Lake Waikaremoana Trip 2003

A chance for a Friday off school, the price, a long weekend in the Urewera's fishing and tramping. I went with my dad, Gerald, my uncle Lyndon and cousin Sashi and some other people from the club.
We left Hamilton at lunchtime and soon had driven through Rotorua, to
Murapara. Ahead of us was the black hills of the Urewera's National Park.

The drive into the lodge was narrow and very windey and at times small streams ran across it. We got to the lodge just on dark to find Mrs. Merrilees had lit the fire in the family room. I had a headache and felt car sick from the drive (or Driver). We emptied the car, had dinner, picked a bed then went through to the main lodge for the competition briefing. What a cool lodge!

On Saturday morning dad took us three beginners for a drive to show us some sights. After lunch we went below the waterfall at DOC headquarters.

Dad caught a prize winning brown trout. I caught my first fish all by
myself, a winning rainbow. Sashi caught a nice rainbow and well uncle Lyndon caught a small one. Not bad for less than 1 1/2 hours fishing.
Dad dragged us up at 5 am next day and we walked in the dark up to Lake Waikareiti. Dad and Lyndon rowed out to an Island in the lake with a lake on top of it. Mr. Scott had told us about it.
We caught a fish beside the Island. Then on the return back to the
boatshed Sashi and I both hooked up at the same time, we were both using the same fly, a Parsons Glory. We kept these two fish; they cooked up beautifully and melted in our mouths. Over two day we fished with 2 or three rods and caught eight fish, a cool weekend.

What I enjoyed the most was catching fish, playing cards at night, winning three prizes including a fly box, the Lodge and the glow worms on the track to Waikareiti. Thanks Mr. Merrilees for organising the trip. I can't wait for next year!

Jonny Kapoor.