La Posada de los Farios

It is rare to see another angler, and the few fishermen that have wet a line on the Cisnes (home water) would prefer that it remain a well-kept secret. The regional rivers invite few comparisons because there aren't many spots on earth that could match their superb fly-rodding during our North American winters.

Among the best in this angling paradise is the Rio Cisnes (Swan River), near the Argentine border north of Coyhaique. Cisnes fishing rivals that of any of the other Patagonian watersheds, and offers a tremendous amount of geographical and angling diversity. Equally important are the spectacular dry fly, streamer, and nymph fishing on the Rio Cisnes that remains reliable from December through March.

The talented staff at La Posada de los Farios uses a combination of state-of-the-art rafts, four-wheel drive vehicles, strategically placed optional overnight "wilderness" lodging, and a wealth of knowledge. The action is sometimes

We've organized, arranged, guided and hosted anglers on trips to Chile, Patagonia for better than two decades. That knowledge and field experience has been invaluable in helping our clients choose the best dates, and has added a more custom-tailored finish to each of our reservations. The travel staff here at The Fly Shop communicates almost daily with Rex, and has up-to-the-minute access to their calendar. When you call us, we can tell you immediately what space is available for

Package Cost:
The cost of the week-long La Posada de los Farios package is $3,950 per person (double occupancy)

•  La Posada de los Farios has shorter stays available. This modestly - priced package can be scheduled to begin any day of the week from December to May.

Inclusions:
Your angling package at La Posada de los Farios includes fishing, guide service, ground transportation, lodge accommodations and meals, beer, wine, Pisco Sours (Chilean national cocktail) and mixes.

Non-Inclusions:
Not included in your La Posada de los Farios package are hard liquor and items of a personal nature are not provided. Fishing licenses are not included in the package price. The license cost is US $75.00 for non-residents and can be purchased at the lodge upon arrival.

When to make plans for Chile:
The lodges and outfitters that we work with in Chile are small, owner/operated and many of them are family run businesses. Their guest capacity is purposely small in order to deliver exceptional personal service. Our lodge's limited capacity, as small as six and no larger than ten, results in space becoming tight, especially during high-demand months of January, February and March. Therefore, if you are serious about booking a trip to Chile it is important to secure dates at the conclusion of the current season; best in April, May or June. That is not to say that prime space isn't available later in the year, but if you are set

Trout and salmon are not native to South America. They were first introduced into Chile and Argentina's regional rivers beginning in the early 20th Century primarily by European owners of large estancias in the south who imported the eggs and smolt by ship from hatcheries in both the U.S. and Europe. The first brown trout were introduced to Chile's rivers in 1906, and three decades later the world famous strain of McCloud River rainbows (salmo Shasta) were added to the cold clear rivers and streams of that part of Patagonia. Subsequent government sponsored introductions into the pristine lakes and rivers of the Lakes Region of Chile were very successful and this area blossomed into a sports fishing mecca in the 1950's and 1960's.

It was made famous by writers such as Rodrick Haig-Brown, Ernest Schweibert and Joe Brooks. Additionally, introductions into Patagonian waters have been highly successful and the Aysen Region of Chile (Coyhaique) is now considered the sports fishing center of Chile. Rainbow and brown trout are the most abundant species and trophy size brook trout can be found in a few remote areas.

With a coastline stretching 6,435 kilometers (about 4,000 miles), Chile is a world leader in the global aquaculture industry; the number one producer of farm-raised trout and second only to Norway in salmonid production. Millions of rainbow trout, silver salmon and king salmon escape those farms and their offspring can be found cruising the rich saltwater shoreline. The physical condition of these saltwater raised trout and salmon is awesome and they are some of the hottest fish we have ever tied into.

Over the last decade we have seen an increase in the number of Pacific salmon making their way upstream, and resident trout have started to key-in on the salmon spawn as a food source. Although a few fly fishing outfitters are targeting the migrating salmon, we don't think this trend is going to take over the trout fishing in Chilean Patagonia. However, it does warrant attention and it will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

Spring in Chile begins in December. Trees have dropped their blossoms and warm summer weather lands in Patagonia before Christmas presents have been opened.

Trout season in Chilean Patagonia swings into high gear by the New Year, and continues until leaves turn crimson and drop with the arrival of winter in late April. The summers of Patagonia are abbreviated, much like those of Montana and Wyoming. Warm days often begin with cool mornings and can be punctuated by sudden thunderstorms. But for the most part, the best time to visit this fantastic part of the world is from mid-November through mid-April.

In the mid-60's, it took pioneer fly fishers, like Joe Brooks 22 hours to fly from Miami to Santiago and another twenty hours in the air with numerous stops along way to reach the trout infested waters in and around Puerto Montt - now that's dedication!

Getting there is easy with a wide choice of convenient, daily flights from Los Angeles, Atlanta, Dallas, Miami, and New York. Most flights are direct, departing the States in the afternoon or early evening and arriving early the next morning in Santiago, the Capitol of Chile. Airlines that service Chile include LAN, Delta, United and American.

Arriving in Chile is simple, hassle free and safe. The flights are almost always on time, the new ulta-modern airport is clean, and the entire experience, from clearing immigrations and customs to connecting with domestic flights, is very smooth. Airfares from the U.S. to Santiago vary widely, with tickets from New York, Miami and Los Angeles ranging from $900 to $1,200 round trip. Usually the best fares can be had by flying LAN, the national airline of Chile. LAN is one of the largest air carriers servicing South America. Their modern, new air fleet has a superb record for reliability, safety and on time departures and arrivals.

Immigration Requirements for entry into Chile: U. S. Citizens: When traveling to Chile, a valid passport is required with an expiration date occurring at least 6 months later than the day of arrival. Chilean Tourist Card: A Chilean Tourist Card Application will be handed out by your carrier during your flight to Chile. Please fill out the application and present it and your passport to Chilean

Specific flight details for La Posada de los Farios

Your end airport destination when fishing with La Posada de los Farios is a small regional airport south of the city of Coyhaique called Balmaceda (airport code BBC). We ask that you arrive Balmaceda in the early afternoon. On departing Balmaceda, please book a flight back to Santiago in the afternoon to allow plenty of time for auto transfer from the lodge.

Day of Arrival: After a comfortable night in Santiago (optional), guests arrive Balmaceda Airport in the early afternoon, where they are met by Rex Bryngelson or one of his staff and taken to the lodge. Often, you will have a delicious lunch at the Bryngelson’s home in Coyhaique before starting the drive to the lodge. This is a great opportunity to pick-up any sundries you might have forgotten or check your email.

The drive to the remote lodge on the Rio Cisnes is about three and a half hours and is highlighted by beautiful roadside scenery and stunning mountain vistas of the Southern Andes. Anglers and their companions are met upon arrival and introduced to the lodge and staff. The comfortable riverside ranch house backs up against the Andes and a large hanging glacier, all visible from the front porch. Each of the guest rooms is well appointed, has a private bath, and the amenities are in stark contrast to the remote Patagonian location.

After a brief orientation, you will have a chance to purchase your fishing license, organize tackle and to get settled in and get a shower, that way you can enjoy a nice dinner, relax and get to bed early enough to be fresh for a full day of fishing the next morning.

The Angling Week: These are full fishing days, and the exact schedule will depend on the guest's wishes. Breakfast and dinner will be served in the lodge and fine mid-day meals are served in the field, streamside.

La Posada de los Farios angling is exclusively for Brown Trout in the Cisnes River, and a

It opened for its first guests in January, 1994. Los Farios, itself, is on a small (4,000 acre) working cattle ranch, located in the heart of the Cisnes Valley, far from any sort of organized civilization. The roads aren’t paved in this part of Patagonia and the only phone is close to an hour’s drive away in the village of La Tapera toward the Argentine border.

The three guest rooms in the lodge are simple, spacious, and tastefully decorated, each with its own private bathroom. This timber framed (out of logs cut and hand hewed from the ranch) house oozes charm and warmth and the atmosphere Rex and his wife Maike have created is homey and relaxed. The living room is surrounded by a bank of windows and is the gathering place for cocktail hour and delicious hors d'œvres. Breakfast and dinner are served in the dining room, just off the living room. Heat is provided by two wood stoves and electricity provided by generator. There is no phone service at Los Farios, however the do have radio contact to Coyhaique in case of emergency. All linens are provided at Los Farios as well as bar soap and shampoo. There are no single occupancy options at La Posada.

Chef Fernando is a talented kitchen magician and his family-style meals are centered around fresh fish, chicken, lamb and beef. Fernando Bravo has been with Los Farios for many seasons and is now considered among the very finest lodge chefs in all of Chile today. His wonderful breakfasts and dinners are a highlight, and the dining schedule is built around the day’s best fishing, not the schedule of the guides or staff. Meals are always accompanied by fresh baked bread, salads, and fresh vegetables from the garden, and complimented by the finest Chilean wines. Delicious lunches are served in the field and prepared by your guide. They are usually served on a table with table cloth, cloth napkins and a great bottle of red “tinto” or white wine “vino blanco” to complement the cuisine.

The shallow tributaries support healthy numbers of smaller brown trout, offering non-stop action for anglers using high floating dry flies and grasshopper patterns, while the lagunas and large serpentine sections of the main stem of the Cisnes harbor healthy numbers of mature wild trout. Rex insists these Browns are thick in many of the regional rivers, lagunas, and spring creeks. There is also a moderate run of king salmon that can on occasion be targeted. Very few of the wading destinations at Los Farios are challenging or difficult. Anglers often choose to wade "wet" in the intimate

The Upper River Float:
Classification: Moderate to difficult
Starts roughly 1 hour upriver to the east of the lodge. This is a 10 mile float and can make for a very long day. However, it can be broken up into 2 parts if anglers are willing to make an approximate 1 mile hike out from the river to the road at the ½ way point. (It is a moderately difficult hike along a dirt road with a short but steep uphill accent of approx. 300 yards. This float section is the highlight of our fishing program both fishing wise and scenically. It flows through semiarid mountainous terrain and can offer excellent dry fly action with the right conditions.

There is one class III rapid to be navigated about ¾ of the way through the float. We

Lodge Float:
Classification: Easy
This float starts right from the lodge and is about 6 miles long. This is a good place to start the week after the long trip down to Chile. This section is wide and meandering and floats through some old growth Coihue (coy-way) forest that makes up the transition zone between the drier Patagonian steppe and the coastal temperate rain forest. Fish average 10-14 inches on this section of the river and are very abundant. This is not to say that larger fish cannot be found here! All of the very largest predatory browns (25 inches +) we have caught from the lodge have been on this section of the river. The river passes by 2 small tributaries, The Rio Las Torres and the Rio Rodriguez, and anglers may stop to fish the lower sections of either one of these, as well.

Lower Canyon Float:
Classification: Moderate to Difficult
This float option is a brand new for us having just recently been opened up as a result of the expansion of the "Carretera Austral" or "Southern Highway" now in the process of being paved to the north. The float begins about 25 kilometers down river to the west of the lodge (30 minutes). Here the river delves into the lush coastal rainforest with even more rugged and spectacular glaciated mountain terrain providing for the back drop. Along the way to the put-in we pass by Villa Amengual, a quaint rural village of about 200 inhabitants and our closest link to civilization. The river gets big down here and flows several miles away from the road and, due to the fact that there is a tricky class IV rapid to be negotiated, we will only undertake this float when the water flow conditions are favorable. We choose not to chance making this float during too high of water conditions and, for safety

The Rio Manihuales:
classification: Easy
Due to the present paving of the Carretera Austral (Southern Highway) it will now be reasonable for us to add the Rio Manihuales to our float fishing options. There are 3 or 4 floatable sections of this river from about 45 minutes to 1 hour and 15 minutes away from the lodge. This will be our closest and only option (aside from the coast) where we can fish for rainbow trout in addition to brown trout. The Manihuales is a large river and best fished from a boat. The river is rugged with immense logs lining the banks in several areas

Lower river wade options:
Classification: Moderate to difficult
There is some moderately easy wading to do right in front of the lodge that becomes easier the lower the water gets. During high water we will suggest floating instead. This is a good option on the day of arrival.

About 10 minutes up from the lodge there is a gorgeous wading option at a place we call Jose's. This is moderately difficult wading and involves and fair amount of walking. The river bottom is primarily large cobbles and boulders, but not slippery, nor is the current overly fast. This section of the river is very rarely fished. It is quite scenic here where the river leaves the rugged canyon section of the

The New Zealand Hole:
Classification: Moderate to difficult
There is also another wading area just up river from here we call The New Zealand Hole, named as such because it is a deep canyon pool like what I have always envisioned it to be like in New Zealand. It involves a ¼ mile walk down a moderately rugged trail. This is where the lodge record brown (31 inches) was caught in 2005 during high water conditions; a 28 inch fish was also caught here the same day, both using streamers. It is a gorgeous place to fish with steep granite walls surrounding a deep bottomless pool. This is a

Tributaries:
Classification: reasonably easy wading
There are 2 small tributaries, The Rio Las Torres and the Rio Rodriguez, located about 10 minutes downstream from the lodge that can be fun to fish. They are both reasonably easy wading. Getting to the Rio Las Torres involves using a raft to cross, or crossing using a small cable car that traverses about 20 feet above the water. Both rivers produce primarily small browns, but we have seen 20+ inch fish come out of both of them over the years. (We believe these larger fish are

The Moro River:
Classification: difficult
Another productive tributary that comes into the Cisnes about 40 minutes up-river from the lodge. It has a very scenic canyon with nice pools and is relatively arid and protected. Dry

The Upper Upper Cisnes:
Classification: easy wading
Larger average fish (14-18 inches) on this section. About 1 hour up river from the lodge the Cisnes splits and the southern branch becomes a small and very easily waded river that could probably best be described as a creek. This is where the mountains begin to fade giving way to the vast open Pampa to the east. Conditions tend to be windier here because of the relative lack of protection. This section can make for excellent dry fly fishing

The Main Upper Cisnes:
Classification: Relatively easy wading
About 50 minutes upriver. This is also relatively easy wading with small gravel but, bigger water than the upper Upper section (during high water times we typically opt to float fish rather than wade this area). Again, dry fly action can be excellent during the hopper season from (mid-January through mid-March) and then afterwards as the mayfly action gets going, from mid-March on. There

Lago Las Torres:
Classification: easy to moderately difficult
Located about 20 minutes form the lodge. Surrounded by jagged mountain peaks that literally rise up to over 1 mile above the lake's edge. It is hard to imagine a more scenic setting. The lake is surrounded by a lush and ancient old growth temperate rainforest and completely protected within the 40,000-acre Lago Las Torres National Reserve. There is a very healthy population of brown trout that average 18-22 inches and are spectacularly colored due to the rich organic quality of the water. Dry fly action can be superb on warm days as the browns aggressively hunt adult dragonflies cruising just above the water's

Hidden Lagoon:
Classification: moderately difficult
There is a remote and very productive hidden laguna (where we keep an Outcast boat) that is connected to the main lake via a small creek. It involves a moderately difficult ¼ mile trek

Lago Los Farios:
Classification: private lake
For many people, the thought of lake fishing conjures up images of vast, featureless expanses of water and hours of mind-numbing trolling, hoping for some unseen denizen of the deep to somehow find their lure and bite. Not very scintillating stuff. The lake and laguna fishing at Rex's couldn't be further from this kind of picture. Imagine instead small, manageable-sized lakes and ponds, the kind you can often float tube around in an hour, or less. Visualize shallow, clear water, where you can see many of the beautifully- marked 12 - 20 inch browns before you cast to them. Consider that these fish see only a handful of anglers each year, and often rise eagerly and aggressively to large dry flies, as well as chasing midsized streamers and nymphs. In addition, some of the lagunas are tiny; the kind you sneak up to, not really believing anything bigger than a guppy could possibly live in, then stand slack-jawed as a big brown head engulfs your hopper off the surface, the owner of which, when you set the hook proceeds to cartwheel wildly across the top of the water. No, trolling this DEFINITELY is not!

It's a great trip for those who enjoy riding horses. Our horses are very mellow. It's a

Floating the Rio Queulat:
Classification: Easy to moderate
This is a 4 mile float on the river that ends right at the Cabanas. It is very scenic as it flows through the lush rain forest. Several waterfalls are seen along the way. The water is incredibly clear. The river has many small resident fish (browns and rainbows), but our primary goal is to find the large sea-run fish that make their way into the river. Sea-run

Wade fishing the Queulat River:
Classification: Easy to moderate
We can also wade fish the lower reaches of the Queulat River walking out from the Cabanas.There are 2 very good pools about ¼ and a ½ miles upriver, respectively, and this is where we most commonly find large sea-run fish in this river. Wade fishing this area involves a fair amount of walking. There is

The Rio Ventisquero (Glacier River):
Classification: moderate
Located about 20 minutes from the cabins. It is a larger braided glacial river that requires a ½ mile walk from the vehicle to get to the lower pools. The water is typically colored from glacial silt and the best fishing tends to be early and late in the season when there is less glacial melt water coming into the river. We wade fish the lower 1 mile or so of this river where it is not uncommon to find large sea-

The Ventisquero Chico:
Classification: easy
This is a small glacial-fed river and we typically only fish the very bottom section of it where it dumps into the Puyuhuapi fjord. As with all of the river bocas flowing into the salt,

The Point:
Classification: easy
This is an old glacial moraine that is forms a point at the opening of the Queulat fjord where it joins the Puyuhapi fjord. It is a spectacular fishing location that trout, salmon and native Robalo are attracted to because of the tidal currents continually wash back and forth across it. It is common to see Toninas