Gone Carp Fishing

Gone Carp Fishing

Steve Graham

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Steve Graham

All rights reserved

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INDEX

Chapter One - Woodland Waters

Chapter Two – Lake Albert

Chapter Three - Loeuilly

Chapter Four – The Main Lake

Chapter Five – The Big Back Lake

Chapter Six - Contre

Chapter Seven – The Middle Lake

Chapter Eight – Back To Albert

Chapter Nine – The Mystery Lake

Chapter Ten – The Middle Lake In July

Chapter Eleven – A Return To Loeuilly

Chapter Twelve – The First Lake In September

Chapter Thirteen – A Second Chance At The Mystery Lake

Chapter Fourteen – The Main Lake Again

Chapter Fifteen – Albert In October

Chapter Sixteen – Back To The Middle Lake

About The Author

Other Books By Steve Graham

To my grandsons Logan and Dylan

CHAPTER ONE – WOODLAND WATERS

October 2013 was one of the wettest months that I could remember for a long time. Every day seemed the same as the last – rain, rain, rain. Now rain is obviously not necessarily a bad thing when we go fishing, in fact a lot of anglers really rate those type of conditions, but getting soaking wet before you even start, and then getting everything covered in mud is not my idea of fun. Just when I thought the rain would never stop, I looked at a weather website on my computer and to my delight the following Thursday was forecast to be dry. Not only that, but it was forecast to be mild with light southerly winds too. That sounded just great to me, so I decided to fish a couple of nights at a lake called ‘Woodland Waters’

It`s a fifteen acre lake about an hour and a half from my home, which I had fished four or five times over the last few years. The fish weren`t enormous, with the biggest being just over thirty pounds, and the majority of the stock being doubles and low twenties. I wouldn`t call it difficult, but it isn`t easy either, so you have to work for your fish, and I`d always enjoyed the time that I`d spent there. There was a site for touring caravans and some chalets there too, so it could be quite busy at times, but the main lake was not heavily fished, and it was unusual to find more than two or three other anglers fishing. I wouldn`t fancy fishing the lake in July or August, during the school holidays, but I expected mid-week in October to be absolutely fine.

I left home just after six thirty on the Thursday morning, and as it got light the sun made one of its all too rare appearances. This would normally have been very pleasant, especially after all the wet and miserable weather that we`d just endured, but at this time of the year the sun is very low in the sky, so it made driving very difficult as I struggled to see in the glare.

O.k. – I know, I`m never happy.

The traffic was a little heavier than I`d expected and it was almost half past eight when drove in through the gate. As I approached the lake I got a bit of a shock, because there seemed to be far more people about than I`d expected. There were three bivvys on the short near bank, and when I reached the far-bank car park, there were five cars there already. I couldn`t understand why it was so busy at this time of the year, but then it dawned on me – It was the schools half-term holiday! Now that my children had grown up, I didn`t keep track of the school holidays anymore, and I`d managed to pick what was probably the only busy week for months.

Certainly not good timing!

I walked down the shallowest arm of the lake to try to choose a suitable swim, but the two I really fancied were already taken. The swim at the entrance to the arm had six rods lined up along the bank (obviously two anglers sharing) and the swim next to that was occupied by another two anglers. These two were coarse anglers, not carpers, so they wouldn`t be fishing after dark, but that didn`t help me much with my swim choice now. That part of the bank was well and truly stitched up. I carried on walking, and eventually settled on a swim half-way down the arm. There were overhanging trees on each side of the swim which gave good cover for the fish and I instantly felt that these might be good spots to place two of my rods.

The near margin was not quite as deep here as it was further up the arm, where all those other anglers were fishing, and it seemed like an area the fish were likely to visit. After a few quick casts with a light marker, I discovered that it was four feet deep under my feet and six to seven feet deep about 1½ to 2 rod-lengths out, so I was quite pleased with that. The bottom under the two overhanging trees seemed quite smooth and clear of any debris, so that was two of the rods sorted. I found a nice area about 3 or 4 rod-lengths out in about ten feet of water for the third rod, so all in all, I was quite happy. I put a little bit of bait on each spot with a catapult. Mainly hemp and chopped boilies in the margins, and boilies and a few chops on the third rod, and then I allowed the swim to settle for the next couple of hours, with no lines in the water, while I organised my bivvy etc.

I saw a fish crash about an hour before I started to fish, about fifteen yards out in front of my third rod. It wasn`t on one of my spots, but it wasn`t far away either, so that was very encouraging.

The sun continued to shine and all afternoon there were people walking dogs, kids running about and shouting, and generally just a lot of noise. Now this certainly wasn`t ideal, especially as I was fishing at such close range, but I knew that at this time of the year it gets dark quite early, and then they`d all disappear. Then I should have a chance of a fish during the night.

At least I hoped so.

The rods were cast at about four p.m. and then I sat back in the chair to watch the water until dark. As I sat there, I heard something moving in the trees behind me, and when I looked I discovered that it was a couple of squirrels, chasing each other. I watched them for the next twenty minutes or so as they ran up and down branches that seemed too thin to bear their weight.

Magic!

Woodland Waters

Just after dark I had a take on my right-hand margin rod, but unfortunately this turned out to be a bream, which certainly wasn`t what I`d planned. I unhooked and returned the bream and put the rig back into position under the tree.

Over the next hour or so I received numerous bleeps on the delkims supporting that rod, without ever getting a proper take. I couldn`t work out what was causing this, but I realised that something was obviously not quite right, so I decided to re-cast the rod again. I tied on a new rig and as I got out of the bivvy I stumbled and the hook went into the little finger on my right hand. It was an ESP G-4 size four and I had just used my hook sharpener on it. This had made the hook-point needle sharp, and it sliced straight into my finger well past the barb. I tried to get the hook out of my finger, but it was in far too deep, and I sat there wondering what to do.

Perhaps a trip to the hospital was going to be the only answer.

Now I`d heard various stories about anglers going to the hospital in similar situations to this, and most of these stories told of the medical staff being rather unsympathetic and brutal, so I decided that I`d rather do it myself.

‘One big pull should do it’ I thought.

So I took a deep breath and pulled hard on the hook.

The first try produced a lot of pain and the hook was still in.

The second try produced a similar result. More pain and the hook was still in.

Third try and out popped the hook. There was a lot of blood, but at least the hook was out at last, and I was very relieved. Then I rubbed some klinic onto the wound (the antiseptic that I use on the carp). ‘It works on them so I`m sure it will work on me’ I thought. I`ve used this on myself in the past when I`ve had cuts etc. while I`ve been fishing, and although I wouldn`t recommend it to anyone, I`m still here to tell the tale. One plaster to stop any dirt getting into the wound, and the job`s a good un!

At a quarter past eleven that night I had a few bleeps on the left-hand rod. I jumped out of bed and was half-way towards the rod when I realised that it wasn`t a take. It was the low battery warning signal on the delkim.

‘Great! Just what I needed in the middle of the night’ I thought.

I`d only just managed to get back to sleep too. Fortunately, I`d got a spare battery with me, so I changed it, and that seemed to solve the problem. I couldn`t manage to get back to sleep though, so I sat up reading for a while. It was a very mild night and I sat there with no coat on.

Was this really late October?

I read for an hour or so then went back to bed, but I`d just got back to sleep when the same buzzer started the same low battery warning bleeping again. I`d had quite enough of that by now so I decided to change the alarm for another. That one was obviously faulty. I switched off the remote before going out of the bivvy to change the alarm. I always do this because if you leave the remote on, and turn off one of the alarms, then the anti-theft alarm sounds. It`s so that no one can switch off your alarms to enable them to steal them or your rods, but I didn`t want all that noise at that time of the night. Amazingly, when I turned off the remote the ‘faulty’ alarm stopped flashing.

‘That`s strange’ I thought. ‘Maybe it`s the remote that I`ve got the problem with, and not the alarm at all.’ So I changed the battery in the remote, and all seemed fine again. Hopefully I`d cured the problem at last, but time would tell.

Ten minutes later I had the answer, when the low battery warning started on the same alarm again. This time I did swap the alarm, and it would be sent back to Delkim for repair when I got back home.

Just before three o`clock that same morning, the left-hand alarm started screaming again, but this time it was for a far more welcome reason, and I soon had a small common in the net. Although the carp was only small, I was delighted to have caught, and took a few quick photos before returning the fish safely back to the lake.

That proved to be the last action to the rods that night, but at least that enabled me to catch up on some sleep, and it was at least an hour after first light before I roused myself from my sleeping bag. I put the kettle on for the first cup of coffee of the morning and sat there watching the water. Over the next hour or so the wind swung right round until it was blowing in a north-westerly direction – straight into the bivvy door. ‘If it rains now, it`s not going to be very comfortable’ I thought, and sure enough, about ten minutes later the rain started. It was only light rain, but there was a moderate and gusty wind too, so it wasn`t pleasant at all for a while. Fortunately at about ten o`clock that morning, the rain stopped, the wind swung back to a more southerly direction and the sun came out. All of a sudden it was like being in a different world. It really was lovely now, and as I sat there in the warm sunshine it seemed more like June than almost November. Conditions were to stay like this for the remainder of my session, so I couldn`t have wished for anything much better.

Throughout the day I tried various combinations of baits and rigs, but none of them proved successful, although I did see a good fish head and shoulder just ten yards from my left-hand rod at about two o`clock that afternoon, which was very encouraging.

‘Perhaps I`ll have a chance of another carp this evening’ I thought.

I had all the rods in position and the spots baited by half past four, and less than ten minutes later I saw another good fish. This time it was just five or six yards from my right-hand rod, and I really was beginning to fancy my chances for the night ahead.

After dark, the wind became much stronger and I was forced to turn down the sensitivity on my alarms to prevent false bleeps. Despite my optimism, when I got into the sleeping bag, just before eleven o`clock that night, I hadn`t managed any more fish, but at about half past one the next morning my right-hand rod was away. Although it wasn`t a huge fish, it fought strongly and it look quite some time before I was able to slide a mid-double common over the net cord. It was a lovely looking fish, and I weighed it and took a few photos before slipping it back into the lake, and then I got back into my sleeping bag, very contented.

That proved to be the last fish of the session, but I when I packed up at ten o`clock the next morning I was very happy with the session. I`d caught a carp each night, and none of the other anglers on my bank had caught any carp at all, so I had to be happy with that. It had been a very enjoyable session too, and being able to pack away my kit in the dry, rather than having it all wet and muddy was a bonus too, especially considering the amount of wet weather we`d had to endure during the previous few weeks, so as I drove home I was very happy and determined to get back on the bank again, sooner rather than later.

CHAPTER TWO – LAKE ALBERT

Despite my good intentions, I didn`t manage to get out on the bank again over winter. The rain continued day after day, and many parts of England suffered some serious flooding problems. I waited for conditions to improve, but that didn`t happen until well into February, and by then I was deep into planning my first trip back to France. It was a shame really because although it had been incredibly wet, it was also one of the mildest winters for many years. What it did mean though, was that by the time that I was due to travel to France, I was absolutely desperate