A change of venue for Craig

After a successful few trips to my syndicate I couldn’t help but feel an itch that needed scratching. A water I had hoped of fishing during the spring was calling for my attention. I had missed the chase of a certain big common and felt the remainder of the summer and the autumn this was the place I wanted to be. I had been hearing the lake had been stupidly busy and still was.

Unfortunately there was still so many anglers on furlough and the banks were proof that they were using the lake as a get away. Problem was most were down for week long sessions and I knew this was going to be extremely difficult to get on the fish.

Luckily I had a few mates who were keeping me in tune with the lake and after a phone call to tell me it was quiet the decision was made to do 2 nights straight after a 12hr day shift at work.

I arrived at the lake late on and made haste in finding a decent peg. Given the conditions during my stay I had 2 swims in mind. To my astonishment the first choice swim was free. I loaded up the barrow in a rush and headed straight for the swim. Before long I had 2 rods at range and one near a dot island. A good few kilo of hemp, tigers and C-food boilies was spombed over the rods. I settled down for the evening in expectation of the fish turning up in the morning. This had been the case on other trips in the same swim with similar conditions.

I awoke at 4am and decided to get up and put the kettle on. Shortly after 5am just before it got fully light I received my first liner on one if the long rods. As soon as it got light enough I could make out activity on the long spots. Plumes of bubbles peppered the surface and I felt a take looked imminent. During the rest of the morning fish fizzled and showed over the long rods and I received nothing but a few liners.

As the morning drew on the activity slowed down and my confidence dwindled away. I couldn’t believe I had not had a bite as they was seen clearly feeding and showing over the long rods. I had hoped I had no bait on when I reeled in. To my surprise both rods still had bait on and the hooks was super sharp. I didn’t have a clue what had gone on that morning but I knew things had to be changed for the last night. I decided to change my rigs for something less inconspicuous and fished whittled down baits on the 2 long rods. Come evening I recast the rods topped up the spots with another kilo or two of the mix and hoped for better luck.

At 4:30am one of the long rods burst in to life. I scrambled down to the rod and was met with the spool spinning. After a pretty straight forward fight a 20lb mirror lay beaten in the folds of the net. As I was sorting out the mirror my right rod was now away again a pretty 24lb mirror being the culprit. The remaining of the morning past by quietly.

It was a great start to the tricky pit and I knew the change had definitely unlocked the code as such.

Bag a biggun