Kitza

We had lovely mild weather yesterday and in the afternoon the wind dropped right down. It felt pretty warm in the sun and in places there are the signs of green shoots poking through the brown, dried old grass. Here at Lower Camp the beat below Morskoy rapids was the hot spot and of our 26 salmon landed 15 came from there; a sure sign that the main run of fish is building up.

The road to Kuzomen

Up at Middle Terry reported that the team of seven rods had landed 63 salmon; the fish were well spread out over all the beats. As of yet they have not fished up the Yovas rapids above Clarkes Corner and I suspect that it will not be until next week, when we have 12 rods fishing, that they will venture up there.

Loading stores into the Kitza boats on the White Sea coast

I took Ollie Maxwell and Rosie Furnival over to Kitza to settle them in and to see the camp. Tom Ledger is also out here this week and with four season’s experience of fishing and guiding on Kitza he will make sure that Ollie gets a good feel for the river before our first Kitza guests arrive this Saturday. The river was high, but dropping in nicely and running pretty clear. As always it will be about a week or so behind Varzuga in terms of height and water temperature. Ura said that the salmon were already there and Sasha’s did look very inviting, but sadly time did not permit a quick flick or two. Honest!

Kitza River, looking upstream from Clay View yesterday

Ura and his team have been in camp since early May and have done wonders. New doors have been fitted on the bedroom cabins, new floors laid, new showers installed and there is lots of shiny new paint etc. We have not enlarged the sitting room this year; although we had had a plan to do this it proved to be structurally impossible to do – so Plan B is to rebuild the whole Lodge, both sitting room and dining room for 2016. On reflection I am sure that makes sense and rather than a bodged temporary fix we can rebuild properly for the long term. But there is a new sofa and some new chairs on the way, the fireplace is painted and it all looked most welcoming.

Robin M with another springer from Morskoy

The drive over the remarkable Kuzomen desert is always memorable and we stopped for a few photos and to admire the estuary and White Sea. On the drive back there was not one of us who did not want to be left at Kitza for a week or so – what a charming camp it is.

It is mild again this morning, the river continues to drop and salmon are showing. Looking good.

Christopher Robinson