Dawn Promise. That was it. The name came back as vivid memory as I crossed the field. A Hoseasons’ Boat on the Norfolk Broads. Summer of ’77, the first holiday with my wife, though back then she was my girlfriend and we were both 17. Plenty of fishing for small silvers off the back of the boat in the River Bure, Wroxham Broad, Salthouse Broad – known then for its huge rudd, while Vanessa cooked up the bacon butties. What could be better?
Well today was one that equalled it at least… though dawn actually promised little by way of fish as there was a severe frost, the temperature was minus two as I left the car and headed down to the stream. But it was the most gorgeous day, the most glorious daybreak, and even the sheep in the field seemed to have a spring in their step as the weak sun rose over the distant skyline trees.
I love dawn and the first few hours that follow, the freshness of the new day, often with a sunrise that can be as vivid and striking as the most colourful sunset. But few of us rise early enough to see it.
Of course I know I have a better chance of a big roach at dusk/.. but when I fish afternoons into evening, the gloom arrives quickly, the temperatures dip rather than rise, and the day quickly disappears. But there is something special about dawn, it promises so much and brings life – especially on my stream where the first blaze of colour often comes with the kingfisher’s early morning fly past salute.
And fishing is not just about fishing. Is it? It’s about our surroundings, the birdlife, the wildlife. And sitting on an old fallen tree sipping a coffee and breathing in life, allowing the stresses of everyday life to ooze away. Wonderful.
So today I headed for the deeps to trot a small balsa and cane stemmed Paul Cook traditional float, attached to three pound line and a 1930s Allcocks Pattern Nine reel banded to a most delicious blue whipped Allcocks Lucky Strike, 10 feet six inches of the most splendid dark flamed cane – just like the one Chris Yates is holding in several of the photos in Deepening Pool and in A Passion for Angling.
It’s a boy’s rod – and there is a boy in all of us fisher folk. I flogged several swims to death for almost three hours, trotting maggots and worm on a size 16, seeking my roach, or a quality stripey. But both species avoided me — but the small dace, chublet, minnows and gudgeon kept me busy.
As I moved slowly upstream, towards the car and a hot shower, I dropped a few maggots into a lovely long glide, poured a coffee, and sat on an old tree watching a kestrel working the hedgerow. First trot down, tight to the nearside marginal reeds, dying back after the numerous frosty dawns, the red top sailed away and I connected to something that was determined to put a fine curve in the 50-year-old cane. It did not disappoint as it dived under the overhanging margin… but the cane was as good as the day it emerged from the production line at the Redditch factory, around the time that the young Princess Elizabeth came to the throne. Four pounds nine ounces of chunky chevin came to the net. A super fish, a lovely specimen for such a small stream, with a huge frame and head that no picture could do justice to. I poured another coffee and savoured the moment.
My day was complete, no roach or perch, but a super chub had christened my first trip out with the Lucky Strike since I acquired it. I wandered upstream picking up flood-travelled litter and passing the time of day with two new members who were also long-trotting for roach. Nice guys.
I dropped a worm in the upper pool and was rewarded with a greedy two pound chub that didn’t seem to realise it was attached to my Lucky Strike. Then my first perch of the day, a pristine fellow of eight or nine ounces perhaps, all bristling (one of Mr Crabtree‘s favourite words) and proud, and with bright orange-red fins.
Then I stopped off , for one last cast – why is it that our last cast becomes three, six or even a dozen last casts? Is it to feed our addiction? But I only needed two… a gentle trot, in a long straight, impassable in summer, but now a lovely run amongst the withered and decayed streamer weed and ‘onion’ plants.
On went two brandling-cum-big-redworms. At the end of the trot, some 25 yards, the float buried and it was fish on. Let battle commence and it did. Boy did it. I don’t think the L.S was built for such action, but thanks to Mr Allcock’s skills as a rod designer, it performed admirably and took every lunge the small stream specimen had to offer as it fought for its freedom.
It was a double first – at six pounds and two glorious ounces it was a pristine barbel and not only my first float caught barbel but my first barbus caught on the humble earth worm. It wasn’t huge, but it was a veritable monster specimen for such a small Hertfordshire stream.
I felt that warm glow of success across my face as I wandered back across the field to my car, the half-century-old Strike indeed having been exceedingly Lucky today.
Gary Cullum
