaza!

 

The set-up will be basically the same as what we have been doing in Rio Pico all these years, an affordably priced program ($4,500 a week) in a comfortable but not too fancy lodge or cabin complex, and everything included apart from alcohol and tips.  We’re only doing a maximum of three weeks there this season though, so anyone interested should get in touch right away.

Salmuera is a condiment to top all condiments, at least in terms of its versatility.  Meats, vegetable, eggs, bread, we put this stuff on everything except ice cream, although Aya has said she is considering that combination since she recently started a phase of garlic obsession.

 

Many guests over the years after trying our Salmuera at the table in Rio Pico have asked for the recipe, then gone home and made their own.  It quickly becomes a fixture of their kitchens and tables, and my guess is continues to spread its presence even further from each of those to other houses in those countries as guests at those tables ask for the recipe.  In truth, each household down here in Argentina that uses Salmuera generally has their own recipe, ranging from a simple salt and garlic combination to much more complex mixtures of flavors that sometimes even include several species of hot peppers.

 

So here’s how I make it; for those of you who have had it in Rio Pico this will replicate what you spread across your lamb on asado night, and everything else you tried it with while you were here:

NOW - it is important to understand that the contents of this bottle will get better and better with time.  It's not like the first day you get good salmuera out of it.  The garlic has to steep.

 

WHAT’S GREAT THOUGH is that as it cures and steeps the fact that the garlic and peppercorns and whatever else it is you decide to put in there is suspended in a saturated salt solution means it cannot rot.  SO JUST KEEP ADDING WATER/SALT whenever needed.  I have bottles of this stuff that I use for three or more years before changing them out, and they just get better and better with time, like a cast iron skillet.