On the 2nd of October I flew to Slovenia – this time alone, but I also invited my parents to meet up, combining fishing with family time. I booked a nice apartment in a small house in the village of Volarje, near the geographic centrum of the Tolmin Fishing Club‘s waters. It was still a two hour drive from the airport in the dark, but I managed to avoid both the deer and the fox that decided to cross the road at some point. It was ridiculously late by the time I managed to get to bed and fall asleep… (Delayed flight, catching up with my parents, dinner, assembling all the fishing gear for the next day, being way too excited and laying wide awake in bed, just the usual stuff.)

On the first day I decided to go and fish a long, relatively difficult to access, but – based on my research – promising section of the Bača (a tributary of the Idrijca). Having only slept three and a half hours might have contributed to spooking quite some fish in the beginning (even though the most beautiful spots came early), but as I found my rhythm, I also found the fish! I explored around 6 km of the river between Klavže and Koritnica and caught 10 fish (including 2 pure marble trout, with the rest being brown trout and marble hybrids), with the largest being around 45 cm. In the middle of this river section I had to climb out of the valley to bypass a narrow and steep gorge across the forest (and a railway bridge), which was definitely more hiking than fishing, and I would not recommend it to people who are not in shape. In the afternoon the river got hazy, but this might have actually helped to avoid spooking fish. My parents (who spent the day sightseeing in the region) came to pick me up at the end of the day saving me from a 1.5 hour walk back to my rental car (in the dark – although I was prepared and had a headlight with me). While I also had a Euro nymphing rod with me (in a rod tube on my backpack), at the end I did not use that at all (except for wasting half an hour at the start while I debated myself what equipment to use – sometimes having too much of a choice can be a blocker), and I caught everything using a nymph under a yarn indicator on my standard 9′ #5 Rivermaniac rod. For lunch I had sandwiches prepared by my father (with Pick salami from Hungary), and for dinner my mother cooked something nice. I swear I did not invite them for the food and the taxi service, but it was a nice extra :D

On the second day I decided to go to the Nadiža. I had very little information about these waters, so I just wanted to check out a few spots that looked promising from the satellite images. At the end I fished around 4 different spots, the first being close to the Italian border where the Nadiža enters Slovenia, and the last being close to the border where it exits back to Italy. In two days I managed to collect a good 8 hours of sleep deficit, but following another short night the morning started good. (Not to mention the beautiful drive to the river, emerging from the fog in the Soča valley into the morning sunshine above the clouds…) I sight fished a smaller rainbow (on the dry fly!), and also caught a chub (which was rather unexpected, and it was also the only fish on the Euro rod over these days). I spent quite some time on this upper section of the river, it was too beautiful too leave it behind early, but it was also very technical, and after the first two fish, I spooked everything I saw. Here at the turnaround point I spotted some huge fish in a deep pool (while standing on a massive rock slab), but they saw me too, and from then it was an impossible mission. After leaving the upper canyon section behind, I tried another impossible spot at an old bridge, before driving to lower, calmer sections of the river. When I arrived there the water was hazy again, so I was blind casting, and the only fish I saw went for my indicator (and of course it was not caught like that). Then after another hour of wading around searching for fish the water finally cleared up, and I could start sight fishing the pools. 7 hours passed between the last fish of the morning and the first fish of the evening, but in the dying hours of the day I still caught 8 nice big rainbows from various crystal clear pools (and a hiding spot under the trees), including my biggest rainbow trout so far (which I actually measured), weighting in at 48 cm in length. In general most fish here were around 40 cm, and they were strong fighters! I ended the day after 10 fish, but I am sure I could have caught even more in the last pool, but it was getting dark and I was also getting pretty tired and hungry.

 

The third day (actually already the night) started with a lot of rain (around 50-100 mm, which was still much better than the original forecast), so I played board games with my parents in the morning (after finally sleeping a healthy number of hours for the first time in 3 days). In the early afternoon the rain stopped (but the rivers were very high and coloured) so we went for a cultural visit to the nearby Kobarid. After the impressive WW I museum we walked up to the Italian Ossuary, which also served as a nice lookout point to the valley and the fresh snow covered peaks of the Julian Alps. After a coffee break, we drove up (on a narrow road) to 1000 meters above sea level to see the fresh snow from a bit closer. The views were pretty amazing as we watched the golden and then pink patches of sunshine climb higher and higher towards the peaks, leaving the valley and the lover slopes in the shadows. In the evening we played more board games, while I was monitoring water levels and trying to figure out if I could still go fish another day…

On the last (3rd) fishing day I decided to go further North, as the upper Soča area got the least amount of rain the previous day, so that looked like the best area to fish. My actual goal for the day was the Lepena, but I could not not stop at a random bridge on the Soča on the way there, to catch the first rainbow of the day. I expected the fishing on the Lepena to be more difficult, so I wanted to take the pressure off with an easy catch before getting there. Fish were not very active in the morning (again), so this took me way more time than expected given the number of fish I could spot in the water… With the first trout in (and out of) the net, I immediately drove further to my final destination. In the spring I did not get to fish this tributary of the Soča, so this was also going to be completely unknown territory. I think also the other fly fisherman in the region figured out that this area would be the only option for today, because after not seeing anybody for two days, on this day I saw quite a lot of people already in the early morning. Luckily they seemed to prefer the Soča, so when I arrived to the Lepena, I was alone again. I stared at a beautiful pool just under my parking spot with snowy mountains in the background (holy guacamole that was 10 out of 10 as far the scenery goes), but all I managed was a lost fish. I saw plenty of rainbows, but they wanted nothing with my nymphs… Then I checked out a few hundred meters of the river upstream, but once again I only managed to spot fish (3 large marbles here and there), and then spook them… So a good 1.5 hours later I returned to the original spot, and tried again. As the sunshine reached the bottom of the valley, the fish seem to have started eating, and I caught a nice (~40 cm) rainbow first, before hooking a monster. This fish was by far the largest fish I have made contact with so far, around 70 cm, and for around 3 minutes the fight was going well, but then the fish decided to head for the overhanging fallen tree, and as I was trying to stop it, my leader got torn… I was devastated… My emotions were in for a roller coaster of a day for sure. Still slightly in shock from the lost monster rainbow, I hiked/waded further downstream, looking for fishy spots. It did not take long to catch the first (~40 cm) marble trout of the day, which managed to make me feel somewhat better. On this section of the river there were some really good spots, and I managed to cast at fish without spooking them. A few hundred meters downstream of the previous fish, I hooked into a significantly larger and stronger one: a beautiful 51 cm marble trout! The fight lasted longer than 5 minutes, the fish made multiple runs downstream, I barely managed to hold it out of the next rapids and the bushes, but by some miracle I landed it at the end. 5X tippet was definitely on the risky side here. The fish was so big that actually the size of my net was the limiting factor which stopped me from netting it sooner… It was and is by far the biggest and strongest fish I caught so far. After the big marble I still caught one rainbow on the dry fly from a very nice pool further downstream, but fish were extremely picky there, and I had more looks and last minute refusals than I could count. Since I was pretty satisfied with all the fishing of this long weekend, I stopped the day before sunset for the first time, so we could still go and get dinner in Tolmin at a normal hour…

As my flight the next day was only on the evening, I could still do some sightseeing with my parents (who were also not on a tight schedule). We visited the Tolminska Korita, one of the many beautiful gorges of the region. No fishing is allowed in here because it is a sanctuary for the marble trout, so I was only spotting them from the distance. Then we drove to the scenic Skofja Loka where we visited the centrum (and had some coffee and cake). And with that another awesome trip to Slovenia came to an end.

After a quick evening visit to the Ijse, and making my best pancakes of the year (they were seriously fluffy!), I payed my last visit to the Walloon rivers, in search of some grayling in the Lesse. I think my expectations were a bit out of touch with reality, because while I found grayling, they were all under 20 cm (a.k.a. tiny). I got six of them (using all techniques in my repertoire: on the dry, with the Euro rod, and also with a nymph under a yarn indicator), plus a larger trout had a very short visit in the net. Still, the day was filled with lost flies (the river is full of debris here), and lacked any proper sized grayling, even around the most fishy looking spots… A year earlier such a day would have been considered a success, but now I came away with a sour taste in my mouth. But I was outside and I caught fish, and I would give a lot now in the middle of the winter to have the same experience again… Only two more months till the next trout season starts. Anyway, back to October. The next weekend we went to London for a long weekend to visit Cole and Nora (and to have a lot of fish and chips and nice brunches). While I enjoyed this part (friends and food), I was less impressed by the crowds and the weather of the last day. I also got sick, so I was not having the best time the following days/week… On the 31st I went back for another long day to the Ijse, and to be honest I had a lot of fun (probably the most I had there this year). Got 24 chub and 3 trout, in just 5 and a half hours, equaling my local best (on this river) from the previous year. The largest fish was 34 cm long – my biggest chub this year. The trees were also getting yellow so the scenery was also pretty. This was the “local small stream appreciation day” for sure. (BTW I was fishing using the least authentic fly fishing technique, with my nymph under an indicator on a Euro nymphing rod… so basically bobber fishing… Sometimes you do what has to be done.)

In November things slowed down as usual. We spent two days near the top of Belgium again: after our usual lunch at the Peak Beer we started with a nice hike in the High Fens, then we had a nice dinner in our B&B. After a good night’s sleep we walked around the Bütgenbacher See(and I was looking for potential fishing spots along the small rivers for next year). Then on our national holiday I went cycling with friends, and that ride with only 77 km was by distance my longest ride of the year… This was the first time since I started road cycling in 2010 that I did not ride 100+ km. Not like I could not, I simply had no motivation to spend that much time on the bike in one go anymore. I much preferred two hour rides, and my biggest motivation was simply to do some sports to keep a basic fitness level. I still like cycling, but it is definitely what it used to be (so the numbers don’t motivate me anymore at all). Funny enough while my cycling mileage was almost on an all time low (3380 km in 2025, just a tiny bit more than the 3344 in 2010 – and actually in 30 minutes less time), my yearly step count was way up thanks to all the walking in and around rivers :) The rest of the month not much special happened, I went to the Ijse one day to fish while also recording it (and somehow also managed to fall in – video still to be made), and we walked to the newest park of Leuven.

December was first of all very busy with work. (Just for the history books, this year I used a lot of AI – ChatGPT and Claude mostly – to aid me in my coding tasks, but they cannot do the job without me – for now.) I got a very nice advent calendar with various chocolate covered liquorice from Clio (my favourite snacks during our Scandinavian holidays), and our terrace got a bird feeding house (but we have only seen birds two or three times). For the first time in ages I not only bought a lot of presents for myself (mostly small fishing related things for the next season), but I also packed them in wrapping paper, so our Christmas tree looked even nicer than usual. Winter is not my favourite season, but it can be cozy for sure. Filou got a new cat bed to lie in on my desk, and by some miracle he even uses it… I also got myself some new shoes (awesome coloured Salomon Genesis and a GORE-TEX Nike Pegasus), some more pants, a warm and cozy Patagonia zip-hoodie, and a new warm winter hat. I am really getting old that buying everyday clothes is a notable event, while I feel not enough motivation to replace my 7 year old desktop PC because I don’t really want to sit in front of it… I prefer doing the little gaming I do on the PS5 anyways (thanks Andrew for coming over sometimes for fires and FIFA) – except for a few evenings with Manor Lords (which was fun). I mean there are still gadgets I would like to own, but for most things I feel like I would not use them enough to validate the purchase. After a few weeks warm enough for cherry trees to start blossoming in the city (and for me to go back to the Ijse once more and catch – besides the usual chub – the largest and prettiest trout of the year from there at ~30 cm) Christmas brought the proper freezing temperatures, but also clear blue skies, so we spent quite some time outside over the holidays – sometimes to get coffee in Leuven, but sometimes also to wander around in the nature. I especially liked our hike along the Dijle and the Ijse on Christmas day. We discovered two (for us) new restaurants (Slō and Ongefiltered, we will definitely be back to the first one for more), and I also played my bass a lot (I learned quite a lot of new songs this year).

2025 was a good year again, thanks for all the fish (literally). Hoping for a similar 2026!