Slacking Off…17/03/2014

Slacking Off…17/03/2014 “Tell me why I don’t like Mondays” was running through my head having listened to it just before leaving work but to be fair I don’t mind what day it is, they all blend into one. What I don’t like is windy days or rainy days…and today was the most unwind of the week by the look of it. This meant have a coffee before leaving work, stick matches in my eyes and go home to get bait. I should have left straight away but Rome was apparently burning. So I fiddled and arrived at the beach around half nine. Too late, I’d not get all that long before slack. The news for the usual spot hadn’t been encouraging though, none of the boats had a sizeable cod yesterday so I decided to save the pull back up the slope and headed to Links Hill instead and dragged the MidWay off the roof and down to the water’s edge along with a plastic jerrycan that I filled with water and returned to the car when I went back for the rods. More on that later, it featured heavily in the day and may well in the future. Quite a hefty shore dump but the sea past it, though there was a bit of swell running, was looking very comfortable. I waited for the set to pass through then went without hindrance, paddling out a mere two hundred yards or so; I was wanting a dogfish for the species hunts and figured the rough ground here would give me a decent chance as they’re certainly abundant here later in the year. First rod down, 2/0 pennel, frozen black and a squid head. Second rod out, clip the weight on, start threading a black and the rod is banging away; pull up and a good whiting is hanging from the hook. Fine, good start, really promising…I pop him back as I’m not too worried about whiting today. I tip the second rod with squid, cast both in and call up Humber Coastguard to let them know I’m here and static so they don’t get any calls from the public, paranoid after last week’s events. And then pull in the fish on the end of my second rod, missing one on the first. I keep pulling up whiting, reasonable ones, and a juvenile codling and keep a couple of the former but then the bites tail off. The flow is dying on me and the wind is turning me side on to it so keeping the lines tight for a firm strike is tricky and what few bites I get I’m missing. I stay with the programme for a bit and then decided to call it a day – I’m maybe half an hour from slack, that could last an hour before the ebb and then I’ve got to haul anchor in a strong run (this is a bit of a headland here, strong flows) and I just can’t be bothered. I pull up and paddle in, there’s people waving on the beach. They’re not where I was expecting them but this is quite pleasant and so I head in and land and our volunteer and a couple of residents wander over and see me suited, booted and with fish. They’re getting whiting from the beach, fishing club is up and running again and we have a decent natter before I head back up to the car to be greeted by one of the town lifeguards out for a ride on his bike; he paddles too and knows my old boss so we chat some more. Perhaps not the greatest fishing session lately but I was really pleased I hadn’t just gone home and crashed out for half the day like normal! Back to the jerrycan. Paul gave me his aquarium as I want a marine tank to try. This was the first batch of water for it. It gave me the perfect opportunity to be silly on facebook by taking pictures of a murky tank (the sand hadn’t dropped out of the water yet) and getting my friends to suggest a name for the small shore crab I’d caught while fishing. I chose the first suggestion, Claude. Well not being one to do things by halves and with low water at a suitable time I wandered down to the beach for some mussels and more water, took the children’s shrimp net and found some pools in the sand by the end of a groyne…ten minutes later I had eight shrimps, three tiny dabs and a cracking hermit crab to add to the tank…watch this space!