The wind howled a gale around me. The waves washing ashore with white horses sending the feeding boilies in all directions. The rods were baited with the rigs hanging in the big guide waiting to be cast out. The clouds closing in - it didn't look good. But this is carp fishing taking the good with the bad and doing the best you can with what you have.
When the wind changed direction and came from behind the rods were cast out into the depths. The clouds grew darker and angrier as the minutes passed by. At this point the bivvy was set up, I sat with a cuppa in one hand looking out from the bivvy thinking - Another Tempestuous Session. The weather seemed to turn against us when the rain started falling. The mid-week sessions takes it's toll. I was only one angler fishing this stretch of water when the right hand rod's Fox Micron beeped twice, the Solar Hanger lifting ever so slowly and the tip bending over pulling towards the right. Lightning all around I was worried I could get fried when lifting into the fish. Playing it from my bivvy and being cautious there was no way this fish was giving me any quarter. The battle continued, rain pelting me it was the two of us head to head. I could feel the braid grating against structure. I worried because I was fishing over a shelf. Slowly but surely she gave quarter and took from me. The weather didn't abate and my thoughts on this violent storm was forgotten for a while. Landing net at the ready I waded in a few meters as she came closer - and closer to the net until her flank showed...another good fish. I didn't recognise this fish from any of the sessions I'd done here before but a welcome fish all the same. I sacked the fish in the floating weigh sling sending it out as the rain continued. The rod was re-cast to the same spot, baited up and there was me with a cuppa warming my hands as the winter night settled in. Just before sundown a neighbouring angler assisted with weighing and photo's - The common tipped the scales at 28lb with every ounce of fat stored for winter this was a fine specimen. I was well pleased.
The night passed with another fish coming out early morning weighing in at 23lb. The cold set in and rain and wind abated. The session wasn't over ... the weather wasn't done with me either and little did I know how well this session would turn out.
During the session it seemed the two other anglers on the lake also had action as I heard their alarms go off. This was me, fishing some of my sessions on my own enjoying the solitude making sense of life and the changes that were coming. When a man is faced with challenges he rises to the occasion making life changing choices and decisions on his feet. Circumstances changes a man and his ideas and when this happens his existence takes on another dimension that will never be the same ever again. Fishing - If you anything like me as an angler does something for me and my sanity. I take it that serious otherwise I'd never have lifted a rod.
What choices and decisions were you faced with - what have circumstances done to you ?
Get out there - fish hard - fish smart.
Taken from my Carp Diaries - 2011.
Till the next Time
John'O
When the wind changed direction and came from behind the rods were cast out into the depths. The clouds grew darker and angrier as the minutes passed by. At this point the bivvy was set up, I sat with a cuppa in one hand looking out from the bivvy thinking - Another Tempestuous Session. The weather seemed to turn against us when the rain started falling. The mid-week sessions takes it's toll. I was only one angler fishing this stretch of water when the right hand rod's Fox Micron beeped twice, the Solar Hanger lifting ever so slowly and the tip bending over pulling towards the right. Lightning all around I was worried I could get fried when lifting into the fish. Playing it from my bivvy and being cautious there was no way this fish was giving me any quarter. The battle continued, rain pelting me it was the two of us head to head. I could feel the braid grating against structure. I worried because I was fishing over a shelf. Slowly but surely she gave quarter and took from me. The weather didn't abate and my thoughts on this violent storm was forgotten for a while. Landing net at the ready I waded in a few meters as she came closer - and closer to the net until her flank showed...another good fish. I didn't recognise this fish from any of the sessions I'd done here before but a welcome fish all the same. I sacked the fish in the floating weigh sling sending it out as the rain continued. The rod was re-cast to the same spot, baited up and there was me with a cuppa warming my hands as the winter night settled in. Just before sundown a neighbouring angler assisted with weighing and photo's - The common tipped the scales at 28lb with every ounce of fat stored for winter this was a fine specimen. I was well pleased.
The night passed with another fish coming out early morning weighing in at 23lb. The cold set in and rain and wind abated. The session wasn't over ... the weather wasn't done with me either and little did I know how well this session would turn out.
During the session it seemed the two other anglers on the lake also had action as I heard their alarms go off. This was me, fishing some of my sessions on my own enjoying the solitude making sense of life and the changes that were coming. When a man is faced with challenges he rises to the occasion making life changing choices and decisions on his feet. Circumstances changes a man and his ideas and when this happens his existence takes on another dimension that will never be the same ever again. Fishing - If you anything like me as an angler does something for me and my sanity. I take it that serious otherwise I'd never have lifted a rod.
What choices and decisions were you faced with - what have circumstances done to you ?
Get out there - fish hard - fish smart.
Taken from my Carp Diaries - 2011.
Till the next Time
John'O
