Experience the beauty of Tasmania

Fly fishing here with Miena Village Guiding is a fantastically novel and cinematic experience – and people from all over the world flock to experience the Highlands’ abundant wild trout fishery.

You could easily spend weeks here exploring the never-ending chains of tarns and hiking through the dramatic wilderness: whiling away your nights parked up by a roaring pub fire, snug in a rustic fishing cabin or camping out on the land.

Explore: https://weareexplorers.co/fly-fishing-tasmania/

Who we are:

Miena Guiding Tasmania has been operating in the fly fishing guiding space for over twenty five years initially as Rainbow Lodge Tasmania, then shortly as Miena Village Guiding, and following a rebranding launch in 2025, going forward we are Miena Guiding Tasmania.

Our bush walking guiding has also been operating since approximately 2015 where we were known as Wildside Tours Tasmania and are also now known as Miena Guiding Tasmania, thus coming into our tenth guiding year, as a walking company.

Jason Garrett, some times known as Junior, has lived, worked and played in the Central Highlands since he was ten. Passionate about regional Tasmania, Jason now calls Miena home and works with a dedicated team of guides to provide a seamless tour outing for both fisherpeople, bushwalkers and hikers. A quick bio goes something like this:

•  Born and raised in Papua New Guinea until the age of ten where Jason first learnt to fly fish in the mid 1970’s;
• Moved to Derwent Bridge, Tasmania, where he spent his school holidays fishing the upper reaches of the Derwent river, swimming in Lake St. Clair and climbing Mt.Rufus, the first Abel Jason climbed back before it was called an Abel;
• At the age of 14, moved to London Lakes, Tasmania where he first started guiding fishing clients on his father’s international renowned fly fishing estate
• Educated in Hobart, including University, Jason travelled around Australia working in the gas industry for ten years and returned to Tasmania to live in Hobart in 2000 where by his passion for bushwalking, fly fishing and the Central Highlands saw him most weekends travelling to the Highlands whilst not working in the corporate sector
• Competition fly fishing and long distance running were Jason’s sport of choice, other than his Mighty Hawks, and he has run, fished and competed all over the world for over twenty years.
• For those who know Jason he is not built for long distance running, Jason’s latest challenge has been climbing Abels in Tasmania, where he has currently completed 35 of the 138 possible pinnacles. kunanyi/Mt Wellington holds a special place in Jason’s heart and it is his fascination with this mountain, that has lead him to explore the high peaks across Tasmania
• In 2019, Jason finally took the ultimate plunge and along with a business partner, created the Miena Village, home of the Great Lake Hotel and Great Lake General Store and Miena Village Guiding team, and thus returned to his roots in the Central Highlands to live, and the third generation to do so.

Since late 2024, we are a guiding tour company focussed on providing exceptional guiding experiences and this can include accommodation if requested, and we often package up customised arrangements for most of our experiences if requested, with relationships with all the major accommodation providers,  particular in the Central Highlands. Our walking and fishing experiences are across the State so that wherever you are considering your adventure, we can find the right experience for you, so give us a shout.

We are proudly Tasmanian, we are proudly local, and we are proudly Highlanders!

Acknowledgement of Country

yingina/Great Lake is a place of ancient stories from deep time. This is the country of ‘teen toomele menennye’, the Big River people.

Through our actions and love of this land we respect the ancestors and elders and practise truth telling. We celebrate the future as we imagine what might be. We are caretakers of this place, custodians, We are a small chapter in a long dreaming.

FAQs

Seasonality – Tasmania generally has a long cold winter; a wet and windy spring; balmy summer days and nights, and wonderful calm autumn days.

Walking in winter can be wonderfully adventurous in knee deep snow, but can turn hazardous very quickly, so we recommend late spring to early autumn for the best walking months ( late October to end of March). One must always be prepared for inclement weather in Tasmania, so layers of appropriate clothing are a must.

Fishing – Fly fishing whilst it is envisaged that we can fish it all year round, in Tasmania there are some quieter months, particularly the spawning months of May, June and July. Streamer fishing is the method of choice in early and late season being August, September, March and April, whereas dry fly competes with the best of them in October, November, December, January, February and March, a period where sight fishing on the shallow lagoons is world class given the right conditions.