It's been a while

Fishing and thoughts
I've been down the Trent a few times since my last blog and I''d like to say it has been a productive time, but it hasn't been worth putting pen to paper.
Having said that, the last time out, I took a note book with me I've, never done it before, but thought I'd see if I was getting inspiration to write whilst awaiting that three foot twitch.

So, this is how it went, and as written.

The idea is that if I get any inspiration or thoughts whilst I fish two rods into the middle Trent perhaps I should jot them down.
I can't say that I normally have inspirational thoughts, so having sat here for an hour without movement from my rods, accompanied only by the occasional passing boat, an annoyed wren, and a vole at my feet having a fleeting dash out of cover towards my spilled hempseed, I've taken up my pen.
A skein of geese pass before me in their usual V shaped formation, for identification purposes they too far away for my eyesight, and my lens.

Probably pink footed

Over my shoulder is the mewing of a buzzard, generally though it's all quiet.
There are three other cars along the stretch, not near enough to chat to. The wren still wants to though, and there's a kingfisher close by betrayed by her call but, not by a fly by.
It's 2pm, very little movement from the fish, but that is not unusual on this stretch, as surface movement usually starts as the sun goes down.
A chap named David A from Oakham has turned up at this time, and we chat for some while before he settles down to tackle up in the swim just upstream from me. 
He fishes solely for barbel and uses an apple corer chunk of spam as his main bait, he feels it picks out the bigger fish.

It's now 4pm, just a couple of knocks, if I was negative I would have put down to leaf debris!
A good size flock of fieldfare pass overhead chattering individually to each other.
David pops over again, he's bite-less too, but he's just had a four horse accumulator come in, and goes on to tell me a few tales about what is his favourite and well studied hobby of horse racing, and betting.
I'm getting desperate now, only two hours to go to dusk at around 6.30, other anglers have passed by on their way home, all reporting a bad day with no bites.
So, I've poured myself a cup of coffee, and have a pee in
the hope, as so often happens, a fish is induced to bite....well.... that failed!

David pops along for a further chat (he's obviously getting bored). This time he tells me of his business woes, a total loss of his premises due to a fire in his chimney's last May. 

It then occurs to me just who he is, so we continue chatting about the insurance claim, and how it affected his staff.

I'll not go into the detail of our chat here, as it is still an ongoing matter.

Once again I'm on my own it's 5.30pm, I continue in hope.
At last, a few nudges on my quarter tin of garlic spam, time to put the other rod away.
The nudges continue and finish with a big tug stripping line from my baitrunner...and that was it. 
Big spam gone!
I think the eels come out at night, as I've experienced this before. Maybe I'll have a go for them sometime. It's reported four pounders have been taken accidentally .
The session ends with just one last cast, as always, in
the hope of that three foot twitch.

I'll be taking my notebook with me again

Portugal
I mentioned last time that my 10 day trip was  cancelled.
It's subject to an insurance claim, but basically our flight out of Humberside to Amsterdam was delayed four hours due to a  gauge failure. 
A four hour delay would find us arriving in Amsterdam just as our fight to Oporto was leaving.
So we removed our luggage from the hold, and made our disappointed way home after checking if a later flight was available to Oporto. 
There wasn't.
As it happened the four hour delay eventually turned into a cancellation,so we are entitled to compensation of around £200 each plus the tickets cost to Amsterdam. Leaving us with an insurance claim for the air tickets to Oporto and back home, plus the lost deposit for the holiday.
So far the insurers have denied any liability, but the fight will go on.

Short breaks
We've had two since I last blogged.
Our first to our favourite inn in Norfolk, the Gunton Arms at Thorpe Market, a three night stay that lived up to all expectations in this deer park location. 
If anybody is interested, I last reported on this inn here. Gunton

Our next trip, just last week was to Poole in Dorset, the weather was at it's best, a final fling,18-20c after the morning mists.
We stayed in The Antelope Inn which was alright, and had a few pub crawls along to quay over three days.
A trip out to Brownsea Island was probably the highlight. 
A very natural place almost untouched by the National Trust.
We sighted our first non captive red squirrel which started off a three hour walk around the island. 

A magical place

Life on a big tree stump

Until the next time.