Season 1 Episode 6 Guatemala and Argentina

Steve discusses his recent trip fly fishing for Sailfish in Guatemala.  Shaun shares about his time in Argentina guiding and fishing for sea run Brown Trout

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:08

All right, welcome to episode six of the Flying Around Podcast. We're back after a little bit. We we fixed finished up with the the big hole conservation conversation. Big hole's a mighty fine place to be. It's fishing really, really well right now. Uh but what we're going to talk about today is uh a little bit of our our travel experiences here at Frontier Anglers and also some of our hosted programs we do. So uh just want to start off here. Why what are the advantages of traveling with Frontier Anglers?

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Well, you know, due to you and I's like international experience guiding, and you know, you have some visiting some other places uh throughout the Western Hemisphere. If you go on one of these trips on a hosted trip, you kind of know what you're walking into. We've you someone else has done the homework for you. It's you're not headed into just a nightmare of a trip with poor accommodations, bad guides on a on a fishery that's just not capable of being somewhere you want to spend your money and your time at. So we've done the homework on that. And in several of the places that we're going to, um, we have a lot of personal experience.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

Right. Yeah, so we're gonna talk about uh I just got back uh a week before last after a trip down to Guatemala. Um we're gonna jump into Sean's done uh several years of of hosting a trip where he guided down in Argentina, Tierra del Fuego, this trip, and we're gonna spend some more podcasts and talk about some of the other places we've been in the future. But um, I just want to talk about our our trip down to Guatemala. Guatemala is a place I visited eight years ago. Um I went with a big lodge, Casa Vieja, where they have 30 dudes from Miami, you know, that have all showed up to gear fish. And uh what we like to do here at Frontier Anglers obviously is provide the best fly fishing in the world. And a lot of what people don't necessarily know about Guatemala is is how exciting the fly fishing is down there. People are very aware of the the bill fishery, the sailfish, the marlin, the mahi-mahi. Um it's hard to even imagine that it a place where you have a 250-meter continental shelf that drops off to 800 meters that just brings all these bait fish and the perfect currents, the perfect storm. There's even a little canyon that runs up into Guatemala that creates this amazing experience.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

Well, you've only been back, you've been back for what, two weeks now? So this is about two weeks. This is fresh in your in your mind, this experience.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

This is fresh. I've still got the buzz. You know, definitely you you you get a buzz from being hooked up to these fish. But these captains are really good about knowing where the fish are. And they developed this process about 20 years ago where they started teasing these fish up really in close to the boat. Um, and and by close, I mean like two and a half rod links in front of you, where you are taking. I've got a little show and tell here. And we can get our our assistant Colin Peterson to zoom in on this guy a little bit right there. But a popperfly on the surface in 800 meters of water, they're teasing these fish up where you see the action go down. You talk about sight fishing, you talk about permit fishing, tarpon fishing. You can't even imagine what this possibly looks like in front of you in the clear blue water going down a fish that's anywhere from 75 pounds on the smaller side to 120 pounds, fired up, ticked off, ready to kill.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

And they can move. I think I saw somewhere recently that a sailfish can move at like 68 miles an hour.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

It's actually the fastest game fish in the ocean. Yeah. And uh prime time is the springtime. We we went down there and we hit the prime time. Unfortunately, our fishing was uh a little slow, as things can be on hosted trips sometimes, but um everybody hooked up, everybody caught fish, and and we ended up landing seven of them. Um when you think about that in terms of steelhead fishing, I'll I'll take seven. Yeah, yeah, without a doubt. Yeah. But uh, you know, one of the cool things is the bike down there too. We uh ran into some mahi mahi that you are able to tease up on the fly. We we found some tuna that we're blitzing around that we could put some flies to. And uh boy, you talk about a shore launch. Um fresh sushimi, fresh mahi burgers, uh uh uh ceviche on the boat. Um, no, it's pretty doggone cool. The the experience is amazing. You land in Guatemala City, a city that's almost five, six thousand feet up in the mountains, and you drive to sea level in about two hours. Navigating yourself through volcanoes and jungle, and and it it really is one of those experiences too. I mean, as much as the fishing was a great thing, it's a great destination to go see someplace just absolutely wild. You know, the the jungle, the volcanoes. Um, there's a lot of places I'd like to see in that country if I I wasn't fishing, but unfortunately the pull of fishing really kind of eats at you a little bit. But uh no, it was an amazing trip. I took some folks from from Bozeman down there. We had a great time. Um, we're going back. If anybody's interested in in fly fishing in Guatemala, reach out to us. Info at frontieranglers.com. Um, I'd love to talk more and more about it with you. But um just a really cool, affordable trip, exciting. I I think probably one of the biggest benefits is you do not have to be an expert angler. The the fishing all occurs again.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

Well, and the equipment they use is wild too. Like the rods look like somewhere, they don't even look like a fly rod. Um, they and there's a lot of you know, you guys took a couple Scots and the captains were really impressed with them. Uh the reel, which I know you've got another prop under there. I do have another prop under there. I'm pretty sure I could winch my driftboat onto my trailer with that thing if it need be.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

This thing came out of the uh the Frontier Anglers Archives.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

We had one of these sitting on the shelves, and uh Sean fortunately just when we got the shop and yeah, a long time ago, it's no longer made, but it's it's a hatch 12 plus, but it's at the upper end of uh what a reel can be.

SPEAKER_01 6:21

Yeah, 15-weight fly rods, um, which is what we got. We got ones from from Scott's and from Scott, uh uh we got fixed up with a couple of really nice ones, and they the captains agreed that they were definitely the best tools for for the job down there. But yeah, yeah, pretty exciting stuff. We had a we had a great time and and we're definitely going back.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Yeah, good deal.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Uh what are your plans for for next season?

SPEAKER_00 6:46

Well, we have a really good week. Uh let me go back a little bit. I've got a lot of experience in Tierro del Fuego on the Rio Grande, fishing for C Run Browns. It's kind of one of the pinnacles of my life, really. So back somewhere around 2002, I just apply for this job like you would any other one. I meet a gentleman named Chris Francis in Bozeman, who turned out to be a lifelong friend of mine, and I applied for like a job. I didn't fail. Off I go, 8,000 miles away, land in Rio Grande and get to this river, and come to find out these are kind of these moody fish. I don't really have anyone who's walking me through how to do it, had to figure the fishery out. Um, designed a dozen flies specifically for that fishery, um, and was down there for 19 or 20 years, um about 90 days a year. And it's just an amazing fishery, in my opinion, one of the six great places on the planet Earth you could go fishing. And um, unlike a lot of other anadromous fisheries around the world, what we're seeing on the west coast with steel head, we're seeing declining numbers, some of the Atlantic salmon fisheries are struggling a little bit. The Cron Brown trout in in Chiera de Fuego and the Rio Grande are doing just as well, if not better, than they have historically. They're not like all trout to Patagonia in Argentina and South America, they're not native. But there was a gentleman named John Goodall who in 1931 had some eggs shipped into Punta Arenas, Chile, and then put them in the river, and nothing really happened for a really long time. I'm talking decades and decades. Somewhere in the late 70s, they started to catch a few of them that were kind of pushing to 10 pounds, and and then it wasn't really until sometime in the 80s that the fishery was really even discovered, almost the late 80s, and now it's it's it's the greatest sea trout fishery on the planet Earth. And in Europe, I where I've got it a number of my my clients down there from a 10-pound sea trout in Europe is kind of a fish of a lifetime. That's the average fish in the Rio Grande. And so you're you're in the spectacular vista with vistas with these crazy wildlife winacos, which are a member of the llama family, they're running everywhere. You've got Andy and Condors, the biggest brown trout swimming on the planet, and it's just almost like you just stepped into another world. And uh, Argentine hospitality being the level it is, with amazing wine, outdoor cookouts at Colisados with lamb and beef, at levels that you're really hard to find even here in the United States. Just an amazing place. So we have a great week down at San Jose, um, the last week of February, um, and we're feeling that every year. And we're also occasionally doing some combining to a one or two week. Some clients will stay, some won't, with a couple of other lodges downriver. But amazing fishery, and and one that I um I feel I don't there aren't a lot of Americans. I can think of only one who's ever been down there as much as me. So, you know, I can speak with authority, I know the fishery, I can even help people when we're on site fishing and whatnot, and that's translated as some success for our guests as well.

SPEAKER_01 9:41

Yeah, sure. So now we talk about that. I mean, it's so much as much a part of the story of the trip is the cultural experience that you have down there. What are some of the your your favorite influences from their culture down there?

SPEAKER_00 9:56

Everything in Argentina begins and ends in Buenos Aires. You fly into Buenos Aires, usually you're gonna arrive you know early to mid-morning. You know, most of the flights down south don't take off till the next day. So you've got a day to get your wits about you. Latin America, me in Latin America, you go to a late dinner, and the 50 best steaks I've ever had were in Buenos Aires at a couple of different restaurants. And it, you know, you leave Montana, it's 20 degrees, you get in Buenos Aires, it's 85. The people are all beautiful, they're friendly, um, and then off you go. You get on a plane the next day, you go three and a half hours down to literally the end of the world. Um, one of the destinations, depending upon flight schedules that year, that you may uh arrive in down there is in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego. Ushuaia is the southernmost city on the planet, and you're literally, I think, 525 miles from Antarctica at that point. A lot of weather in the mid-50s to mid-sixties, it's you know, and it's known for its wind, but that's not always the case. And but just an amazing fishery. I think it should be on everybody's bucket list. And uh just don't know if I could consider my life complete if I pulled that whole couple decades I spent there out.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Yeah, sure. So as a trout angler, um what sort of experience or uh level would you?

SPEAKER_00 11:07

You know, it's uh it can be being able to cast helps. Now, depending on water levels down there, it will dictate a little bit what type of rods you're gonna use. Like in lower water conditions, you might be using an eight-weight single-hander. Um, normal to bigger water conditions, a light two-handed rod, you know, something in about a seven-weight is what you'll fish with a lot. And so uh when you go there, what my hope is always that I'm gonna swim flies, and it's a lot of grease lining with without heavy sink tips near the surface and and and whatnot, which is about is one of the most pleasurable ways I've ever found to catch a fish anywhere in this world. And so everything in between, but um, you know, it's it's it's a challenging fishery, but it's also very rewarding. And you'll typically a day down there goes you'll head out fishing about eight, you'll come back about 12:31 and have a lunch. And one of the reasons the fishing program is is geared around mornings and afternoon to dark, is that right about dark, it you can gotten beat up by the wind all day, maybe not caught a fish. And this that of there's a lot of magical fishing that happened in the last hour of daylight, whether it's trout fishing or anything, it just seems to be something that's good. Well, you'll be down there, and I've had people just cussing at me like there's no fish here, blah blah. And you so we always choose one of our pools that's been really consistent where we know there's a bunch of fish, and in that last hour, you'll see these like three-foot-long fish just start to come up and roll, and that gets everybody amped up a little bit. So you can go the whole day, and then you have like a lifetime memory in 20 minutes right before dark. Yeah, oftentimes they they choose to bite throughout the day, but we take that 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. window out because if the wind is blowing, it's gonna usually peak then. And there's nobody tough enough to go out and fish from eight for 8 a.m. till 9 30 p.m. anyways. It's just you're gonna kill yourself in three days. So it's a good way to break the day up and and and keep your sanity as well as enjoy some amazing food and hospitality.

SPEAKER_01 12:57

Right, right. Talk about the the food, the hospitality, uh, asada, wine, mate, the the whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

Yeah, it's um Argentina's got it's kind of a unique culture, and it's honestly centered around beef. Like they used to like gauge the quality of their life on how many times a day they could eat beef. If things were going really well, they would eat beef twice a day in Argentina. Um, lamb, I'm not really a lamb guy. Like, I can't recall ever buying in a grocery store here once, but like boy, come asado day where they've got the little lamb, they're cooking it on kind of a crucifix-shaped piece of iron over an open fire. It's just there's no there's no strong taste, it's just tender, cut it with your fork, and in addition to some great cuts of beef, empanadas, and yeah, it's it's spectacular.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Yeah, sure. Really famous for wines down there as well.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

Yeah, I mean, probably the the the wine that Argentines and Argentina is known the most for is Malbec, which is kind of what most and it pairs really well with you know, grilling, like we're saying. Unfortunately, we can buy it most everywhere in the United States. Um, I didn't know much about wine at all, so I started going down there, but it's such a part of the culture that I just had to adapt to it.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Yeah, sure. No, being able to absorb that culture. Yeah, that's one of my favorite parts of the club.

SPEAKER_00 14:07

Lifelong friends down there, you know. I mean, tremendous place. Uh, you know, that their Argentines are a little bit like yeah, some of them are friendly about Athaban, there's others that are kind of like Westerners, like where I grew up here in Montana, like they might seem a little standoffish at first, but boy, once you get through that first shield there, you've got a friend for life and they take a bullet for you.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

All right, so tell the big fish story.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

So I've been down there for 20 years and I'd hosted trips a few years, and due to the just overall luck in life of having the position I did, I caught somewhere around 2,000 of these sea trout, which a good week down there is 20. So I'm fishing away, the wind's kind of blowing, and um I'm with my good friend and client Ken, and Ken's poor Ken, he's out there just getting beat up by the wind. I decided to go kind of sit by this log for a while. Wind dips about 10, 15 miles an hour. I'm like, well, it's the last day, you might as well get out there, go out there and make about six casts, hook this fish, and like it. I can tell I got a big one. I'm thinking it's like, you know, it's a 20-pounder, which is kind of a benchmark on the river. Then it jumps about three times, and I'm like, oh wow. And I'm instantly go back to like the 12-year-old when you've caught your first fish and you just want to like take it home and like put it in a bathtub like I did when I was 12. And it's uh like a 41-inch 30-pounder. And we'll probably spice in a photo over this, but just an amazing creature. Like it was really just kind of like a life statement for me almost. I've been down there for two decades, and so they do exist out there, and they're fish like that caught, but it's it's a just amazing fish. But that was just kind of one of the top five experiences in my life right there.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

Sure. And being down there and having a group to share with. I mean, I think that's one of my favorite parts, too, is is going through this process of communicating with people, and and you talk about Ken. I've got some people I travel with that I've known forever as well, too. And you know, you've got all these experiences, all these places, but boy, you you put the experience of landing official lifetime with some of your best friends in a faraway place.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Um one of the other things we try to do at Frontier Anglers too is we don't want to go to lodges or destinations that are really high capacity. I'm talking 18 to 20 anglers per week. We're we there can be some kind of like personalities that collide at the dinner table and cocktail hours. So we generally are looking for smaller venues where we we got the entire place, and we even we're even careful about mixing and matching of groups, like or you think so-and-so is gonna get along with so-and-so for a week. And because we know that's all important because it's one of the phrases I used to use when I guided down there a lot, and people would kind of get down when they were fishing, is well, if you have the red glow going, you're not gonna catch one. But if you have the blue glow and you're positive and everything else, and you keep fishing, it happens. And so you want that's just being in that mode where it's an enjoyable experience from it from the time you land until you leave is just as important as how successful the fishing is sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 17:01

Yeah, for sure. No, I agree a thousand percent with uh with that small lodge intimate atmosphere. And any of you guys can go with any of the bigger travel companies, pick a destination, and it it really is. It's kind of a crapshoot who you're gonna end up at that lodge with. I mean, some of the bigger ones I don't want to name names, but yeah, you're gonna sit there at a table with every personality imaginable. And I've seen it get rough around the dinner table, too. Whether it's it's well, a lot of times it is the person who's got the you know, the red glow who's not catching so many fish, and you have somebody who is really yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

I've seen the happy-go-lucky guy who kept a positive attitude end up better off at the end of the week than the guy that was uptight and you know hadn't caught one in ten minutes and was really worried about it.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Sure, sure. No, so that's that's something I can absolutely promise you if you travel with one of our groups, you're gonna have a great time.

SPEAKER_00 17:53

I mean, well researched, well thought out, and you know, not only on the Pacific fishery, but uh uh uh not a but a lodge or a destination that we've kind of handpicked that we we don't want to, we're not gonna get into a situation where it's a disaster. You know, sight unseen.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

There's just no way right. And uh, I think one of the great things about the experience too is is you know you could potentially set yourself up for an annual deal, you know, where it's something you look forward to. And you know, year after year traveling with with these groups at this time, we're we're picking the best time as possible. And hey, here's the thing. Sean and I get to go on a fishing trip with you. Um, it gets a little bit labeled as a free trip, but here's the honest thing. We're working so hard, putting so much time and effort into your flights, your hotels, making sure you've got all the gear. We're gonna work our butts and earn that position down there, down there with you. We're gonna work our butts off to make sure your trip is gonna be.

SPEAKER_00 18:48

Yeah, what is it uh that you told me one time? I thought this described it like, I don't know if I shop, you were you're my shop manager. We can't afford to go on these trips. So explain to me how it is that we're able to go.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

Yeah, sure. So uh we we charge the exact same price that you would pay if you contacted a major travel company, if you contacted the lodge directly. You do not pay a premium to travel with us. Um, a lot of times these lodges do give us, if we bring X number of people down, they do give us a hosted spot. And then we make a little bit of a commission, not much, but it's usually enough to keep the lights on and pay for a plane ticket or something for us to go down there. And and you know, we we tip as guests, we're we're part of the guest experience, but at the same time, you know, I I enjoy that position of being kind of the go-between, you know, if there is any concerns with or any requests from the anglers that that I can take that then to the lodge owner and ask that question and sometimes get better results, you know.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

It's an added level of insurance on your trip.

SPEAKER_01 19:51

Yeah, yeah, 100%. No, it really is. So, yes, we are very fortunate. Um, and and we can talk to this more in future podcasts. We've we've gotten to essentially travel the world, and uh no, we love sharing that with people. That's uh that's probably my favorite thing I do here at Frontier Anglers. I know you enjoy that a lot too. Yeah, but uh yeah, we'll share some some further experiences. I think we're about probably about ready to wrap this one up. Um what else is going on here at Frontier Anglers?

SPEAKER_00 20:23

Well, you know, um spring arrived early, there wasn't much of a winter, and we um have some excellent fishing on the big hole right now. I mean, I was out a couple days ago with my son and one of the guys. We didn't see another boat, we're catching nice beautiful day, we're wearing sun hoodies like a June, and we don't see anyone the entire day, and it's really hard to plan from one year to the next because it could be possible in 27 if you called on the phone. I might say, whatever you do, don't come here before April 20th because it's gonna be a snowstorm. We have some fantastic weather for the duration here, it looks like, and so we've talked about this before. We're and this is true uh out west, that in a lot of places we're gonna start running out of water late summer this year without a lot of ample rain in June. So um you've got to kind of go when the fishing's hot rather than when you gotta go. When you want to go.

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Yeah. Yeah, it's it's nice if you can plan a little bit of extra time too. If if you can be out here for a week and plan to fish three to five days, you know, because there's probably gonna be a few windy ones, yeah. Maybe even some really frigid ones. But boy, if you do make it out there on one of the good days, oh man, you you can't beat a good April mid-April, late April day in Montana. So there's still time. There's there's still time for some great spring fishing out here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

I don't know. Yeah, we've got a lot of folks uh start doing some trips next week. And um, you know, it's in Montana weather, like you said, is kind of schizophrenic in the spring. It could be snowing one minute, sunny half hour later, and rainy indoor sleeting and two hours later, or it could be like the day I just experienced a couple days ago, 65 degrees and not a wisp of wind and partly overcast the entire day.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

Sure. Yeah, no, folks are definitely looking at the the at the weather. Closely, and there's a direct correlation with how little the wind is blowing to how many folks seem to walk through the door in this phone. Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

We've had we've had we've had some wind this winter for sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

So yeah. But yeah, I think that'll probably about wrap it up for for this one. We'll come back with some more and uh try and get you guys some more podcasts before we get insanely busy. Things are picking up, steam's picking up. We're gonna do some some trout fishing here in Southwest Montana.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

Yeah, we may have focused, but yeah, sounds good.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

Yeah, all right. Thanks everybody.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Thanks for tuning in.