Normanton on soar was chosen for this latest get together and the hands of time were turned back as we took the ferry across !? Memories of some 25-30 years ago were evoked as we all gathered our gear and walked down to the ferry crossing point . Its not changed in years it still has the grand large houses opposite with their majestic lawned gardens splaying towards the waters edge. The architecture also included the magnificent church which Adey remarked it could have been a jig-saw puzzle scene.
The stretch was pegged out the day before by Tony and the pegging was well spread out and the work to gain access to the waters edge was minimal . I forgot just how good this stretch is with a huge distance behind you to able you to ship back the pole on a flat bank. The bank you fish on is complimented with a wide track which is occasionally used by the odd vehicle added to that are plenty of pathways for walkers and their dogs. I have to say its the perfect river bank venue to fish on , its wide with plenty of scope and the views are just awesome , its a real pleasure to fish it. Mr Ferry man completed the task in three trips and stated his return for 17:00pm .
We drew the pegs and i pulled out peg 7 which i could only describe as 100 metres to the right of where we land in the ferry boat , so downstream . The match was 11 - 4 which gave us ample time to set up a few rigs . My rigs were a 6 N0.4 stick bulked down with 8 shirt button droppers. Also fished a CCX pencil with 15 styles down the line graduated and spaced out equally two-thirds down . My depth was surprisingly deep , estimated at about 10-11 feet . The river had just lost its chocolate brown colour and was just starting to tinge a little greenish . (Think in a few days time it could be perfect for bagging).
I decided to use ground bait SENSAS Match Blend and SENSAS Lake 50/50 with Terre Rive leam with caster and pinkie in the mix. At the start of the match i place 8 balls at just 11.5 metres. It took 10 minutes before i had a few bites and a first roach on the bronze maggot. That followed by several more in the first half hour . The fish tended to drift about and you could only get fish in ones and twos but it was still pleasant to gain bites. I started to feed caster half way through the match and took 2 decent roach but again they did not stick around. To my left Tony was taking consistent roach be it small but his catch rate was higher so i decided to take a 10 minute break and watch the 'machine' in action. Tony was fishing at 16 m with a pencil float and strung out shot holding it back really slowly and swinging in samples on a top-5. He made me laugh when he said : ' Some people think i am lucky and knowing my luck i am likely to drop a fish off close to my feet in the reeds and go in with my hand and grab and even larger one !'' :)
In the last hour Tony accelerated his catch and took some fine specimens to win the match with 6-10 . I tried for some larger specimens on the worm but it did not happen so i ended up with short of 3lb.
Incredibly when we waited for the Ferry man to cross with the gear there was a wedding at the church and the happy couple were posing for photos as it snowed !! The bride had nothing covering her shoulders in her white wedding dress she must have been terribly cold ! They did gain compliments from the match crew as the Ferry man aided by his son took us all over in just two trips , trolleys and all !
Last match in 2 weeks time that could see us back there but a chance of fishing the cobbles , Greens , 1860 is also a possibility. Let us know if interested ?
No comments:
Post a Comment