Bad Lauterberg im Harz and the Oder River

Upper section of the Oder

Lesson #1 when you’re traveling by train to a fishing destination: make sure the train stop is relatively near where you actually intended to fish.

5+ kilometers. I didn’t account for 5+ km. I’d have to trek to get from the “Bad Lauterberg im Harz Barbis” train station to, well, Bad Lauterberg. Now, I can hear some of you saying, “5 km? That’s not much. I walked twice that much every day to school and back.” Well, kudos to you. I just wanted to hop of a train and fish.

So, I hopped off a train, walked a few miles and began to fish. My destination river was the Oder. It flows at a frigid temperature out of a dam below the Oderstausee. Before I could do so, though, I went and bought my permission form for the river at Freie Tankstelle R. Mävers…I also bought a pack of Schlümpfe. Who could resist? From there I dropped off my pack at the nearby Pension. [I stayed at Pension Haus Kempe, but there are places to stay littered throughout the area.] I only had a few hours of fishing on the river, so I jumped into the river just below the foot bridge at Hotel Revita (I hiked across the Kurpark to get there) and fished up to the upper boundary of the river near Hotel Panoramic.

First thing to know about the Oder: It’s cold. No, it’s freezing cold. I’ve been doing all my fishing in Germany with sandals/shorts/pants, and this water tested every ounce of fortitude I had. Cold, freezing cold. And apparently this is the feature of the river that makes Bad Lauterberg’s park not just a park, but a “Kurpark.”

Wading Pool at the upper boundary of the fishing section

Through the years, people have come to wade in the freezing cold water, which is somehow healing? (Yes, I plan to use freezing cold every time I write about the water temp. It was freezing cold.) The signs for the various wading apparatuses warned people to only spend 30 seconds in the water. 30 seconds. I spent a few hours, and I’m expecting that every second over 30 was to my benefit. Every. Second.

The fishing was good. I tied on an Adams dry and used it all day. The river is too small to naturally produce large fish (although I could be wrong), but there’s a healthy number of browns and brooks that call it home. Add to this the fact that the upper section offers about 300 meters of scenic wooded fishing, and it was well worth the trip.

I caught a good number of 10 inchers. Walking the river down through the town, there is a spill-dam, which collects a few trout. They were the largest trout I saw in the river. Nothing over 12 inches. And at this particular dam it appears water gets diverted from the river. The flow thereafter dramatically drops, and walking it a bit convinced me the lower portion wasn’t worth my time.

All in all, it was a great, relaxing afternoon.