A little bit of fishing

Guesting

A short session today on the middle Trent.
Set off in the mist from home at about 9am arrived by the river, with surprisingly little mist at about 10:30 after meeting my host at the Fox.

The swim

downstream

The river looked in prime condition, up and running with good colour.
I set up two rods,one to fish the inside line, the other off the crease.
I had taken my float rod but decided against using it, conditions weren't quite right,and the banks were dangerous to get down to a decent spot to trot.
The inside line got an almost immediate violent take on a large bit of pink stuff,  I wasn't ready for it so thought I would leave it in and let it develop, five minutes later another take and I was into a fish, it didn't move a great deal stuck to the bottom, even under full pressure it only moved slowly the...snap, not a loud crack but just a give.With no knots, just a free lined chunk, I think it must have been a pike!
Both rods remained fairly inactive for the rest of the session, so I tried alternating with lobworm and flake on the second rod, and landed a chub of about 2lb on the worm, That was about it.
Watched a kingfisher sit a while in the upstream bush, plenty of long tail tits chattering in the bankside trees, and a buzzard or two mewing away, one flew over me and was being nibbled at by a crow, a quick wing dip and it was off..
It was a nice day to be beside the river.

Jim's 80th
 My day was cut short because we had an appointment with neighbour Jim to celebrate his 80th birthday.
Eight of us descended on a  hotel just outside Louth for what turned out to be a very good meal , my turn to drive so not too may drinks for me.
When we got in at 11pm The Boss asked if I fancied a nightcap, my response was in the positive, with a long often used phrase when asked the same question, "do bears crap in the woods"?
So, we started and polished off a bottle of merlot whilst watching the highlights of Fulham beating the Villa on the box.