Well my visit to Yateley was an enjoyable one albeit slightly exhausting!

I left home at 6am to go and pick Aaron ''Lead Shed'' up from Colchester, the trip was an easy one and I arrived at Aaron's front door at 8am, after a "posh coffee" as Aaron called it, we hit the road to do battle with the M25 and M3.

After only a few delays we arrived at Yateley Angling Centre at about 11:30am, we picked up our pre-booked tickets and headed straight to the South Lake.

On our arrival we were greeted by a very busy lake and with only a handful of swims available we certainly had our work cut out, we did manage to find the fish, although as soon as the weather changed they soon drifted off and with no swims free to move to we just had to sit tight.

I set up in the "Ladders" and Aaron next door in the "Channel", we had a good number of fish in front of us so felt confident of a take, the rods were soon sorted and we sat back to enjoy a long awaited social and some fine cuisine not to mention some very heavy rain, Aaron cooked up an animal of a Curry......we both regretted it after though as we crawled to our bed chairs to rest our now stretched stomachs!

It didn't take long for me to get into the land of nod and before I knew it the alarm on my phone was going off, that will be 5:30am then! I put the kettle on and rolled a smoke, it was still raining!

I received a few big liners at 7am, I was hovering over the rods expecting a take at anytime but unfortunately it never came. It was great to finally fulfil my lifelong ambition to fish The Yateley Complex after reading about it for so many years, I shall definitely be back to fish one of the other ''special'' waters.

By 8:30am the heavy rain had now turned to light drizzle and we took this opportunity to pack up before we hit the road again this time to drive to Kent to pick up some bait fromActive Bait Solutions.

After being greeted by Paul and having a well deserved coffee and a catch up we got back on the road Colchester bound to drop Aaron off although we did have a slight detour to get some grub as we were both starving!

After dropping Aaron off, I got straight back on the road and headed home and walked through my front door a little after 8pm.

Whilst on the way home I noticed a lake situated right next to the A428, now I've always known about it but never really took any notice, but with the sun setting over its banks it looked very idyllic and once home I did a bit more research and found the info I wanted, definitely one to keep an eye on this one.

I intend on doing an overnighter on "Heron" tomorrow,that's if it isn't too busy we will see maybe its time to head back to the Beds Pit......I was going to leave that until the Autumn but may well have to get back on sooner.

Time to get the gear sorted again, if you're on the banks this weekend be lucky and I hope you have a fish that makes your dreams come true.

Until next time,

Smithy

Apologies for the lack of activity in the last week, its been pretty hectic to say the least!

Firstly, I decided at the last minute to chuck the gear in the van and fly down the M5 Clovelly bound to see my Dad and also have a dabble on a very attractive venue that I spent a bit of time on whilst living in the South West.

I had a great Journey down and completed it in a little over 4 hours which isn't bad for a Friday afternoon, on arrival it was the usual ritual of meeting Dad and jumping straight into the pub then stumbling out sometime early the following morning.

I awoke Saturday morning feeling a lot worse than when I went to bed, strange that I felt great the night before must of been the pillow!

I very slowly got myself organised and made my way to the lake, it was lovely to see the place again, its been years since I've graced those banks.

It didn't take me long to get sorted and soon enough two rods were dispatched to the far bank, very accurately as well considering my condition!

An a hour or so later, I was just tying up another rig ready when my hand slipped and I embedded a Size 7 Barbed Fox SSC straight into my finger, I then spent 30 Min's trying to tease it out......but had no joy so I just bit the bullet and gave it a big pull and out she popped, flesh and all!

Following the incident I decided to move as not much was showing in front of me, so I loaded the up the barrow and went for a mooch.

It didn't take me long to find the fish, I located them doing circuits of a reed bed at the far end of the lake, two "Magic" PVA bags were put on their patrol routes, I sat back and rolled a smoke......by this point my head had got a little less hazy and I started to feel more like myself again, but for how long I didn't know....you can never tell once you are in the deepest darkest Devonshire country side!

Out of the blue my left hand rod melted off, I lifted into it and felt the solid pull of a good fish when all of a sudden the hook pulled, I was gutted! The rod was soon back on the spot and I awaited action.....I didn't have to wait long as the left hand rod was away again, this fish decided to go through every reed bed in the corner of the lake, I thought I had lost it a few times but after a bit of a struggle and having to wade out up to my waist in silt I had an immaculate upper double common in the net, photos were soon done and she was returned to her watery home.

I decided to call it a day, I had a great few hours fishing so headed back to the village to have a nice dinner and a pint or 2 before having an early night as I was driving home the following morning.

The drive home was great and I did it again in a little over 4 hours, I had a few website bits to do as well as catch up with some photographic work before an interview the following day on the Monday.

Which brings us pretty much up to date, I got the call today (Wednesday) saying that I got the job so took my wife and son out to have a joint celebration as its her birthday too!

Tomorrow will see me heading down to the Famous Yateley Complex in Hampshire with Aaron from the "Lead shed" to have a quick 24 hour session on the South Lake, to say I'm excited is a big understatement, having never set eyes on the historic complex before. I can't wait and will be sure to have the camera clicking away for the duration of my stay and will hopefully land a fish or two as well!

Before I go I must mention how saddened I was when I heard the terrible news about the death of all the fish in "The Mere" including The Black Mirror, its been an awful year for fish deaths lets just hope this is the last of it.

Right time to sign off and get the kit sorted, I will report back in a few days.

Be lucky,

Smithy

Well I did manage to grace the bank for a few hours today, I arrived in the Island car park at mid day.

I got a bucket of mixers out of the van and set off in hot pursuit of my prey, I decided to have a quick look in the "Fridge" on Heron lake as it's right next to "Island" and is the first swim you come to between the two lakes.

I was greeted by quite a few fish, the majority of which looked well over 20 lb, I fired out a few mixers and watched as one was slurped down straight away, perfect!

I fired out a few more handfuls then popped round "Island" to get an update on the latest captures from "Brownie" and to see if there was anything worth putting a bait to on "Island".

After a quick chat it was quite clear that there wasn't much occurring on "Island" other than Gav's capture of the stunning "Plastic Linear" at 28 lb+ well done Flex!

I trotted back round to the van and got the kit before make the very short journey back to the "Fridge", I sat on a log and continued to flick baits out but they didn't seem anywhere near as interested as they did when I first arrived.

I continued to flick out a few mixers at a time for over two hours, the fish were still there but only ever taking the odd mixer, "not having it" you might say.

After another 20 minutes or so they seemed to get a bit more confident, I would have preferred to wait a bit longer but was worried the right time might pass, so I gently cast out beyond them before slowly drawing the bait back to the hot area.

Just as I did this, the wind turned and the swim looked dead, completely devoid of fish and then to top it all off the flying rats got scent of the mixers and swarmed over the area, I reeled in and spat my dummy out.

I decided to have a quick look at Island, and spent about an hour in a secluded corner of the lake trying to get them going but they just didn't seem interested, I threw in the towel and went back to the fridge with my tail firmly between my legs.

On my return to the fridge, it looked completely different to when I left, the flying rats had left and the fish had returned.

I started flicking mixers out again, just one or two at a time for about an hour, they seemed to be getting more confident by every pouchful, I could see a fish was taking very confidently down the right hand margin so I gently cast a bait onto it.

A minute or so later a pair of lips came up and engulfed the bait before causing an eruption as I lifted into it, after a short scrap in the heavily weeded corner of the lake she was soon in the net, I couldn't believe how easy it came in, I expected the weed to cause me much more trouble than it did.

I guessed she was about a low double but in reality the weight was immaterial to me, I had a quick picture before returning her to the crystal clear water of Heron Lake, I then left for home a happy man.

I spent all afternoon down the lake, but actually only fished for about 30 minutes, I've always known it's best to get them feeding confidently before putting a bait out, but have always struggled to sit on my hands for the right moment.

But since I realised the error of my ways, I've managed two fish on the bounce.......things are certainly coming together now.

Be Lucky,

Smithy