Monday, April 14, 2008

Ashinoko

Saturday: Mr. Sakai-san and I met some of our fishing friends at Lake Ashinoko for some Rainbow fishing. Lake Ashinoko is located in the crater of the extinct Hakone volcano. It is 725 meters above sea level, very clean and pristine. It reminded me a lot of Lake Jocassee in South Carolina.
(below: stock photo of Lake Ashinoko with Mt. Fuji in the distance)

We rented a motor boat for the day. It was only 9,000 yen (about $90) for the day, including a tank of gas. This was the first time I have ever fly fished from a boat. It was really nice not worrying about my back-cast getting hung in the trees.

(Here is Niida-san taking us to a good spot on the other side of the lake.)


We fished using Olive Marabou Damselfly's on #12 hook. Niida-san caught the first two (or 3?)rainbows. Then Sakai-san caught 2 rainbows. Average fish size was about 30 cm.
(below: Sakai-san landing a 31 cm rainbow)
(close-up)

Sunday morning while we were packing up we ran into Taka Sugisaka-san in the parking lot. Sugisaka-san is a very famous fly fisherman in Japan and around the world. I had just purchased the May issue of Flyfisher magazine which has a 4 page article written by Sugisaka-san. He was gracious enough to sign the article and let me have my picture taken with him.

(the autographed article)

Next stop is Oshino Spring Creek...

2 comments:

  1. AnonymousApril 17, 2008 at 11:11 PM

    Hello Tsuribaka-san,

    I have a customer desperate to go fly fishing in Japan with an English speaker. Dates available for this day out could be: June 22/23/24/25th. He could meet you near Ashinoko or where ever you can suggest. I sell holidays to Japan (from Ireland).

    If you can, send me an email: darina@japanirelandtravel.ie and we can talk more.

    Cheerio,
    Darina

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousApril 18, 2008 at 12:35 PM

    I find in my own fishing travels, that sometimes it's not about the fish, but the beautiful places that you see.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)