|
|
| |
I assume that there are plenty of people out there who, like me, have never ventured into this increasingly popular aspect of our sport. So it seemed quite a good idea to give a blow by blow account of how I made my first faltering steps into this brave new world. I will not be attempting to baffle people with clever talk – indeed, as I mentioned earlier, I wouldn’t know how too. What I will do, however, is give an honest appraisal of how I fared. So in advance, I make no apologies for my lack of knowledge on the subject. In fact I hope my total lack of understanding will be what makes the articles interesting.
Please feel free to comment……The Forum is at your disposal!
Days 1 And 2
I finished my last article with the following propheticwords:
“My time on Blithfield was now approaching fast; I was to fishfor eight days in total, comprising of four sets of two consecutivedays. The last of my gear was assembled one day prior to my fist tripand I had now done everything I could conceivably thought of to pushthe odds a little in my favour. Despite the continued torrential rainand howling winds I was as excited as a five year old on ChristmasEve, at this stage there was still some doubt as to whether thereservoir would be fishable – tomorrow would show if all my effortshad been in vain.”
Anyone who has ever been a fisherman will know how I slept thatnight. The following day I was to fish a venue that actually had thepotential to produce a British record. The chance was slim, I knewthat, and the chances of me catching one were even slimmer, Iaccepted that also but it didn’t help me sleep. For hours I tossedand turned, my mind in constant turmoil. Not content with the imageof unseen monsters, there was some real doubt that the lake would befishable. We were currently experiencing some of the wettest weatherthe country had endured, floods were widespread with bulletins onevery news programme showing whole towns underwater. Coupled withthis was a gale force wind that quite literally was shaking the tileson the roof above where I lay. Over and over again I ran thepossibilities through my head. Although the plan was that Eric and Iwould be boat fishing and so had only planned on talking one landingnet, sack, sling, etc. there was a good chance we would be forced tobank fish so all these things had been doubled up at the last minute.Eventually, to the sound of the howling wind I fell asleep.
Fortunately by morning things had changed, the heavy raincontinued but the wind, which had threatened the actual fishing, hadrelented and was now just a moderate breeze. Fishing would be cold,wet, but most importantly – possible!
Flood Alerts
I picked Eric up at around 4.00am – ridiculously early for an hour’sdrive but we didn’t want to take any chances. As it happened thisturned out to be a pretty prudent move. Everything was going welluntil we approached Stafford. As I mentioned earlier, our first dayon Blithfield coincided with three-quarters of the country being onflood alert and the Staffordshire area was amongst the worstaffected. A major traffic island on our route was under 2ft of water;half way round I bottled it and reversed the wrong way around theisland. Illegal, yes but I’m convinced if I had continued we wouldhave needed the RAC to get us out.
We were now following our noses, guessing which routes would beaccessible and at one point ended up driving through a dip in theroad lasting some 500 – 600 metres with the water gushing up thebonnet and the windscreen wipers going at full speed. This wasactually getting a bit serious, there was a distinct possibility wemay not be able to even GET to the venue let alone fish it!
Eventually we found ourselves within a couple of miles of thereservoir but this was to prove the biggest barrier. The roads werenow very minor ones and the vast majority were actually underwater.Had the venue not been Blithfield I would now be back at home – makeno mistake about that. I was risking serious damage to the car butwhat the hell, we were SO close. Eric got out of the car and donnedhis waders. Like the old flagman on the railways Eric walked ahundred yards or so in front of me, testing each pool of water forits depth. Many times we had to turn back as he disappeared from theglow of my headlights around a corner, slowly shaking his head as hecame into view. We were now lost but knew we were near, going roundand round in circles we tried every tiny road we came across in anattempt to find our destination. I do not exaggerate when I tell youthat the pools of water we were driving through were actually flowinglike rivers.
THE
