21st
December 2019
It feels like it’s rained for forty days and forty nights
and for the first time in a very long time my local river is in proper flood,
it’s in the fields where it shouldn’t be and hammering through where it should.
Hopefully a few years of accumulated
silt and debris will be moved and the river will be more approachable in
future? It’s that time of year when the
world goes mad and I need a bit of time by the water to forget all the bullshit
but free time shrinks and to be honest I’ve fished hard up until now and I need
a rest. When the festive fuckery is
finished I’ll be well up for getting afloat.
I’d had a hankering to get my bank kit out again and
recently found a reason to visit a gravel pit that I’ve fished rarely over the
years. I remembered clear, weedy water,
comfortable swims, a few blanks but also a couple of big Pike. I’d forgotten a railway line, a busy road and
industrial units and I’d also forgotten the big reed beds made covering water
very difficult in most of the swims. I just
ignored the carp anglers. The day was
wet and windy meaning I had to carry more kit that I like, this and the carp
anglers meant moves were reduced to just one. I haven’t fished anywhere so accessible in a
few years and I’d completely forgotten how much I dislike what is for most, the
‘normal’ angling experience. I blanked,
didn’t enjoy it so won’t be rushing back.
Other than that December has been a quieter month, tough
going at the special place but a few Pike have obliged at other out of the way
places. I’ll probably have another day
afloat to soothe myself from the assault of society before the year ends;
hopefully the day is not too far away.
29th
December 2019
A few days respite from work, eating too much, drinking too
much, you know the rest… The Christmas
bollocks always makes me grumpy but once it gets here I enjoy the good
bits. We did get out of the house a few
times but two weeks without wetting a line is way too long so I had to take the
opportunity before stumbling back into the work days. I was up before the alarm despite being into
a lazy routine but dragging a teenage son out of his bed was more
challenging. We left home around 0700,
for once the cross county roads were quiet; as was the car, Isaac was
practically mute beside me. I even
turned the stereo down for once, blasting Royksopp out didn’t seem to fit well
on this Sunday morning.
It was 0800 before we made our first casts; we used two rods
each, fishing deadbaits near and far banks and also shared a fifth rod which
drifted a bait down with the gentle current.
We’d picked a decent mild day with a light south westerly breeze which
unusually wasn’t sweeping rain clouds towards us. For the first time in a very long time I
actually fished beneath glimpses of a blue sky, with the boat tucked into the
reeds we were sheltered and comfortable.
The water had a downstream ripple and was well coloured, unsurprising
with all the rain we’ve had.
We’d hardly got settled before I heard the sound of vehicles
and a few minutes later a couple of Pikers were walking the banks. With a mile long stretch to go at they just
had to set themselves up right opposite us, friendly enough but noisy. Even our unsubtle recasts couldn’t dissuade
them. It didn’t help that Isaac’s
upstream rod started travelling, as we couldn’t hide the commotion of a nice
fish fighting hard coming to the net, one nil to my son. Our neighbours were slow to set up but
definitely weren’t going anywhere, they probably guessed we’d be moving at some
point and wanted to wait it out.
Time passed without any action but there were definitely
Pike at home, three or four decent sized swirls giving their presence
away. It would have been silly to move
with fish showing; our neighbours were fishing the margins. We spotted an Egret fly over and a Kestrel
hovered downstream, the wind rattled the reeds.
Around 0915 my downstream rod was on the move but the bait was dropped
before I wound down. I chucked it back
into the same spot and a few minutes later it was heading for mid river once
again. This time it didn’t stop and I
bent into a surprising weight that dragged the rod down and upstream. After this initial surge of energy it was
soon plodding and brought into the net.
I didn’t want to make a fuss but this was a nice chunky fish in good
nick and well worth weighing so out came the scales and a pleasing weight
recorded,. We were being watched so I
slipped it back without a photo then regretted it straight away. After that I gave up and moved downstream, am
I anti-social or paranoid? Perhaps both
but an isolated piece of water and the only other two humans around had to fish
so fucking close! Even in the out of the
way places I’ll always have to contend with other Pikers, at least here
everything else is close to perfect.
Our first move was a short one but an hour without a fish was
too long so we were off again, soon settled with the rods scattered again. Today Isaac was without a phone or any
electronic gadgetry so the chatter flowed; there are many more mutual topics of
conversation as he gets older. But for
the next hour most of the chat was fishy as we’d dropped onto some Pike. I started things off with a thin, otter
ravaged fish that should have been a double then quickly followed it with a
shorter, fatter Pike that was. Both took
smelts fished tight to the downstream bank.
Isaac lost a fish on a bait cast mid stream then I had a dropped take on
the margin rod again. A few minutes
later the smelt on the same rod was on the move again and I soon boated another
fat fish but the smallest of the day so far.
It was 4-1 to Dad but Isaac was taking it well, even so I made him
recast the rod so it was now his, as was the shared rod. I wanted him to catch another even if he
wasn’t fussed. The next take didn’t take long but this time it was Isaac’s rod
cast upstream. He wound into it and
thankfully it stayed hooked. We soon had
our sixth fish of the day and as the camera hadn’t yet been out I decided it
should.
Had we stayed on I’m sure we’d have continued to find fish but
we’d only planned a short trip and by now it was midday so we decided enough
was enough. Back in the car and back on
the road home, Happy Mondays playing on the stereo, I’m not sure if I have one
of those in store…
So that was my last day of fishing in 2019, a year that has
followed the usual pattern of successful and hugely enjoyable Pike fishing at
the beginning and end, sandwiching a few months of catching bugger all of note
whilst the sun shines. I know why this
is and my last two trips of the year remind me why I can’t change my ways, too
much.
Other than fishing I’ve endured another year of addiction to
our cricket team which has become even more unpredictable than Pakistan at
their maddest moments. The World cup win
was torturous and only enjoyable after the match had ended but the feeling when
Buttler broke the stumps… It wasn’t just
the tournament, the four years of brilliant ODI cricket deserved reward. But the test team drive me mad and I keep
coming back to the captain. The Ashes
were brilliant though and that afternoon at Headingly was as good as I’ve ever
experienced, albeit by TMS.
And we’ve seen a load of live music this year too, mostly
good. Starting with Fucked up, there was
Fat White Family (twice), Paul Weller, Primal Scream (twice), Stereophonics,
Underworld, Hawkwind and many others that slip my mind. Eels are always a highlight and we saw them
play in Nottingham but best of all might have been Loyle Carner at Latitude.
My fishing highlight?
Well it will definitely be a Pike because I’ve caught bugger all else over
the last twelve months. Seeing both my
children catch Pike this year has been lovely, Isaac has been doing it fairly
regularly for a few years now but Maddie’s was her first for almost a decade. For myself an unusually prolific day on a
headbanger of a water which started with a couple of nice fish from my first
stop followed later in the day by a fish I’ve happily? avoided catching for
forty years. She fought like she was
furious and I was sure she was bigger but for the first time my scales stopped
at 19.15. I might have been disappointed
for a second or two but it’s just a number and that Pike wasn’t the biggest of
2019.
At some point during the last year I realised it was actually forty years since I caught my first Pike, forty fucking years? The first was caught from an idyllic weirpool on my local River Gipping on a live Gudgeon in August 1979. It's been a few years since I've had a Pike from this river and the last Gudgeon landed has fallen from my memory. There's two worthy challenges for the fishing year ahead.
So 2020. How the fuck
did that happen? Happy New Year.
