Reef Breaks…23/09/2013

Reef Breaks…23/09/2013 Last week was a write-off; training, meetings, wind, rain. The weekend was a no-go too; I try to avoid fishing weekends most of the time now and my youngest had a birthday that needed my cake-making skills anyway. I am not too bad at cake making and this year I even managed an okay job at decorating, so much so that nobody mentioned the memory of the good cake with the abysmal first attempt at icing which was supposed to be blue but just looked like blue sludge of a few years before. No, I went for chocolate sponge with caramel and chocolate spread and marshmallows in the middle, the same spread and rainbow drops on the top. And Star Wars figures having a lightsabers battle because that’s what my daughter likes. Good for her! That’s all in the past though. I was awake around five and couldn’t get back to sleep, even though I am currently shattered. I couldn’t leave until half eight either so that made matters worse. It was a still morning though and though it was overcast I knew this was only temporary as I set off for the thirty mile trek to Sea Palling. I took my pound with for once, the tourists have thinned now so the charity car park would be useable and that damned dune wouldn’t see me today. It’s quite nice to be able to drive up the ramp, drop the yak onto the sand, load up and go and park before setting off, especially with a sea like this. Lovely and flat it was, a bit cloudy still but perhaps some more clarity on slack water a few hours hence – I launched practically bang on high water and headed downtide and into the sun. None of the bottom reefs were particularly exposed and the bottom one didn’t even uncover when I came in five hours after high. I had to rely on guessing where the rocks were to some extent, having been broken up somewhat by the storms back in the spring, and got it wrong a few times, the first casualty in minutes when I lost the lip on one of my most successful bass lures this year – a 13cm Jointed Minnow. I was relying on any feeding bass going after vibration and noise rather than sight. I trolled the four reefs there and back twice before deciding to play it wise; I got to the uptide end of my favourite reef and then drifted around to the other side before slowly winding the lure in. Bang! Fish on! Then it went light – a hit but no fish…then I felt a fish on there. I think I had a hit which didn’t connect before an immediate connecting hit following it rather than the fish coming towards me. The result was the same. One hell of a battle, I love these light rods! The bass went left, right, forwards, backwards, up, down, sideways…then appeared on top…Nice fish! I grabbed the leader, got it onto my foot and flicked it on. By the time I weighed it back home it went four and a half pounds for it’s bright, plump, muscular 59cm. A pity I had my polarisers on and didn’t notice the out of focus photograph due to still being on macro mode! Oh well, regular readers will have seen pictures of decent bass before. Nothing more came in the following quarter-hour here and I did some more trolling. I should have loosened the drag off again but I didn’t and hooked the reef while paddling through a rip…the usual stop and go back, the feeling of the rod being pulled and unable to slacken it quickly enough I heard a crack and stared unhappily at my now trashed spinning rod. Luckily I have three of these and had them all with me, the tears would have to wait and I swapped over the one I was planning to feather with and continued on my way. I tried the same tactic next time I hit that reef and lo and behold, same place and another bass, a 42cm two pounder. Same lure too. The mackerel patterned Jointed Minnow. This has also produced me a lot of bass this year. I wandered in and went off to buy a drink as I had a slight headache from yesterday’s birthday carbicide. Too much cake makes old Snapper a fat and sickly boy in need of exercise! Rather a civilised fishing spot this. Coming back out I decided to try and feather up some mackerel so paddled out a mile and gave it a go in clearer water, though not as clear as it was a month ago. Nothing doing so I went back to the reefs and trolled up and down once more. Same reef, a quarter up and yes! The rod went over and I turned and grabbed it. Then I back paddled. Then I grabbed it again. Then I swore at the other line that had drifted around it (I was heading downtide and it didn’t stop like the kayak did). Then I backpaddled again, then I fought the fish some more, then, with a bit of a tangle and one line fighting the next I grabbed the leader on a fish not yet played out and brought it in as the hook hold didn’t look too clever now. It was almost balancing half in and half out on the gunwhale. Slightly more half out though, when it shed the hooks. Caught and released, that one. Another two pounder. Not to worry. I tried for another hour but the water clouded up pretty soon after and nothing else came along so it was time to call it a day and head home with amongst the last of my summer fishing done. I figure my next set of shifts will be the break into autumn. I’ve had enough breaks today though, thanks, so I’ll just put it off a few more days. .