Knoydart Adventure
- Details
- Published on Wednesday, 06 August 2008 13:31
- Written by Joe Whoriskey
I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who read Drew’s account of Loch Bhraomisaig in the spring edition and decided to add it to their list of must do’s. So if your reading this and it is on your list read on.
I arrived in Mallaig on Thursday night after an early start, a ferry crossing, and a long drive north from Cairnryan. Therefore, my intention was to get something to eat, repack my rucksack for the umpteenth time, and have an early night. The something to eat went without a flaw; the rest of the plan fell apart spectacularly when I ended up in a pub showing the Celtic - Dundee match. Well the outcome of the SPL title is now history so you can guess the celebrations among the green and white clad patrons, celebrations in which I became a not too unwilling participant.
As a result, I woke on Friday morning feeling as rough as a badgers arse, surrounded by the contents of my now mysteriously unpacked rucksack. A shower and a cooked breakfast left me feeling just about well enough to face the rucksack problem, and an hour later, I was walking towards the harbour in lightly falling rain.
Having purchased my ticket from the brown wooden office, I joined a small group of people on the harbour wall waiting to board the boat, and as is usual in such gatherings of kindred souls conversation was soon flowing. By the time we got on the boat we all knew about Munros to be climbed, Lochs to be fished, birthdays to be celebrated and a host of other weekend activities to be crammed into the next three days. 
The crossing takes about 45 minutes, so it wasn’t long before my new found friends and I were climbing off the boat wishing each other the best for our weekend activities. At this point one of said friends by now of course knowing my age, marital status, profession, and why I was on Knoydart pointed out Drew’s wife for me. Jacqui quickly directed me to where I could find Drew, and given that there is only one road/track/path you can’t get lost so it wasn’t really any surprise that ten minutes later I was lost, this was made slightly less embarrassing by running into a few others off the boat who where likewise lost. At this point I gave a master class in route finding in remote areas, I asked a local.
The answer to my query turned out to be very simple “That’s Drew on that tractor”; I can only assume that the others were likewise guided to their destinations. Drew welcomed me, suggested flies, and gave directions to the Loch, directions that made the walk a bit shorter than if I had taken the route that I had worked out for myself from the map. Now at this point I have to say that when Drew describes the walk in his article as taking an hour and twenty minutes, this only applies if you are not the wrong side of fifty, not known affectionately to your nearest and dearest as fat boy, and not carrying the weight of a small caravan on your back.
Finding the Loch is simplicity itself, you simply go uphill until you bump into water, the problem is the uphill bit is in places very steep and there isn’t any obvious route. So although not inherently difficult or technical it is worth taking time and being careful, especially if carrying a heavy pack. If finding the Loch is easy, then finding your way back is even easier since once you walk up onto the ridge above the Loch you have line of sight the whole way back.
So about two and a half hours after leaving the boat, I was standing on the ridge looking down on Loch Bhraomisaig. It was instantly recognisable from Drew’s wonderful photograph on the cover of the spring edition. True in the now steady though light rainfall it didn’t quite have the same magical look, and the island in Drew’s photograph is as a result of the weeks of dry weather now a peninsula, however it was Bhraomisaig and it was majestic.
I immediately saw my campsite, almost directly opposite me on the far shore a small burn ran down the hill and into the Loch. The ground to one side looked reasonably flat, and the burn still had a flow that would provide fresh water for cooking. Behind, the hills rose almost vertically into low cloud.
I walked around the Loch to the mouth of the small burn, crossed over, dropped my rucksack and congratulated myself on the choice. Although exhausted I pitched the tent right away just in case the now mizzley rain got any worse. After stowing my stuff, setting up rods and generally getting camp the way I wanted it for the next three days, I boiled water, made tea, added a large slug of whiskey (sorry it was whiskey not whisky I brought it with me from home) and sat down to take in my surroundings.
As I drank my whiskey-laced tea, the rain stopped, it was still grey and overcast but at least it was not raining anymore. Now fully recovered and with the regenerative power of the Uisge Beatha starting to kick in I put on my waders and boots (now you see why the rucksack was so heavy), and picked up a rod. I started with a rapidly becoming favourite 3 weight and walked the few feet to the water’s edge.
Having seen nothing resembling fly life on the water since arriving, I tied up a searching three fly cast of Silver Invicta on the point, Connemara Black on the middle dropper and a Bibio on the bob. Almost immediately the flies hit the water a trout of about two ounces took the silver invicta, this was repeated on another three or four occasions as I worked my way along in front of the tent. I tried to remember Drew’s article, it did say trout to four pounds had been caught didn’t it, right now I would settle for 4 ounces.
I crossed the small burn and walked down the bay to where the banks were higher and a number of large rocks which, no doubt given more normal water levels would be submerged, now stuck out of the water. Here I hoped something a little more substantial might be lurking. My first cast brought yet another 2 ouncer, but as I was beginning to despair a cast tight to one of the larger rocks produced a small boil which when tightened into erupted into a mass of froth and foam on the surface before doing everything in its power to dive under the rock taking me and rod with it. This trout turned out to be about ¾ of a pound and fought like a trout twice that size.
This set the theme for the rest of the bay, and I caught six more trout in the ½ to ¾ pound range. All this time I hadn’t seen a single trout break the surface other than to take my flies, but as I rounded the bottom of the loch (the end closest to the camera in Drew’s photograph) the breeze dropped off completely, and a few trout started to feed on the surface. I couldn’t see anything coming off the water and although I covered a number of trout they showed no interest.
At this point I decided to change tactics, only to discover that my waistcoat which I had patiently filled with fly boxes, line, floatants, etc, etc, had been left back at the tent and I was in possession of exactly three flies, those already on the cast. Even as I considered going back to get it the rise stopped just as suddenly as it had started and I was left looking at a flat calm bay with not a single trout moving. Still it had been a good start and I had two full days left to fish. So I walked back to the tent, cooked dinner, ate, washed up, and sat with a large whiskey watching the sun set.
I woke next morning about 6am, but being a lazy bugger I simply pulled the sleeping bag over my head and went back to sleep for another two hours. When I eventually crawled out and unzipped the tent I was greeted by what I could tell was going to be a cracker of a day, and I wasn’t mistaken, in fact from then until I left Knoydart on Monday it was wall to wall sunshine.
I spent the next two days fishing the loch, and although I never saw any hatches take place or seen any concerted surface activity from trout, I caught trout consistently all the way around. Strangely, I never got another 2 ounce trout all weekend, the average size was in the ½ to ¾ pound range with a good smattering of 1 Lb trout. The best trout was probably about a pound and a quarter or maybe a bit bigger. However as with all good fishing tales I did a miss a few trout which seemed a little larger, and lost one at the net which was definitely larger probably 1.5 Lb plus. This trout is wearing a coch-y-bonddu in its upper lip so if any of you get it I want my fly back.
Over the weekend I caught enough trout every day to keep the most demanding fish counter happy, and I caught them on just about everything, from single dry flies to weighted nymphs. However, a team of small wet flies on a floating line proved the most successful tactic with the Bibio, Silver Invicta, Connemara Black, Black Pennell, Claret Bumble and Kate McLaren topping the list of killing patterns.
Although you can kill three trout a day on Loch Bhraomisaig I returned all but one of the trout caught over the weekend, and that one, a trout of about ½ Lb was my starter on Sunday night, as you would imagine 10 minutes from water to pan it was a meal fit for a king.
So should you keep Loch Bhraomisaig on your must do list, no, move it off your must do list and onto your have done list ASAP. If you don’t catch that 4 pounder you will catch lots of hard fighting wild trout with what for most mountain Lochs is a more than decent average size, and you will do it amongst some of the best mountain scenery anywhere.
Of course, you don’t need to carry your home into the hills with you, there are a number of self catering options on Knoydart, and according to my friends on the boat back to Mallaig the pub serves fantastic food, great booze and the craic’s mighty. So get over and enjoy, I’ll definitely be making another trip before the season is over.
Joe Whoriskey ,a keen Irish fly fisher, is fifty years of age and has been fishing for more than forty of those. His main passion is wild trout in river or Lough, although he also fishes for salmon occasionally. Joe firmly believes that any day spent fishing is a good day, trout caught are an added bonus and should never be used to measure success or failure.
When not fishing he works as an electrical engineer to pay for licences, permits, and to fund occasional overseas fishing trips.