...and then the fog came down. It was one of those huge changes that resulted in a depressing of spirits and with Onmas having had a crap Friday afternoon session and there being a general lack of fish about he decided to not bother but was still up for the planned waveplay on Sunday morning. I pretty much felt the same and it was 50-50 whether I would bother going either until Westie phoned up from a shopping trip to say that he was up for a session after also having a hard week...y enthusiasm returned and I got everything ready.
Children fed, wife fed, house in reasonable order I jumped into my van at around 7:15 and headed for Hopton. The fog had pretty much gone by now although the wind had picked up a bit and was cold (coming from the northeast) but there are no cod to be found in front of the telly. I parked up, unloaded, kitted up and was on the water by about 7:45 – low water was around 8:30 with the ebb continuing for a bit longer before slack, I figured I had a couple of hours maximum so got a move on.
I snapped a lug off the battery for my finder so had to fish blind, both in terms of waypoints and depth/features so just headed straight out from the slip a couple of hundred yards and dropped anchor. It didn’t really matter where I went as there were, by all accounts, no fish around anyway (apart from the good dab Spiny had landed up at Trimingham the day before).
The first rod down was a 2/0 Viking triple flapper tied with 15lb Amnesia...I figured I might get something, ANYTHING, with that. Each hook was baited with half a black lug and a piece of frozen unwashed squid tipping it off. The second rod was set up with the traditional running leger pennel rig, sporting a pair of 6/0 Vikings (just in case!). Normally I use 4/0’s but decided I wanted to gaff the next good cod that came swimming by ;D
It wasn’t that long, maybe twenty minutes that I had to wait. The flapper rod started to bang away like John Terry (that’s topical) and I wound down to a hard fighting codling. Up to the boat, I swung it in (leash in the bloody way as usual) and unhooked it. Somewhere between 2 and 3lb and in perfect condition I decided to let it go, having had such a good stamp of fish in the run up to Christmas.
It wasn’t long after that I spotted Westie on the beach getting ready to launch, having been delayed in getting away. He was somewhat gladdened to hear that I’d had something and dropped his anchor nearby. A few minutes passed and then I missed a resounding bite on the flapper rod...never mind, it was pleasant enough being on the water. A bit of swell was running, there was low cloud and out to sea the sky was blacker than I’ve ever seen it but it was peaceful.
Until the calm was shattered by another bite. There wasn’t a great deal going on at first and then, as I brought the fish up through the water column it went mental – my rod was bouncing around, the tip bent quite far over and at times I just hung onto it without reeling. Being pretty close to slack now I could feel the fish without either of us battling the current and all that protein was put to good use as it fought to get away. The 2/0 (bottom hook again) held and I swung it in, a prime quality 3lb’er (weighed later). I ummed and ahhed, then decided to keep this one and popped it into the tankwell. An ideal candidate for my Christmas present of a fish kettle, so far unused...it turned out to be the exact fit for this!
We hung around for another half an hour then decided to head back to mine for 12 year old Glenfiddich and chocolate Ovaltine, accompanied by Rice Crispie cakes...we know how to live out here on the Anglian coast!
Sunday dawned dark. It was a bit earlier you see. I woke Westie up and got the pair of us coffee’d up before we headed north to meet Onmas by the harbour at Gorleston. It was around 7:15 when we arrived and although the sea wasn’t very big it was still looking like it would be fun. With my Scupper on the roof and my Yakboard inside I could play quite happily. The others both had their Trident 13’s as well so we took one down to the water and swapped between the boats.
Well, what can I say? It was bloody cold on the face and head (no hat for me today, I forgot to bring it) but the paddling about and acrobatics kept the core temperatures high enough. A few waves were catchable in the Yakboard, some in the Scupper and one or two in the Trident as we headed further away from the breakwater but once we went back inside the curve formed by harbour and breakwater the T13 was relegated to beach duty as we rammed into waves and clapotis, trying to spin or turn on them, surf some of them and basically bounce ourselves around. It was great fun! Poor old Westie now has to justify buying a fourth yak – anyone flogging a Yakboard? ;D Onmas did sterling work as film-maker and will surely post later (he got some great stuff) and a having worn ourselves out over a couple of hours we came in feeling as though we had burned off a good few calories...
...promptly replaced in the café in the car park of course!
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