Midfjardara had a good solid start as seven salmon where landed on the first morning shift. As in other Icelandic rivers, the salmon started ascending earlier than usual and many pools on the river are already holding scores of fish.

Last summer British Colombian fly casting instructor April Vokey visited Iceland, first to run a girl school on Midfjardara, the next time generally to fish herself. She runs her own website, http://www.flygal.ca/ and she kindly allowed us to run her Iceland article on our website.

Our article below, reporting on Iceland‘s biggest salmon of the season of 2009 was found lacking and wanting. We recollected three 107-108 cm salmon. There were however two more we rather clumsily forgot! So here we go again....

The season has now ended on Midfjardara and they‘ll hardly see another season like it. The final total turned out to be an astonishing 4.004 salmon, 1.423 more then the previous record for the river, a record set more than thirty years ago.

Last Saturday, Midfjardara registerd a new exciting  twist to its stunning record. It has broken all shackles and is already a few hundred over the old record. The river has amassed a total of over 3.000 fish and we still have three weeks to go!

While the draughts have ravished the westland rivers, several of the northern rivers have blossomed and some of them wil record record catches this season. Among them is the Midfjardara, the first river this season to register  a record catch.

Many Icelandic rivers are brimming with salmon this year although some weeks of draughts have dropped their levels and slowed the fishing down. One of the AnglingIceland.is staff visited Midfjardara recently with our new waterprrof camera.....

Amidst the constant news of great grilse runs in most of Icelands north coast river this season, it should no be forgotten that there are quite a few msw‘s being caught as well. Recently the biggest so far this season from Midfjardara was brought to the beach.

“This is definitely better than we were anticipating. In fact this is almost to good to be true. The fishing is amazing, yet the conditions are far from favorable, so that makes it even bettar,” Rafn Valur Alfreðsson, outfitter of Midfjardara told us today, the most recent group of clients had just left the river having landed 218 salmon!

Midfjardara has been on fire over the past recent days and yesterday was the biggest day so far as far as the statistics are concerned. The ten rods landed 60 salmon and lost at least the same number as the fish were coming to hitched flies in receeding water. One rod actually landed 27!

Midfjardara has been ticking along nicely yet the water levels have been dropping so things could be beter. At least there are substantial numbers of fish in the rivers and new arrivals entering every day. Due to the lack of water, hitching with minute flies is giving the best results.

Midfjardara had a very ssolid start to the season, four were landed in the first day, today, and several were hooked and lost as the starting anglers found fish in various pools. In the evening witnesses saw a pod of grilse enter a pool on the lower Vestura, so they are obviously running.

Late next month, female fly fishermen will have the pleasure of April Vokey‘s girls school on Midfjardara . April is a 26 year old Canadian woman who, despite her young age, has vast experience as a self educated fly fisherman and fisihing guide. She also has a bussiness venture, which can be seen on www.flygal.ca. We asked Vokey for an interview, and got it.

Rafn Valur Alfreðsson, the outfitter of Midfjardara has put forward a new slogan that he and his people use as a benchmark for the future: „Wild is the future“. It is a combination of new marketing and a strong belief in how things should be done.

British Colombian fly fishing teacher April Vokey will be a feature on the Midfjardara this summer as the rivers outfitter Fishing and Hunting Destinations, www.fhd.is has put up a fly fishing shool on the river, exclusively for women.

The Atlantic salmon season of 2009 is fast building on the horizon. And it comes on the back of such a stunning record season that hardly anybody knows what to expect this year. But for the most part people have concluded that the coming season has a considerable margin for slipping from 2008 without losing a label of excellence.

Midfjardara had one of its best seasons for years in 2008, establishing a total catch of 1.731 salmon compared to 1.131 in 2007. To put this into a better perspective, the ten year average total from the river is 1.176, so close to the total in 2007. The 2008 total is far higher than the average. The record for the river was not under threat though, it stands at 2.385 salmon.