Plan a first fly-fishing trip to the Barrington River in NSW, a stocked rainbow trout stream whose small, weedy headwater creeks reward a short, accurate dry fly.
The Barrington is a NSW river where rainbow trout are stocked, and the reason to drive up is small-water dry-fly fishing that asks for accuracy more than distance.
Think of it as two kinds of water. At the top, small tributary creeks feed the upper river. Below them the river gathers into one channel and runs down to join a larger stream, the Gloucester River.
The first trip, and the easier one to plan, is the main river. Pick a way in from the access card, walk upstream and fish each pool with a buoyant dry, dropping a small nymph beneath it when nothing rises. In our experience the warmer months are the time to come. The rainbows here are stocked, so the fishing leans on those releases, and before you go read the current NSW guide, including its trout-water and closed-water lists, because that is what decides whether you can fish here on your dates.
The second trip is the small upper creeks, and it is the one to save for when you have fished tight water before. FlyLife’s writers describe these tributaries as weedy, with weed lanes that can leave you narrow gaps to fish at normal flow, and they describe Scotch broom along much of the river crowding the bank behind you. Bring a short rod, a roll cast and patience. The same trout-water check applies up here too.
If you only have a day, fish the main river and treat the creeks as a scouting walk. Carry a few sizes of the same dry rather than a box of patterns: on water this tight, getting the drift right matters more than the fly, and a fly you can see in broken light is worth more than an exact match.
Check the live card for the river level, read the NSW guide, and pack a small box of dries.