Lake Thingvallavatn, Iceland

Over the centuries these trout have adapted to the deep crystaline mineral rich waters to become the super-predators of the lake growing to enormous sizes. Numerous springs filter through the lava rock in the bottom of the lake accounting for 90 percent of the water which feeds it. As a result most of the lake maintains a constant temperature of around 3 or 4 degrees thoughout the year. This in turn allows the Thingvallavatn trout to maintain their metabolism levels up and remain active even throughout the winter. Additionally after their hunting sprees these trout are known to congregate in geothermic areas where hot springs filter into the lake raising water temperatures even further accelerating their metabolism in order to quickly digest the fish they have eaten. With such an abundance of food and their unique biological circumstances it is no wonder that Lake Thingvallavatn brown trout grow so large.

The average size of Lake Thingvallavatn brown trout runs about seven or eight pounds, however, fish in the 30 pound plus range are not entirely uncommon. Given that these fish may live up to 15 years they have a long time to reach such proportions. Every year during the Spring these beasts emerge from the depths of the lake to hunt the shores for recently hatched char fry. This is undoubtedly the best time to tempt these fish with a fly from the shore of the lake. Although most of the trout will be caught on streamers in late spring there will also be times in which anglers may have success dry fly fishing. PescaTravel arranges fishing on several private beats which include the hottest spots on Lake Thingvallavatn where rods are very limited. Among these is the famous Ion Beat where the highest concentrations of large browns are found during the spring time or the .