Estancia Tecka Lodge is one of the hudges farms in Argentina that produce cotton. It is situated close to the city of Corcovado in Chubut Province. Estancia Tecka is located about 50 miles South of the city of Esquel, this vast working sheep ranch encompasses 435,000 acres in beautiful Patagonia. From freestone rivers to spring creeks this ranch offers over 96 miles of private water set at the base of the Andes Mountains. From its inception in 1910, when the British imported Merino wool sheep from Australia, this Estancia continues to produce not only the finest wool but some of the best trout fishing anywhere in the world.

Estancia Tecka Lodge is huge because they have connected three different Estancias and have been bought by two families in Argentina, very well known in the Fly Fishing industry Ochoa Family and Paz family. We have been in touch with Pedro Ochoa who runs all the fly fishing program at Estancia Tecka lodge, and after few communications, agreements on how nice would be to do some things together, we agreed to go and visit the Estancia with one of their main guides, so with Juan we arrived to Tecka city or town, is more a town, around 8.30 in the morning, and we met a nice person and an amazing guy that have been in the industry for more than 15 years: Mr Pablo Manavella who was extremely nice with us, with a great attitude and he was telling us the history of the Estancia and details about the fishing experience that mostly foreign claims and guest have a destination. 

After driving 30 minutes together with Pablo we got into the property and we were getting to the main house of the Estancia that has the first lodge called Estancia Tecka. This is a huge original Estancia in Argentina with a lot of history and photos in the world about farming, adventures, gauchos that developed this area in the middle of the Patagonian desert area and you can sniff the history and all the farming history just by getting into the house and walking around.

The lodge has 5 beautiful  bedrooms with private bathrooms, a very nice lounge area, great accommodations for lunch and dinner, a beautiful barbecue place and people enjoy this amazing destination mostly all our summer.

One of the things that make it amazing is that after driving for 30 minutes in the middle of the... let's call it: The argentinian desert, you think “Where are we going to be fishing? you know, it's like “Where is the river? Where is the water?” But then you get into this Estancia and see the green grass that they have been taking care of very carefully all year around just to receive their guests, and it's like getting into an oasis, it's very unbelievable and surprising. 

You can see the river because of local and willow trees that goes from South to North, making a loop and then Tecka River goes from that area to the Atlantic Ocean. What is very interesting is that also the Corcovado River comes from the lake gets into the Estancia and goes through the Estancia, comes from.. let's say the Andes section and then do a loop into the Estancia to run all the other way to the Pacific Ocean, so here no further than 3 kilometers away, we got 2 beautiful rivers that get close together but one runs to the Atlantic Ocean and the other runs to the Pacific Ocean. This is a very unique situation in Argentina and makes it look wonderful!

Once we got out of the pick up track with Juan and Pablo, we found out that it was kind of windy, we couldn't see the trees moving but once you open the door and you get out you say “Oh man! This is not gonna be an easy thing to do!”.

The wind was blowing and we knew it was going to affect our fishing. It’s got a good part and a bad part the wind, the bad part is that makes it complicated for the fly cast, especially when the winds comes in front, and the other part is the good part, that it makes a little drizzle on the water and in this little streams, especially in Tecka River  you need that drizzle, so the fish will not be able to see you that easy.

So after doing a research on the lodge, we decided to go straight to the River with Juan and Pablo one we set up our roads, we got into our waders just in case we needed to wait the stream but really is a river that you fish from outside, is a tiny beautiful Spring Creek that runs smoothly and got beautiful fish. 

So we started with some dry flies and casting from outside trying to you know, work with the wind or working against the wind and we found places where it was easier  to make the fly cast, go where we wanted, and in some other places the fly was playing with us, and going wherever the fly wanted to go made things most difficult in areas where we saw nice spots. We just told  the guide “Pablo come on you do it, show us! We would love to see what happened here and if we try 3 or 4 times, we are gonna spook the water!”

At the beginning like every guide they refuse to take your rod but then when Pablo understood that we were there for the experience and to see how the river reacts on the Fly Fishing, he was doing some of the fly casting too. It was good fun. We were teasing each other, making some jokes while creating the footage. 

The creek is an amazing beautiful creek. I wish I could see that place again one day with a very sweet breeze on a sunny day, something that in Patagonia is, you know, asking too much, but you never know it could happen. Also it happened in some of the days we have been in Patagonia this trip. 

So a few hours after fishing apart from the creek we decided to get our lunch with some appetizers, cheese, hammies, olive oils and some snacks. When Pablo mentioned the story about another fishing guy called Mr Perez I was fishing with them one day and he didn't have a good breakfast  in the morning and before lunch, he was so hungry that he requested for cheese and when the guy was setting the table  and everything for lunch when they realized that they wanted to get some cheese they found out they Pablo get all problems Mr Perez got all the cheese, so here is where the famous phrase is  “they eat it so fast as Paris eat the cheese”, and that's an amazing story that happened and the guys used a lot the story person of the cheese. Anyway after having some sandwiches and our soft drinks and a few minutes to relax with a little knob lying on the grass close by to the river and 30 minutes later parking business again. Like Mark used to tell me when we were fishing in Tanzania the fuicking bussinees and now we are fishing again. 

The wind is a little stronger; there is no action about the water. If a fly or a nymph will pop up from the water that will get you more and less, to the next town, probably with the wind.. Anyway we keep working with some different dry flies. 

We tried with one or two names in some areas with droppers. They worked and we got good fish. At the end of the day, we decided to stop in the Spring Creek and to go to a tributary small river.

  Now we are talking about 3 yards, 4 yards, white little stream  where you almost fly cast from 10 yards away, where you have to be careful with your shade  or the trout will see you and go away. When the water is calm and slow, it's so nice. With a small road and a dry fly with a nymph, when you see the action in that little creek you feel you are touching the sky with your hands, you feel your blind to paradise.

  It was an extremely nice experience but that time the sun was still coming down above us but  we thought  we got enough and we already knew about Tecka so we drove a little bit, we saw some other pools and we started the way back to the launch in the property. The lodges are separated through around  40 minutes  drive very nice rubble roads and when we get to the second lodge in the Estancia named Caridad we did visited the place and then Hugo and Pepe who did a lot of transfer and do multiple tasks for the guys at the Estancia were waiting for Pablo, Juan and my self to get a special Patagonia barbecue with argentine wine. It was a great thing to do. We played some Truco and we also drank the famous Argentinian drink Fernet with Coca.

By midnight we were ready to go to sleep because the following day we had an amazing challenge that it was to Fly Fish the Corcovado River. We hope you enjoy this news and story, and we hope you should be the next one!