Braving the elements

First day back at work after the bank holiday and as I travelled to the gulag I couldn't help but notice that the weather conditions were screaming at me to go fishing! The wind was strong but very warm and rain showers intermittently poured out of the thick black clouds above, for the first time in ages conditions looked really good.

My local lake hadn't been at all good to me this year, in fact not a single carp had fallen to my rods and it wasn't for lack of trying either! As I sat in the office watching the wild weather battering the windows I visualised the carp stacking up on the windward bank of the pool, embarking on their first mad feeding spell of the year. I really needed to be there.

4pm arrived and I was out of the workhouse in double quick time and first out of the carpark by a country mile! after an ultra fast pitstop at home to eat and load the gear I was soon back on the road and headed to the lake. Upon my arrival there was already two anglers in residence with very little to report but fortunately neither were in my fancied areas. The wind seemed to be gusting from all different angles and no single swim jumped out at me. It was generally pushing towards the longest and blandest bit of bank on the lake which also has some very deep water in front of it so I decided to wait for the carp to tell me where to go.

Within a couple of minutes one stuck it's head out of the water in the vague vicinity of where I thought I should be so I headed around there. I opted for a boilie only approach using good old fashioned stringers as I think the fish are wary of little piles of pellets and groundbait because every man and his dog seem to be using pva sticks/bags and method feeders in there at the moment.

The weather lashed at my brolly to the extreme over the next hour and I soon got fed up with adjusting it to stop it blowing away. Somewhere in all the chaos though I suddenly became aware of a delkim warbling urgently and thank god for snag ears because my left hand rod was taking on an alarming bend as a fish made it's bid to get to the far end of the pool.

I leaned into the fish to try and turn it but it seemed hellbent on getting into the reeds along my margin. After a few hairy moments I managed to turn it towards open water where it was much easier to battle despite the ferocious wind making my wielding of the landing net somewhat difficult. A nice looking common was eventually netted and I was pleased to record a weight of 22lb8oz, my biggest from the venue so far.

After that I never bothered to recast as the weather had really started to close in and the drizzle became torrential, home beckoned! A quick result with a decent fish on a work night was a sweet reward for braving some truly shocking weather :-)

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