I had to post this and it deserves an explanation, it's my personal Redmire and the often deserted pool where it all began as a very young lad.
Just yards from where my father first took me, following weeks of pestering having found his old, fusty fishing tackle in his allotment shed.
A fascinating array of floats, end tackle, plywood box which contained the majority of it, a cane float rod complete with a clunky and noisy reel, bait box, an extending and folding landing net and a knotted keepnet that must have been a good three feet long!
I'm pretty sure it was the keepnet which retained the fusty smell, I wish I could bottle that smell and take the stopper off every now and again for a good reminisce.
Strange how you recall these things so clearly, I reckon I would have been about seven years old and I can still see him now with the tops of his gardening wellies rolled down as was often the case back then... Selecting a handsome if totally inappropriate Avon style float and casting it out so that I could watch it drift back and rest up to the nearside reeds before handing me the rod and retiring behind me to light his pipe, the waft of which I always enjoyed immensely.
It was a Saturday afternoon and as he worked twelve hour days throughout the week and then tended his allotment from early weekend mornings until midday along with evenings in the Summer I can appreciate how precious that time was and why I had to pester him so much.
Many a Summer school holiday was spent in the bows of various trees, waiting for what seemed like enormous and uncatchable Carp with just a candid glimpse of one leaving you feeling like you'd won the World Cup and I would often stay until the light faded and the surface dimpled with fish of all species.
I may be a sentimental ol' fool but my God, what had he started?
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