A week or so to go until Christmas Day and I’ve yet to scrape the early morning frost off the windscreen, of course that could be because the past couple of weeks have seen me laid up in bed fast asleep as the dawn broke, but even so it’s still reasonably mild and I’m not about to complain.
Well that’s not entirely true, I am about to moan because one of the drawbacks of living in a location where I see more sheep than people is that whenever I venture back to London whatever bugs, viruses and modern day ills are lurking about, I’m sure to pick them up – they always get to me first before I even think about getting the jab!
So to the point, my annual dose of man flu has put paid to my barbel fishing this past month.
On our way down to London we stopped off at my pal Steve’s cottage in the lovely village of Weston in Hertfordshire, after many years living in Enfield he finally made the move further out to a wonderful thatched cottage that simply oozes charm. I’ve known Steve since I was eleven years old, that’s a long time, more than half a century in fact, it’s fair to say we’re really good mates!
Now for those of you who can, allow yourself to drift back in time, catch a wave of nostalgia to a place far removed from where we all find ourselves today, back to an innocent bygone era when we were holding on to the last throes of childhood before adolescence kicked in. The time when we were growing’ up.
My introduction to fishing came on the Lea Valley gravel pits and the Navigation Canal that ran through Tottenham. When your birthday falls on the 16 June, apart from being born to fish, when your dad enjoys casting a line, there’s only one place you’re likely to be opening your presents and that’s down by the water!
Living in Tottenham I was not exactly close to a river and kids like me had no spare change for the required journey by trolley bus or train to get to the hallowed grounds of Cheshunt and Broxbourne.
Unless dad took me it was back to playing football and cricket and getting up to the kind of mischief short-trousered, rolled down socks and shirt hanging out boys all enjoyed back in the late fifties. Nevertheless the seeds of interest had been well and truly sown and when the opportunity arose to widen my fishing horizons I made sure I grabbed it with both hands.
By some amazing stroke of luck I managed to pass the eleven plus, remember that one? This pleased my dad no end because like so many of his generation he was denied the chance to go to Grammar School and he was far cleverer than I have ever been. However there was a downside, I was the only one out of my group of pals who passed and that meant going to the new school and having to start all over again.
And that’s where I first met Steve and, just like me, he enjoyed fishing. He lived in Edmonton and was much closer to the canal than I was; trips to Pickett’s Lock on our bikes quickly took over from twenty a side kickabouts over Tottenham Rec.
Float fishing for bleak and it was all about how many, playing the numbers game back in ‘62! And if a Gobio gobio came along to pay us a visit that counted double, and a dace? Well that counted treble and heaven forbid a goer roach, then we were losing count and in our own fishing heaven!
The much loved and abused tank aerial had by now given way to a roach pole and I had even learnt the art of baitdropping, I was moving on up.
Steve was, and still is, the only male I have ever met who has never had the slightest interest in football, I mean none whatsoever, [Hang on Steve, you’ve known me a good few years now and I don’t either! Ed] even when Tottenham were winning the Double and European trophies, Steve was oblivious to it all, this meant he had spent a lot more time fishing in his childhood days than I did and he had even been to the Norfolk Broads.
And that is why Dick, Fred and Peter found themselves up in Norfolk ensconced in a caravan no bigger than a shoebox barely fit for human habitation, hidden away at the end of a track in a farmer’s field miles from anywhere. It was dark there, the moon was certainly the only light we saw but we were safe in the knowledge that Hickling Broad was close by and the fishing was going to be something else.
The names are important, Steve was Fred, Gary, the third member of our boyhood triumvirate was Dick and I was Peter, our heroes…Fred J. Taylor, Dick Walker and Peter Stone.
We had read every book they had written, I can still remember the pain when paying my fine at the local library for keeping Angling in Earnest, Walker’s Pitch and Bream and Barbel out for far too long!
We were very keen but had to endure the financial constraints of the period that befitted our age. Paper rounds, delivering groceries, and cutting cheese in Sainsbury’s, anything to make a few bob, times were hard!
My abiding memories of that short moment in time when we three apprentice anglers ventured forth on our own rites of passage into the world of Arthur Ransome?
Rowing across the wide expanse of Hickling Broad in a gale force wind and pouring rain, we were young, strong and nothing got in our way!
Catching lots of stunning golden flanked rudd as we cast our breadflake tight up to the reeds, watching intently as the fish moved between the stems and then, the float dipped…pure magic.
The competitions held nightly to see who could emit the loudest or longest accompanying noise to the unpleasant smells that followed the usual cook up of baked beans. I can visualise it as I write, not a pretty sight!
Visiting Lathams at Potter Heigham and seeing the photos that covered every square inch of the walls, the enormous catches of bream and rudd and bemoaning the fact that we could just afford a couple of bags of Spratts groundbait…
Parents would no doubt be locked up if they let their lads loose on a holiday like that today, all I can say is the subsequent more organised trips on Hoseasons’ cruisers and Blake’s houseboats never captured the halcyon moments we three experienced in our little ole caravan during the long days of the summer of ‘62.
Back in North London we spread our wings eastwards to the Walthamstow Reservoirs where we caught huge numbers of perch on lobworms, livebaits and Mepps spinners. Nothing huge but plenty over a pound and to us that was huge!
Roach as well fell to our sophisticated long range legered breadflake, we had kept up to speed with the going methods on Barn Elms where the fish were much bigger.
Our tackle had improved along with our knowledge, part time jobs and presents from mum and dad meant that Apollo Taperflashes, Mark IV’s and, for me, The Peter Stone Legerstrike were now in our armoury and with Efgeeco tackle boxes and holdalls we looked the real deal, although we were still only into our mid-teens.
We started night fishing at the Warren Pond in Chingford and caught lots of tench on freelined breadpaste and we joined a club and that one pivotal move opened up the door to something that would impact hugely on my life and stay with me for the next fifty years!
Joining a club in the London area meant that even as a junior member I had access to a prized piece of paper, the LAA card, and this would lead us to the Old River Lea in Wormley and to barbel!
My first visit was a real eye-opener, I watched an obviously experienced angler expertly casting to the far bank and catching fish pretty much every cast. I observed and learnt and made sure that on my next visit I would have the magic bait – cheesepaste – and I too would then experience what to me seemed fabulous fishing.
All through that school summer holiday I spent many days setting off from home before daybreak laden with gear to ensure I caught the first train to Cheshunt and was thus able to meet up with Steve as the train pulled in to Lower Edmonton station.
Our destination fell halfway between Cheshunt and Broxbourne stations and that meant there was one heck of a walk when we disembarked but it didn’t bother us in those days. We were out to catch barbel, chub and roach!
I had yet to realise how much better it was to fish for barbel with a ‘pin, that was to come a couple of years later after my first visit to the Royalty, so my Legerstrike was teamed up with an Intrepid Regent and at the business end a drilled bullet was stopped twelve inches from a Goldstrike size 8 loaded with a walnut-sized ball of cheesepaste.
A cast upstream to the far bank, the closer the better, and a roll through the swim produced lots of chub, roach and barbel and do you know what? The biggest barbel rarely weighed more than a pound! But boy could they pull.
It did not take long for us to find out about Kings Weir, hardly surprising as it was no more than 100 yards or so upstream of where we were fishing. The barbel there seemed to be that little bit bigger and rolling pieces of Unox luncheon meat or sausage through the lush Ranunculus at the tail of the weir did the trick.
I’m sure I must have seen Fred Crouch at the weir but we would have passed like ships in the night and twenty years would elapse before our paths crossed again.
The spell had been cast and, although I didn’t fully appreciate it at the time, I was just having fun. Little did I realise the impact those barbel would have on me in the years ahead. Within a year or two the three of us had directed our attentions elsewhere, you know the sort of thing, Tottenham Royal, The Blues Room, Manor House…happy days.
The seventies arrived, the three amigos entered wedded bliss and we lost touch with Gary but Steve and I maintained our friendship and we have experienced many highs and lows over the years; watched our respective families grow up but, surprisingly, it’s just me that kept on fishing.
This past summer Steve met up with Gary, he too lives in a cottage set deep in the Suffolk countryside and he too had lost interest in fishing. But just to show what a small world it is at times Gary’s brother has made a name for himself in the world of underwater photography and has worked with John Bailey on some of his books, so the fishing connection sort of carried on!
But Steve and I have set a day and this coming summer we’ll get out on the river together once again, fifty years down the line, and no matter what happens we’ll rekindle those boyhood memories that time can never erase. I’m looking forward to it.
So there you have it, a piece of nostalgia that I hope touches a chord in everyone who goes fishing, enduring friendship is what we remember and what is truly important.
For the first time that I can recall it will be just me and my better half at home on Christmas Day, but no matter, that means more turkey for me. Boxing Day sees us journey back down south for a few days and then it’s preparation for a ten week sojourn in warmer climes down under and I’ll be reporting from there in my February diary.
It’s just left for me to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
