A Weekend to Remember

I was sitting at my desk idly dreaming of fishing when the phone rang and my boss uttered those chilling words.

“I’ve got some holiday next week. When do you want me to go?” I replied.

“You’ll need to go up on Monday afternoon and come back on Wednesday evening.”

“Okay.”

That was close! I could dash back down on Wednesday evening, pick Pete up in Ilkley on the way home and set off for the Kennet early on Thursday morning.

Sean’s 2lb 5oz roach (click for bigger picture)

Every year a group of us meet up to bid the old season farewell in an orgy of fishing and a bit of drinking. Okay, a bit of fishing and an orgy of drinking! This year’s trip was to the Kennet and the Hampshire Avon. No barbel in the stretches we were to fish, but plenty of big grayling, roach and pike. I’d got a weekend pass from her indoors, but the Glasgow trip as well was stretching things a bit. A bit of pleading and the pass was extended!

Its Wednesday night and I’m blasting down the long descent from Shap on the M6 …. what’s that? Brake hard, turn … bang! Bugger! I’d hit a lorry tyre which was lying in the middle lane. In the dark I hadn’t seen it until it was too late. Luckily the damage wasn’t too serious so after a temporary repair I was able to limp home, collecting Pete on the way. An hour in sub zero temperatures with some cable ties and I made the car safe for the long trip South. I crawled into bed just after midnight for some much needed sleep.

Next morning at 5.00 am with the car loaded with tackle and bait I climb into the driver’s seat. “Ouch!”

“What’s up?”

“I’ve pulled a muscle in my back.” Never mind it’ll get time to recover on the drive down. Famous last words!

Barton Court on the River Kennet is a superb fishery. It consists of a short length of the main river and a maze of hatch pools and feeders. You might remember that it featured in ‘A Passion for Angling’. During the summer it is run as a trout syndicate, but at the end of the trout season it opens for coarse fishing. It’s quite expensive (at least compared with Northern waters) at £ 12 a day, but it can be well worth it. We pulled up at the fishing hut at about 10.00 am and I climbed stiffly out of the car. The drive down hadn’t helped any, but my back wasn’t too bad. There were three anglers already on the fishery, plus me and Pete, with two of our party arriving later.

It was going to be hard. The air temperature was just above freezing, the sky was almost cloudless and the water was gin clear. I limped down to the bottom of the fishery out of the way of the others, crept up to a swim and started to feed sparingly. An hour later I made my first cast only for someone to walk down the far bank. Bugger!

I retreated to a small feeder and tried again. A dozen gudgeon later I gave it best and decided that pike were a better bet. My chosen method was to trot a deadbait down the edge, holding it back occasionally to allow it to flutter enticingly in the current. Half an hour of this saw a low double shoot out from the margins and nail my smelt. A short fight and I was struggling to lift it from the water. Ooh me back! 12lb 9oz of pristine pike was returned to the Kennet. The rest of the day passed uneventfully with a small jack for me and a few small fish for my companions. Dusk saw us heading for Hungerford and an excellent meal at the Lamb.

Friday passed without incident. With 10 of us on the fishery, and it still being cold and bright, fishing was harder than the Thursday. The highlight was a 4lb plus Golden Orfe to Dave Martin. We drove down to Salisbury in a blizzard, but thankfully it was fairly short-lived.

Saturday dawned cold and bright . The prospect of another grueller wasn’t helped by the fact that my back had given up the ghost. Must have been the weight of all that beer last night!

Fortified with a good breakfast and a couple of painkillers I drove to a day ticket stretch of the Hampshire Avon, upstream of Salisbury. Pete isn’t at his best in the mornings and even allowing for the fact that the other six people in our party were suffering from last night’s excesses we were the last to arrive. We had parked at the top of the fishery and our companions had spread out at about 100 yard intervals downstream. Now those of you who have fished the Avon know that some of the water meadows are criss-crossed with drainage ditches. This meadow was a bit like a chess board and after the first ditch my back declared that enough was enough and it refused to carry my gear any further. After a bit of pleading Pete shouldered my bag and I struggled downstream to where the river split in two. I collapsed into my chair opposite a couple of likely looking slacks on the far bank. This would have to do.

A few trial casts in the upper of the two slacks revealed that it wasn’t quite as deep as I first thought, but I gave it a go anyway. I mixed a small bucket of mash flavoured with Nash Cheesey Chops and a small amount of spicy appetite stimulator. While the bread was soaking I tackled up with my standard roach/chub set-up – 11ft 6in light feeder rod, 6lb Diawa Match Line, a small cage feeder and a size 12 hook to 4lb Reflo.

After an hour and a half without any action I moved down to the next slack. This was obviously deeper than the first one, but it was on the outside of a slight bend and the flow along the crease was very powerful. By keeping the rod very high I was able to just hold bottom at the back of the slack.

Half an hour later I had a good drop-back and proceeded to pull out of a decent roach in the heavy water as I played it back across the current. Two small chub followed then the swim died. I lobbed a smelt across and gave it an hour just in case a pike had paid a visit. No joy with the smelt so I went back to bread flake and cheesy mash. One thing I do when fishing flavoured mash is dip my fingers in it before squeezing on my flake. I don’t think that this makes the flake any more attractive, but I am convinced that the flavour masks any smell I may have on my fingers.

Pete paid me a visit as I made my second cast and as we were chatting I had a good drop-back. I struck into a decent fish and it plodded off up-stream in the heavy current. “Feels like a good roach.” I said.

It dropped back downstream and kited towards some weed under the near bank.”Nah its a Chub.”

I proceeded to drag it out of the weed and it finally became visible. “FCUK (I know this word is okay as I copied it off the wife’s t-shirt!) me its a bloody huge Roach!”

Pete didn’t take me up on my offer, but he did net the fish. A careful weighing at 2lb 5oz and a few quick photos and I returned her carefully to the water.

An hour later, high on roach and painkillers I floated back to the car with Pete gamely plodding beside me with my bag.

We decided not to fish the next day and after breakfast we made a dash back up North in time to catch the Rugby League Challenge Cup tie between St Helens and Bradford Bulls. And just to cap off a weekend to remember Saints won a pulsating match.