I was in no rush to get down to the lake on Saturday morning, I knew it was busy but a swim I fancied was going to be free around lunch time so with that I attempted to have a bit of a lay in but ended up being awoken by the kids earlier than in the week!
So with that after several strong cups of coffee to bring me back to the land of the living I headed down to the lake a little after 10am.
Upon my arrival it was quite clear that the lake was stitched up with only 1 or 2 swims vacant, neither of which really took my fancy.
I loaded the barrow up and headed round the lake towards the woods, the ground had dried out nicely after a week of good weather and the usual battle through the mud was surprisingly quite easy even with my dodgy knee!
After 5 minutes I arrived in the woods swim to find Mark and David beginning to pack up, we must have chatted for well over an hour catching up on the goings on through the week and spoke excitedly about the week we all had booked off beginning next weekend.
It was now about mid-day, the swim I wanted was now vacant so I began getting the rods sorted for the night ahead, all 3 rods were fishing on running chod’s and baited with Odyssey XXX and they were all placed at about 40 yards range into light weed, I then scattered about 200 baits over the top.
The temperature was really picking up now so I decided not to bother putting the Oval up until darkness fell, so I lay the bedchair out and fired up the Coleman for a brew.
David had decided to stick it out for a few more hours; he was desperate to open his account so I understood his reluctance to call it a day.
Just after 5pm though David had to head for home, he bid me farewell and wished me luck!
The lake was beginning to quieten down and a few more anglers had decided to pack up for whatever reason.
As darkness descended I couldn’t help but feel confident, the conditions looked perfect! I sat up until about 11pm to see if anything gave the game away, I heard a couple of rolls in front of me which boosted my confidence even more, eventually though the mist began to roll in across the lake towards me so I said a little prayer to the carp gods and got in the bag and soon after fell into a deep carp filled dream.
I was awoken from my dreams by the sound of the right hand Neville singing it’s merry tune, I was out of the bag and on the rod in a flash almost forgetting to put my boots on!
I lifted straight into the fish and felt solid resistance, however after that it was pretty much like reeling in a sack of spuds and in less than a minute I had the fish under control on the surface before gently pulling the culprit over the net cord.
I switched my head torch on and had a quick peek in the net; it was a stunning Little Linear full of character and one of the future ‘A Team’ for sure!
I secured the net in the edge whilst I zeroed the sling and got the camera kit ready, there was nobody else near me so it was going to have to be a dreaded self-take!
Once sorted I retrieved the fish from the margins and transferred it into the sling before hoisting it up on the Reuben’s, the needle settled on 18.08, I was chuffed to bits to continue my run of good fortune but I did ask my last catch for its’ mum and dad last time, not its’ little sister!
She was a beauty though, I held her up blurry eyed for a self-take then returned the little cracker to her watery home.
I got the rod sorted, re curved the chod and re sharpened the hook before putting it back out on the spot followed by 100 baits over the top, I thought that as I was awake I may as well have a coffee and see British Summer Time in.
I got back in the bag at about 03:30am but couldn’t sleep at all, it felt like I had been laying there for hours but when I looked at my phone it read 04:10am so I thought to myself I may as well get up to witness the first dawn of spring.
The dawn didn’t disappoint either, it was glorious and it felt magical to see it. It was a proper carpy morning if ever I saw one, everything was beginning to come together and I felt confident that this was going to be a very good year indeed.
The mist began to clear at about 7am and as it did I received an absolute flier on the middle rod, I lifted into it but was met with no resistance, I am pretty certain that the culprit was one of the many Pike that inhabit the water picking up my line.
The rod was placed back out on the spot with little effort so I fired up the Coleman which was being a bit temperamental and sent a few texts and tweets out to friends.
The morning flew by and before I knew it my phone read 10am which was when I was planning on packing up but I had seen a couple of shows over my middle rod so decided to sit it out another hour to see if anything materialised but unfortunately it never did.
It was about 11:30am when I eventually started packing up and it was an extremely hard decision to bring the rods in but I had to be home early afternoon to get a few things done before work.
So exhausted but extremely happy I made the barrow journey back to the van before making my way home.
I will be heading down to the lake throughout the week to keep an eye on it and trickle some bait in then shall be back down with the gear in tow Sunday lunch time ready for my 4 or 5 night session, so with a bit of luck my next piece will be full of big fish and a good story to tell.
Until then,
Smithy