Doubling up on the River…12/03/2014

Doubling up on the River…12/03/2014 I didn’t feel in the mood for doing anything on Tuesday after Monday’s events. I ended up instead going down to the fish merchants for some fresh herring to use as bait to see if I could tempt an early roker which ended up with my drinking coffee and chatting to my old boss Andy who was getting things ready for his first truckload of new kayaks. So the day passed pleasantly enough and I even did a bit of hovering to ensure diplomatic relations at home. It was Wednesday now though and with a mere two days left of the coarse season Bruce was going freshwater. Nick, also free, likes a bit of freshwater under him too and being partial myself that became our plan for the day. James was asleep and with me hitching a ride with Bruce we couldn’t take Paul along for entertainment. I brought stuff downstairs, dropped a lure and managed to straight away catch my sock and hoodie; hooks were sharp then. A quick stop at Avenue Angling for some maggots and we were away to Ellingham to paddle upstream to Wainford sluice and perhaps beyond to Bungay. We had to be quick because people were crashing into other people all over town and it took an age for Bruce to get to mine. Poor Nick, he was looking fed up by the time we got there and was playing on his phone to stay awake. We set off upriver, trolling lures in water that wasn’t too cloudy. I had my Eco Narrow banker on the one rod and one of Paul’s first homemade handmade wooden lures which hadn’t had a fair try yet in my hands. I figured it’d stand a fair chance today and judging by the movement of my rod tip it’s an excellent troller. I spotted a little cut off to one side and decided to stick half a herring out at the junction and dabble with my float rod for a little while after half a mile. I wondered what might be up there and scooted up the shallow water to the end and back without seeing a single fish let alone a crowd of thirty pound hungry, spawning female pike. Oh well. I set off trolling again, running up a few feet from the margins…and then Paul came good, that lure doing its stuff! Let the battle commence…great fun on the XtrafleXX 10-30g I soon had things under control and out she came. Time to go again. I passed Nick, nothing doing but he reported that Bruce had caught a jack. I soon found Bruce, catching roach, had a chat and moved off to another spot around the corner where decent chub gather. Lots of small bites followed and then I had a roach on a single red maggot. I kept trying for a while and nothing else was forthcoming; then I saw a pike jump at something and the reason became clear. It wasn’t interested in my offering of herring though. I decided to try by the weir. I cast my half-herring into the undertow and it got dragged around the corner while I chucked the waggler into the eddy. A couple of minutes passed and I picked up my little Ice Pike rod with the Warbird 220 mini multiplier on and felt it get a nice pull on it; a hungry fish took it straight down and battle, once more, commenced. What a scrap on this set-up! I couldn’t see the hooks and couldn’t get my hand under the gill plate so had to lift her in on the trace, not my preferred method but not using wire meant no harm should arise. Nice fish! I think I need a bigger tape measure. I took three measurements and joined the dots, 85cm which equated to 12-14lb! That was a decent fish to end the season on! Of course I carried on, following Bruce up to the next weir after he reported having a dceent chub. I had nothing and we made our way back with time running short. He paddle don as I tried trolling again, just the one rod with Paul’s lure; I got all the way back before a massive hit on the rod a couple of hundred yards short of the landing. T was on for less than a minute but felt like a good fish. Oh well, I couldn’t really complain.