Pike Fishing – Lapland Sweden

Back in the depths of winter members from the Jackson Kayak UK fishing team were invited to join other european team members to 10 days kayak fishing in Lapland Sweden, it took me all of about 2 seconds to say ‘Yes’. Straight away I was checking out Google Maps for what the area has to offer, answer, a lot of trees and water!

Before we knew it we were on the flight from the UK on route to Stockholm ready to start the 10hr drive north to Lapland, those 10hrs flew by though as were so excited at the prospect of kayak fishing in Sweden.

3.30am Tuesday morning and we arrive at camp based in the lovely village of Blattnicksele, a few hours sleep and we are on the water. Target is Pike, armed with plenty of surface lures, shads and flies we pressed on to see what Sweden had to offer. Only had to wait 10mins before the first fish were biting, only small Pike but very welcome! Vastra Huftasjon was the first venue we fished, though it produced lots of Pike and Perch nothing was of any size but still great fun.

Day two and we are fishing the River Vindelalven which runs next to the cabin/campsite, at around 500m wide it’s not a bad size and much bigger than the rivers I fish in the UK. As with the lake the Pike seem to be hugging the margins around the trees, weed and boulders. My fellow UK JK team mates David and Mark were doing well here, both landing 90cm+ Pike where as I was catching smaller 70cm+ fish.

We fished into the night which isn’t difficult when you consider it doesn’t get dark in Lapland at this time of year! From 10.30pm onwards we were blessed with a stunning sunset that lasted for 3.5hrs until 2am! times like these you are just happy being on the water, really was special and catching fish was purely a bonus.

Next venue (and my favourite) was Amborgtrasket, a large lake absolutely stuffed with features. Large boulders, reeds, shallow bays were everywhere, you couldn’t paddle more than 20yds before you found another feature! This really was a lovely place to fish, due to the clear water the fish were stunning and they were very hard fighters. UK Pike would of given up long before these guys, they didn’t know when to give up!

If the fishing and location wasn’t enough the resident Osprey’s made for a nice destraction, you don’t see them very often in the UK so it was a privalage to watch them.
We fished Ambotrasket for a few more days but I wished I had another 2 months to fish it!

Hopefully one day I’ll be lucky enough to fish Ambotrasket again, it has everything I want I just wish it was in the UK!