The Kola Peninsula or Koloskij Poluostrov as it is called in Russian is an enormous region. Up there above the Artic Circle there are endless tracts of beautiful country, most of it untouched by human hand. This Peninsula is the largest and best preserved wilderness in Europe and is of tremendous interest to nature-loving flyfishers. During the two summer months, June and July, the midnight sun heightens the experience even further.
The region has 110 000 lakes and 20 000 rivers and streams. Most of these waters are teeming with fish and they are totally unaffected by pollution or hydroelectric power schemes. There are as many as 29 varieties of fish, of which the most important are Atlantic salmon, trout, char and grayling.
In the North, the rivers run steeply down to the Barents Sea. Here there is everything the salmon angler could wish for - foaming white cascades, glassy glides, runs and riffles, and big silvery salmon - rivers that give some idea of how it must have been in other countries when the fish could migrate freely without let or hindrance.
The northern part of the Kola Peninsula consists mainly of tundra. Despite the austere appearance of this terrain with its sparse and stunted vegetation, it nevertheless harbours surprising numbers of animals and birds such as white grouse and soaring sea-eagles, the largest birds of prey in all of Nothern Europe. It may even be possible to see the occasional brown bear retreating into the distance like a fleeting shadow. The southern part of the peninsula - the so-called Taigan - is characterised by forests, lakes and rivers, where the wealth of animal life is even greater than in the North. The rivers here are more serene in tempo and they flow majestically out into
the White Sea. Enormous wetlands and a myriad of snow- and rain-fed lakes help to maintain a surprisingly constant water-level in many of these southern Kola rivers. In the Bay of Kandalaksja on the White Sea, the fantastic river Umba meets the sea. This river suffers seldom, if ever, from excessive variations in water level, due largely to the fact that it drains an extensive system of lakes and wetlands. These constant water-levels guarantee a viritually uninterrupted influx of salmon into the river.
Regardless of whether you choose to fish one of the northern rivers such as the Rynda, Kharlovka, Eastern Litza or Yokanga, or the Umba in the South, I can guarantee that you will have fly-fishing the likes of which you never expected to find on this planet.
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