Photos and Story: River of Dreams in Slovenia

Written by: Peter Fong

Although I have tried to spend much of my life near trout—in Vermont, Montana, Mongolia, and elsewhere—I spent last winter in Algeria, where climate change and habitat loss have reduced the native species to remnants and rumors. So after buying a plane ticket to Slovenia in May, I did what I do best: daydreamed.

My destination, Orvis-endorsed Krka River Lodge, seemed to be stalking my correspondence like a predatory brown in a shadowy pool. The first message came from photographer Earl Harper, who had supplied a gorgeous image of a Mongolian canyon for my story, “Sanctuary,” in American Angler. The next from artist Alberto Rey, whose painting, Biological Regionalism: Bonefish, Jardines de la Reina, Cuba, adorned the opening spread of “The Boca,” in the fortieth anniversary issue of Gray’s Sporting Journal.

Both, by coincidence, would also be staying at Krka River Lodge, one week on either side of my trip. Was everyone going to Slovenia? I wondered. And then, after experiencing the place myself, I revised that thought to—No wonder.

The Krka arises in a limestone cave about a mile from the lodge. The river meanders east, toward the Croatian border, then enters the Sava, the largest tributary of the Danube. In spring and summer, anglers content themselves with the self-sustaining populations of browns and rainbows. In fall and winter, their attention turns to huchen, the Danubian relative of Mongolia’s taimen. 

On my first evening at the lodge, we walked across the bridge to a nearby restaurant, Domačija Javornik, where we dined with a clear view of rising trout. While enjoying a slice of apple pie and a glass of sage-infused brandy, I tried to decide what the fish were taking. There were at least two different mayflies in evidence, one blue-gray and one brown, plus some fluttering caddislies and the occasional large stonefly.

The next morning, however, our guides—Matej and Blaž—decided to visit the nearby Dreta River instead. The Krka, they reasoned, was fishable now, but our best strategy would be to save it for a rainy day, when its cavernous source would give us a day’s buffer from rising water. With six different streams within an hour’s drive of the lodge, we had the luxury of choice.

Over the next few days, my notebook filled with new experiences, including first taste of žlikrofi, a Slovenian specialty that the menu translated as “stuffed dough pockets” but which looked more like ravioli in the shape of a bicorne hat. These were accompanied by a savory wild mushroom soup, served with a side of ajdovi žganci, a sort of spoonbread made with buckwheat flour and topped with pork cracklings, and a bottle of Slovenian pale ale.

The fishing was both varied and intriguing. I caught my first European grayling in the Dreta, along with some beautifully marked browns. When Matej called for 6X tippet and tiny flies, I learned to let him tie the knots. At one location, I hooked fish on an Elk-Hair Caddis, a Euro nymph, and a miniature Muddler Minnow, all without moving my feet. On the Sava Bohinjka, two of the largest rainbows were tinged with emerald and jumped repeatedly, as if to show off their colors.

But I kept dreaming about the Krka. The eighteenth-century fountain in Slovenia’s capital city, Ljubljana, is said to represent the gods of three rivers: the Ljubljanica, the Sava, and the Krka. In my book, there is something unimpeachable about any landscape whose inhabitants believe that it merits gods.

One morning I woke at dawn, put on my running shoes, and followed a path to the source of the Krka. The iron gate at the cavern entrance was locked, as expected, but I peered through the bars. The cave is reported to house at least 30 species, including a rare salamander, the olm. The olm’s Slovenian name, človeška ribica, means “human fish.” Its genus name is Proteus, after the Greek sea god who could change his shape at will.

Pale and sightless, these animals can live a century or more and have been observed to survive without eating for up to a decade. When a few specimens washed out from the cave during a flood, a seventeenth-century scientist declared them to be fetal dragons. Because I love stories about old gods and mountains (and have even written one or two myself), I made my way back to the lodge feeling oddly lightened. Not just light-hearted, but light of foot in a way that sixty-something runners don’t always feel.

After breakfast, the guides decreed that this would be the day that we finally fished the Krka. The morning was calm and cloudy, with rain in the forecast. At the first stop, I caught a rainbow on a CDC sedge pattern Matej had designed himself. At the next, with the sun breaking through clouds, I was distracted by a dance of metallic-blue dragonflies. 

Following a brief shower, I found myself swinging a small minnow imitation between two bridge abutments. The next fish that took the fly had the sort of heft that made me worry about logjams and boulders. It wasn’t until Matej netted this particular rainbow that I realized we were standing directly across the river from the lodge.

Peter W. Fong is the head guide for Mongolia River Outfitters. His stories and photographs have appeared in The Flyfish Journal, Gray’s Sporting Journal, High Country News, the New York Times, and many other publications. For information on Orvis trips to Mongolia, click here.