Some days are better than others. It´s a fact.
And this July day somewhere on Nordkalotten was better than most.
With huge hatches of all kinds of insects and big, rising fish all over the place,
this is the stuff that winter dreams are made of.
Music: “Kivran!” (H. Stubø)
Performed by Jazz & Fly Fishing
Here´s a trick every angler should know: how to remove a barbed hook without any tools at all. It´s swift and painless!
While casting for a big, rising seatrout in the middle of the subarctic summer night, Tapani was unforunate enough to hook himself in the nose with a big fly. Luckily, I have done this procedure several times (even on myself once), and knew the super trick – otherwise there would have been a lot more blood involved…
Czech it out:
…when our tours last too long. No further comments.
Hi!
Since we’re going away now for some ten days fishing in the norwegian tundra, we decided to give you a special treat: A very exclusive fly fishing short movie titled Slow Walking Water.
Håvard Stubø from JFF goes for the big trout of Ransarån in swedish lapland. The movie tries to capture the mood and soundscape of the journey.
This was my first attempt to shoot a short film, and it was basically just a field test for the equipment (Canon 550d/T2i, Beyerdynamic MC 930 pair, JuicedLink, Edirol). I had to be quite heavy with the directing since Håvard was talking all the time and he is supposed to be the only one there in the film…
The soundtrack was done in Copenhagen with a great norwegian guitar player, Magnus Wiik. He first came up with the theme in solo and I built the rest of the sounds and instruments later on top of it.
So there you have it. Fly fishing short movie. No real plot for this time, only mood from the beautiful river.
Any comments and feedback is welcome.
Tapani Toivanen
Jazz & Fly Fishing
Blog from Eco-Rapids #3
Hellau!
I´m back from Russia. Here are some interesting videos from our tour in Finland in early June.
The first one was made by Fredrik, who stole my camera and made this epic masterpiece entiteled Karja while I was searching desperately for the camera, thinking I´d forgotten it somewhere along the road:
The second film, What´s Up with the Lainen?, deals with the mythical Finnish word “lainen”.
Fredrik and I have been asking Finns about the meaning of this word for more than a year now, and we still haven´t gotten any good explanation for it. Poor Tapani is the victim this time:
Soon, we´ll go fishing together again! First, we´ll fish a mystical river somewhere on Nordkalotten for a couple of days, and then we´ll move into undiscovered country for a real expedition.
Stay tuned – lots more videos and stuff coming up!
Tapani and I just came back from the legendary Ransarån. Terje Storsten, a great bass player/fly fisherman came with us on the trip. The objective of our little expedition was to hunt for the ultimate Nordic trophy fish – the big arctic char.
Ransarån offers excellent fishing for good-sized brown trout and arctic char, but what really sets it apart is the sight fishing conditions. To be able to see the fish in the water while you´re fishing for it makes things very exciting…
PS! Tapani filmed a lot with his Canon DSLR camera and hi-fi audio system on the trip, so you can expect some really cinematic stuff from Ransarån soon…
Finland here we come! Uusikadulla!!! Rajakala!!! Hevonk****!!!
I just returned from Helsinki where I was mixing Joona Toivanen trio’s new album. This is a band both me, Tapani and the drummer Olavi Louhivuori have played had since we were kids. Olavi had just finished a long US tour with Polish trumpet legend Tomasz Stanko’s quintet, and it was great to meet with the trio again.
Both recording and mixing this album was great fun. We wanted to have a more “retro” sound and used old microhones, tube amplifiers and tape recorders. The sound guy Mikko Raita was very good in creating this kind of sound, and the tubes and tapes were running really hot!
Tomorrow, I was supposed to go on tour in Russia and the Ukraine with my own band, the Håvard Stubø Quartet, but now it seems like it´s all gonna be canceled. God damn it.
The reason is of course the volcano Eyjafjallajökull on Iceland, which is currently spewing out an enormous cloud of ashes all over northern Europe, grounding all air traffic in Norway, Denmark, the UK, western Russia, etc.
Tapani was supposed to come, too, he´s sitting in for the band´s regular bass player, Torbjörn Zetterberg. We were really looking forward to the trip – I´ve never been to Russia or the Ukraine before, and was very excited about going there.
There might still be some hope of making the tour, or at least making the Ukraine part of it happen. Let´s see. Seems like it will take a major shift in the weather or a pause in the eruption to make flying possible…
Well, here´s some video from the bloody volcano:
And these local guys are taking it with a (slightly uncomfortable) smile:
Like Joona, Fredrik and Håvard, I too have been complaining here many times about how the winter is too long, ice is too thick and how I have my fly fishing gear back in Finland etc… About stuff that prevents us from going fishing.
Well, yesterday on Good Friday I got a call from a friend of mine – a great bass player called Joel. He asked if I would like to go fishing with him. I knew that we were talking about fishing with spinning rods but I still couldn’t resist the offer. It had been too long time since the last time I was fishing.
As we met at the gas station to buy some groceries, it turned out that he only had one fishing rod – and even worse – only one spoon with him. We would have to manage with that.
I had a feeling this would not be an ordinary kind of fishing trip.
Joel, my guide for this trip
When we biked to the place, it turned out that my guide’s secret spot was just next to a powerplant in an abandoned shipyard. I got the shivers as we moved further. This looks like the place Håvard’s monster cod must live in – I remember thinking at that time…
Strange place for cod fishing
I was a bit sceptical at this point
When we arrived, the sea looked so beautiful. I almost forgot that just behind my back was a huge wind turbine flapping it’s wings. Joel took the first cast with his primitive gear. Sometimes fly fishing can get a bit serious I though to my self. It was nice to relax, I had no pressure of catching fish at least. It would be impossible to catch with this gear and only one spoon…
But then it happened! Joel shouted: “I have it!” And there it was. The cod! The big torsk was bending his rod to the limit as he was fighting it. And in the next moment it was gone. Next cast and another torsk was on! This time he got it up after the fight. And the next cast was mine. And there it was again – my turn to fight the torsk! We were having fun without fly fishing – I couldn’t believe it. And with only one lucky spoon!
Here is a short and shaky video clip from my cell phone:
Juha Mieto
Well, we finally got word from Fredrik. Apparently he is cross country skiing in Dalarna, Sweden.
We had an interesting debate about the olympics last night. As you might have noticed, things are not going too well for the Norwegians so far. The Swedes, on the other hand… Here´s our correspondence from last night:
Hello guys! I´m skiing (what happened with Petter Northug, Håvard?!? I think I remember that you said he was gonna win everything?) in Dalarna. That is why I m a bit absent in this conversation. I´ll be home on sunday, after that there will be action from Fred!
From: Håvard Stubø
To: Fredrik Hamrå, Joona Toivanen; Tapani Toivanen
Cc: Petzi // Petzifilm
Sent: Tue, 16 February, 2010 23:33:46
Subject: RE: JFF site todo list
Northug? I don´t know. The Norwegians are very disappointing so far… Good with Björn Ferry today, though. A Storuman homeboy! And what about everybody´s favourite Swede, Charlotte Kalla! She´s from Tärendö close to Gällivare, which is where they make some of the iron ore which is the reason my home town Narvik exists, so there is a some sort of connection there. I´ve been cheering for her since she came around a few years ago.
Actually, I often find myself cheering more for some of the Swedes than some of the Norwegians. Maybe it´s because many of the Swedes come from Nordkalotten, and most Norwegian skiers are from the south of Norway? Not my all-time hero Vegard Ulvang, though – he´s from Kirkenes. Where in Finland is Juha Mieto from, Joona? He must be one of the coolest skiers ever.
From: Joona Toivanen
To: Håvard Stubø
Cc: Fredrik Hamrå; Tapani Toivanen
Sent: Wed, 16 February, 2010 23:56:02
Subject: Re: JFF site todo list
This is great stuff man! Put it on the blog!
PS! Juha Mieto is from Kurikka
(end)
Speaking of Dalarna, I suddenly remembered this video that bass player Torbjörn Zetterberg sent me some time ago. Enjoy:
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