Hungryfisherman got himself down to Pakefield early to rig up and sent us a text to say he was there. He wasn’t where I was planning to launch so had a longer walk down with the yak than us but it was literally a five minute paddle with the tide to where we were going to fish so he launched and waited for us. Steve and I were next on scene and got the yaks down to the water, waiting for Onmas and chatting to people in the meantime (one of whom had seen Steve and I the previous Friday from shore).
With Onmas arriving, I launched and went out to give Hungry his bait order just as it was getting dark while Steve gave Onmas a hand down to the water. Amos was about 150 metres off the mark (no GPS or charts on his unit) but as he had, in the hour or less he’d been out, had (I think) Codling, Pouting and Whiting it seemed like as good a spot as any so I anchored up 50 yards away, baited up and dropped my lines out.
Five minutes. That’s all it took. The rod started to almost double over on itself (almost) and the line tightened against the rings as a hungry cod made a lunge for freedom with a frozen black. I tightened into it and after a valiant battle on both sides hauled up a lunker…
I was well happy – my smallest cod to date, ideal for my saltwater aquarium. Trouble is, I don’t yet have one and it’s going to take a bit more cajoling before I do! Back it went and I settled down to await the next one. It wasn’t long, and then a rattle before I pulled in the first of the Whiting.
I had quite a few more of these before a gentle knock that might have been a Whiting or could have been some more of the weed that was about now…I started pulling it in and then it got heavy and started to nod…cod! Up came the first real keeper of the night, around 2lb.
Small crab and shrimp in its belly tonight…and amongst the weed on the line a little hermit crab!
It was funny, the bites were mostly gentle and mostly on the rod with frozen blacks. The fresh was being outfished two or three to one and they weren’t bad worms. Both of my best knocks of the night, however, where on the fresh and the first of them was a small Pouting… I’d now got some water on the lens of my camera so apologies for the lesser quality than normal!
Things had started to quieten down so I decided to up-anchor and head for the mark I’d been using this week, dropping myself a hundred yards north of this morning’s spot. Hungry joined me first, with Steve and Onmas following shortly afterwards. As Steve arrived – fishless as yet, having been debunking my bullnuts about bananas being unlucky on a fishing boat (Ha!) or jinxed by anchoring next to Onmas – and we had a chat…at which point my rod tip started to bounce merrily away! A nice plump 3lber was soon aboard ;D He went and anchored…
Hungry and Onmas drifted past before their anchors settled and we settled down to another couple of hours fishing. It was a perfect evening for it – not too cold, clear, a slight swell, not a great deal of current and plenty of fish. I totalled 5 Codling, 13 Whiting and 1 Pouting before running out of bait and all the others had some Codling to take home too. An absolutely top notch evening. Kit upgrades on my part from last week were extra SOLAS tape around the rods at intervals and I’d found my (unused) tip lights which illuminated the SOLAS at the tip nicely (although one has let water in and the battery has rusted already). At 1:30 we all headed back to shore through the surf that was starting to grow as the wind and swell picked up. It wasn’t big though and sounded worse than the reality because of the shingle – no dramas ensued and we all got up the beach with ease, getting out and getting the circulation back into our bodies – which saw me shivering in minutes. An excellent session!
I called into the coastguard to inform them we were back…he asked how we’d done and I told him…
“I’ll have to save up and get myself one…Yarmouth Coastguard, OUT!”
That was it…on that note, laughing, we loaded up, stood around chatting for an hour and then departed.
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