Highland Heaven - Inver and Kirkaig

Lower Inver morning view upstream from the Scrambles

 

Over the years I have been privileged to fish in many beautiful places, but nowhere else moved me as much as these two small Highland rivers.  As I walked up the Lower Inver on the Monday morning of our week, I found myself humming the song "Dancing Cheek to Cheek" from the 1930s musical Top Hat, produced and directed to showcase the magical dancing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers:

"Heaven, I'm in heaven,

and my heart beats that I can hardly speak,

and I seem to find the happiness I seek.............."

(with due apologies to the great Irving Berlin, who, as far as I know, wasn't a fisherman)

and those words kept coming back to me every day.

Consequently this post may be as much a photo essay as an article on fishing.  Either way, I very much hope that I succeed in conveying the joys I experienced during our week.

Having not enjoyed the Tay very much last year, my team encouraged me to look elsewhere (a polite euphemism indeed).  I contacted Mungo Ingleby of Sporting Lets, who offered me an array of opportunities.  The offer on the Inver and Kirkaig, both completely unknown territory for me, was very attractive, although in view of the age and reduced mobility of some members of the team, I was concerned by the athletic demands the rivers might present.  Mungo reassured me that he could manage that challenge and come up with a beat allocation tailored to our needs, and so it proved.  By December we had an agreed plan for a 4-rod party in the last week of August, which had something for everyone.  If we couldn't fish for salmon there was the vast array of famed trout fishing in the Assynt, stunning mountains and coastline, and the enormous selection of walks and hikes (especially for the much more athletic non-fishing wives).

The Week, its Joys and Challenges

After a string of disappointments and a dismal summer trout season (the coldest in my memory), my luck finally turned.  Against the odds and the worst efforts of Murphy, we had perfect water.  The wettest early August on the north west coast had left the lochs at the head of the Inver and Kirkaig fully topped up, guaranteeing good fishing levels for the whole of our week.  This amounted to +24" on the Inver and +12" on the Kirkaig.  My prayers and dreams had been answered: it does happen once in a while.  With no grounds for complaint and even fewer excuses, it was up to us to perform.  We did, however, duck fishing on the Tuesday, when the wind speed reached 50 mph, as a moderate concession to our age.  Apparently 2 young rods had a field day in our absence - good luck to them.

 

Perfect Inver silver - Day 1

The beautiful water levels presented both bonus and challenge.  The bonus was the quality of the fish.  The peak time on these rivers is usually in the first half of July: by late August the majority of salmon are resident and starting to colour.  However, the perfect water prompted a significant run of fresh fish throughout our week.  It was glorious: every fish we landed or hooked had been in the river for less than 48 hours, a wholly unexpected bonus.

 

 

 

Middle Kirkaig - Wednesday

The challenge arose from the combination of fast water and fresh fish.  Both rivers have sections with steep gradients and very fast flows: on the Middle Kirkaig those flows can be classified as Fast, Very Fast and Crazy.  We hooked a lot of fish in the tails of pools, where it was essential to stop them getting away downstream into the maelstrom below, while fighting them amidst very sharp edged rocks.  It was a big demand on angler and tackled alike.  The fish weren't large, generally in the range 5-10 lbs, but they were fresh and energetic, and had very soft mouths.  Two of my losses arose from failure of the hooking.  Two more were owed to breakage: I was using 23 lbs Seaguar (hardly normal in summer on Highland rivers), but in each case the polyleader was the point of failure, cut straight through on rocks.

 

 

 

 

 

Middle Kirkaig - Hazel Pool - Wednesday

 

This photo illustrates the challenge.  I was fishing from beyond the last little rock point on the right.  The large rock in the centre marks the lip of the pool.  The fish took about 5 yards upstream from there in shallow water.  There was no choice but to lower the rod tip and hang tough.  I managed to keep the salmon in the pool for 2-3 minutes of energetic thrashing until the polyleader was severed by one of the many rocks in the tail.  Rex, fishing with me, suffered exactly the same fate 15 minutes later, albeit his hook came out.  We moved down to the Heather pool, where we repeated the experience exactly but reversed, albeit this time I actually managed to fight my fish up out of the tail into the main body of the pool and get it under control before, suprisingly, the hook came out.  By this point David the head ghillie was begining to think he was fated with us as clients: hooked 4, lost 4 in a great morning's fishing.

 

Middle Kirkaig - Shady

Another challenge observable above and here is the need for rock scrambling/climbing skills, in this case a 40 foot near vertical descent.

The other thing you can see is the extraordinary clarity of the water.  From up here we could see the flash of salmon turning towards Rex's fly as it passed over the lies.  There are two reasons for this clarity: first, the lochs at the head of the rivers act as filters by causing sediment and fibrous materials to drop out; and second, in this area of the Highlands, the volcanic granite is overlaid with limestone.  The colour you see here is that of the bottom of the river, not the water, which is unexpectedly clear.  It's another part of the wonder of the place.

Lower Inver - Red Run

 If you look down the left side of this photo looking down Red, you can see the ledge you follow.  Some head for heights is essential.  I didn't hook a fish in here, but Rex did, right down by the tail, fighting it from 15 feet above.

If I was a skier I might rename this run Black, as a better representation of its demands.  But whatever those demands, it was certainly fun to fish.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 It wasn't all cliffs and cascades: both the Inver and Kirkaig have some gentler pools, and in the case of the Upper Inver, up on the moor to the east, there were lots of easily approached and fished pools that were delightful.  Fishing them against the backdrop of the Highlands was magical.

 Lower Inver

 A 25minute walk (hike?) up a very stony track from the hut leads you to the top of Beat 4, where you start fishing the Whirlpool (L) and below that, Dyke (R).

Whirlpool was full of resident fish that showed little interest in a fly, bar one grilse that tried a take as I was lifting  into a cast and thinking of other things.  The photo of Dyke was taken in the slightly lower water conditions on the Saturday.  On the Monday the left side was an interesting wade, with the water correspondingly faster.  I was in an awkward spot half way down beside the rocks when I hooked a fish (shown in the net at the top of this post), just upstream from the small point.  Moving from there was not an easy option, so I had an interesting time fighting a fresh and feisty salmon back up to me for netting.  Fortunately my luck held and I'd succeeded with a beautifully fresh, almost white fish on Day 1, oh what joy!  However, it didn't on the Thursday, when I hooked a substantially larger very fresh fish - probably 8-10 lbs - in exactly the same place.  After performing some spectacular aerobatics - cartwheeling across the run - to show its dislike of coming upstream, it eventually conformed.  After 3-4 minutes, having done the hard high-risk stuff, just when I thought I had everything under control, was getting confident and even thinking where best to net, the hook came out: exciting but sad.  It's always worse when it happens in the confident phase of the fight.  The lesson is simple: you can't win them all, but don't let up on the pressure, especially if the first part was violent.

 

Laird's, New & Cow from the hut

After Dyke you make your way down through a series of lovely runs: Island, where I missed a very forceful take on a most appropriate MCX Sunray on the brilliantly sunny Saturday morning; Red, as described above; and Scramble, where I missed good take in the fast water each time I fished it.  They lead on into the wide open spaces shown here, looking upstream from the hut.  The engineering work applied to the river in the 1930s is very evident, and although unnatural, it does create a stunning vista on a sunny day.  There were plenty of residents in here, but none were impressed by our flies.

I fished Pollan below the hut after lunch on the Saturday to close the week.  The loss of 3-4" made a big difference.  Rex had caught a nice fish here on Monday, but at the lower level I wasn't confident of imitating his success.

 

 

 

The Lower Inver is marvellous fishing, with lots of interesting pools and runs, all of which require thought, imagination and adaptation, which make it such fun to fish. It was also ideal for our two mobility-limited novice rods.

 

Upper and Upper-Middle Inver

 

The upper beats of the Inver offer a huge expanse of fishing set in moorland, with the mountains as a dramatic backdrop.  At the very top of the Upper beat is Loch Garbh, which plays an essential role as stabiliser and clarifier.  The entries to Garbh and the smaller Lasgaich provide excellent fishing in July as the early runners arrive.  

 

 

 

 

Lower Bridge Pool

Our main attention was focused on the Upper and Lower Middle beats, especially the latter, which have a succession of lovely pools.  Unfortunately, the light on the Thursday, while potentially good for fishing, was very poor for photography. 

The Lower Bridge offered almost 200 yards of lovely water that was well populated with uninterested residents who periodically showed to jeer at my efforts.  Below it the equally extensive and attractive Deer pool similarly failed to deliver.

 

Washing Pool

Despite the disappointments I fished with my customary enthusiasm, always hopeful for a take.  The Washing pool reeked of fish, but to no avail.  My theory is that heavy rain the day before had three effects: a small rise moderated by the lochs; the appearance of fibrous material in the water, making it look matte and flat, rather than the normal clarity; and increased acidity evidenced by foam.  Generally I found these features unhelpful on other rivers and can only assume that they may adversely impact the Inver.  Certainly, I only touched one fish all day, a great disappointment, but I loved fishing the beats.

Lower Middle Inver - Upper bridge Pool, leading down into Minister's

The Kirkaig

 

We only fished the Lower and Middle beats of the Kirkaig.  The upper limit is defined by the falls,barely 3 miles above the tide.  Although it is smaller and much shorter than the Inver, it has an established history of much larger fish.  I can offer no explanation although hypotheses abound: perhaps its violent waters produce stronger, later-emigrating smolts.  On the other hand, the one Kirkaig fish I caught was the same size as those on the Inver!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking upstream towards the gorge

Most of the Middle Kirkaig is enclosed in a wooded gorge of varying depth and breadth.  I showed some of the deeper sections earlier in this post, all of which present challenging fishing (and some demanding rock-hopping and scrambling).  Indeed, it was great fun to fish.

Despite the pace of the water, its extreme clarity led us to use smaller flies than would be normal at that speed, in my case MCX Dark #8 double and 1/2" Conehead tube, both of which hooked fish.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In circumstances like this you are on tenterhooks, expecting a take any moment (I had two here), knowing that you have to stop any salmon from getting away from you over the lip (by the tip of my right ear) into the maelstrom below.  This was really exciting stuff, and in this weight of flow, if you hooked a fish you had a fight on your hands, even if it might only be 5-6 lbs.  With the 12' 6" #7 XO the best answer was to drop the tip to 30 degrees to bring the full force of the butt into play and apply both drag and palm.  If something large - anything over 10-12 lbs here - I would not have rated my chances of stopping it.

After a day of this I knew I had been fishing!

 

The Lower Kirkaig beat has one lively pool - Heather at the mouth of the gorge - while the others are comparatively sedate, notably Bridge and Elder's.

This is the charming Bridge pool, another extremely fishy stretch, where most of the party caught salmon on Wednesday or Thursday.  Mine came from the tail on the Thursday afternoon, providing my first stress-free fight of the week, and David Macleod an opportunity to demonstrate his skills with my net.  It wasn't big, perhaps 5-6 lbs, judged a salmon, but it was certainly nice and fresh.

Summary

Although we didn't catch a lot of salmon, just 6, it felt like many more on account of the number we lost in the fight (7), and the vigour of those fights.  We also missed loads of takes as fish snatched at fast-moving flies in heavy water without getting hooked.  The fishing was challenging, sometimes physically demanding and always huge fun.  Although I'm fit for my age, I've never gone to bed so early in a fishing week.  Our party was relaxed, convivial and most enjoyable.  We were blessed with two lovely rivers, perfect water and utterly stunning scenery.  And the dreaded midges stayed away apart from one short period in a sheltered spot on the Lower Kirkaig: I never needed the head net.

I close this post with some photos of the surrounding area for your pleasure.

Sunrise behind Suilven from the lodge

 

Lochinver Bay

 

And from the opposite direction with Suilven behind

 

Autumn is coming

 

Top of Lower Inver beat

 

 

Upper Inver - Upper Bridge run

 

Pretty salmon - rubbish photographer