27th May 2010

Four years!
Yes, it's four years since I started up my blog.
Have I regretted it? No
Have I gained from it ? Not certain about that, probably not.
Have I enjoyed writing it ? Yes. So that means I've gained from it...I suppose!
On top of that, I'm not too bothered what others may think of my writing, it's a personal diary , and that's the way it will probably stay.Unless I get some signs of wisdom in my dotage!

Late May
I've come back from Australia, fair to say, I'm refreshed by the experiences over the 30 odd days.
Meeting up again with the family and seeing how Ted and June's kids have matured, also meeting their offspring, and how they are fitting  in with the new multicultural world of theirs.

I'm also refreshed by the state of the garden, all fully grown since my last view back before Easter.
I've missed the great tits fledging, but the nest box has been taken over by a colony of small bumble bees, so I shall watch what they are up to with interest.
Apart from cutting the grass in the back garden which must have been a good six inches long, my front garden was looked after by John from around the corner ( my quiz team mate), there's just a bit of tidying up needed.
The ivy which has taken over the flank wall of my house needs trimming back or removing, but I've found a wren's nest, it's empty and probably an offering by the male wren not taken up by a mate.
I'll keep an eye on it

I've found a song thrush nest with 5 eggs in the hydrangea next to the front windows, a surprise find because the local blackbird pair took every opportunity to chase them off earlier in the season.

We'll need to have another go at the vegetable patch, the slugs/snails have made a good meal of them.
The fruit trees are looking well laden as are the fruit bushes, so a good crop expected all round.

Front garden

Wisteria

For the very first time our wisteria has flowered

My "dry" river bed

 back garden

"orchard"

the pond

I've had my first pint of proper "warm" beer, well three, yesterday lunchtime

June
It's make my mind up time this month.
Do I renew my Barbel Society membership and Scunthorpe Pisces, or my subscription to Coarse Angling Today ?
Do I look at different opportunities to fish? I must admit the call of the tench is stronger than it has been for some years?
My CAMRA membership is due for renewal, tempted to put that to one side for the time being, the jobs done there I think.
Decisions..decisions!

So just about ready to get out and fish...maybe Tuesday to see if there are any tench..Down in the Valley.

It's just stopped raining, so I'm off out to enjoy the countryside....via the bottle bank!

I think I've been bitten!

two elbows!

Australian Experience(Part two)

The itinerary

On our last visit to Australia 8 years ago, we started in Perth(via Singapore) moved up to Exmouth, back to Perth.
The we got on a train to Adelaide, flew on to Melbourne, then by plane to Sydney and then across to the North Island New Zealand we couldn't get the the South Island because the Cook Straight was closed due to the weather. Then home(via Bangkok).
We decided we would have to go back go back to see more of the country. It took a long time, but with much world travel in between time!
I think I have, somewhere the report I did to our travel agent, I may well put it on here!

17th April to 19th May
This time, using the same agent, we decided to see a little more of the country.
So, we started in  Kuala Lumpa , had two days there before flying on to Sydney and two days more. Then flying up to Cairns for a couple of nights and to pick up a hire car and drive slowly down the coast to Brisbane over 13 days.
From there we flew across to Perth, had an overnight and then flew up to Exmouth (Learmonth) for a week with my brother Ted, his wife, of 40 years June and the dog Mollie!

Whilst there, we met up with their second daughter Vicky and her husband Jeff ( a boat owner) and their two kids (Alex and Axel). More about that later.

Exmouth is a town on the tip of the North West Cape in Western Australia. Located 1,270 kilometres (798 miles) north of the state capital Perth.

After the week with them we flew back to Perth for two nights, and to see the rest Ted's "kids" Katie, Debbie, (little) Ted and their 8 kids,

Vicky,Ted, Debbie and Katie

Then straight home, business class on Malaysian Airlines.
All in all a great trip, with plenty of very good food. I could detail our experience but I'm not certain it will interest my readers.
I can say is there is still a great deal to see, so before we leave it too late, we need to get back, to visit Tasmania, the South Island (NZ), maybe Darwin and the north and more fishing off Exmouth!

The fishing

With Jeff, working for most of the week we managed, apart from a couple of attempts at shore fishing with lures, to get out on his boat for one day, in an autumn temperature nudging 30c.

Our day started with the launching of the boat from a trailer into fairly strong on shore winds that were pushing waves straight into the jetty giving us a good chop to contend with and potential to push the boat back onto the loading ramp, or into the jetty..

At first, Jeff was of a view that it wouldn't be an easy task to do this, what with my inexperience and young Alex age 11, also holding the ropes.
So we held off for a while awaiting the expected calming of conditions.
In the meantime a more experienced team of 4 arrived and launched their boat without a problem,  so Jeff said OK, lets do it. I'm not certain that Alex was very confident with that decision!
After a slight struggle and some bumps, Alex and I managed to secure the boat to the jetty, whilst Jeff moved his 4 x 4 off the ramp to a parking area.
The trip out was a bit bumpy, to say the least, and although I don't suffer from the mal di mer, young Alex was a bit peaky.
He soon overcame this, when within 5 minutes of trolling off the back of the boat I hooked into and landed a Spanish mackerel. I'm advised of about 13kg.

There were no more takes on the way to Jeff's first first mark.
I must confess at this stage, that I've always seen sea fishing as a bit of a chuck it and chance it way to fish, so have not put myself out too much to fish this way.
Over the mark we pulled in the trolling rods and made use of some lighter tackle, my first problem was the fact that I had little experience of a multiplier reel, especially one set with a right hand wind!
Anyway, after baiting up with strips of mullet, I was soon fishing at about 20 metres depth with a heavy lead on the bottom and two baited hooks up the trace, and the boat on a drift through the mark.
This is where my thoughts changed on the chuck it and chance it approach,as I was soon feeling the tugging of fish and hit into a big tug which turned out to be a very colourful rankin cod.

It was rankin HOT!!

It was a hard pull up from the bottom as the fish was a good size, but with the kit, I had no experience of a fight....that was to come later!!
We landed a good few fish, moving marks in rapidly improving weather conditions, including tomato cod, bluebone. Some of the catch were undersized that went straight back in, some not fine eating, but which backed up our bait bucket, which was rapidly diminishing.

tomato cod

What we hooked and didn't land, as we weren't fishing for them and our tackle wasn't up to it, were the sharks!
On two occasions I had what I felt were good fish taken by shark, one minute I was hauling up, the next minute my rod is bucking and pulling it's way around the boat.
My first straightened the hook, the next I thought I had the better of, but it bit through the trace after a hard tussle. This was the fight I hadn't experienced earlier.
So after some hours of drift fishing, sometimes with a drogue,especially over the deeper marks, Jeff thought we should see if we could get ourselves a marlin or sailfish.
The trolling rods were put out again in flat calm waters and I was very soon into a fine barracuda, I'm told of about 10 kg.
We didn't get a picture as Jeff was quick with the long handled pliers to remove the hook whilst the fish was still in the water, and I was too excited to think about the photo opportunity.... I do remember it had a fine set of teeth, not certain I would have fancied it on board though!
I did get one more fish on the troll before we got back to shore, which was a small longtail tuna.

No luck with the big game fish though.

We had fish and chips that night, Jeff did the preparation and cooking. The cod were very fine tasting fish, gently fried in a crumb.
The mackerel was expertly filleted cross cut into steaks and is currently in brother Ted's freezer.


I'll be back!

That's it for now

Monday

I ventured back to pond one, aiming to get myself a crucian carp, to see if they had got any bigger.
My aim entailed ground up fish meal pellets and mixed it with liquidised bread for feed, some more worms and hooker pellets.
There was a cold North Easterley blowing down the pond and I hadn't prepared for that, it was freezing, especially around my lower back.
I soldiered on and soon had the rudd and roach taking the small red worms before the first carp of the early evening turned up.

This was followed by my first crucian of the year, so my hopes were high that I had made the attracter right.
It was not to be, even with the soft hookers, some roach and more carp and a lone chub, no more crucian showed.

Tuesday

The wind had turned this evening to an equally cold Easterly, this time the thermals came in useful.
Unfortunately, my aim to attract roach with some hempseed failed, it was comparatively speaking, a very slow early evening session.
A few roach and the occasional rudd, not of any size, the one carp and close to home time a small eel.
I had bought an old packet of prawns from the freezer, they had turned to a mush so formed some loose feed, which whiffed a bit, and probably bought the eel in!

Heading back after the line snapped at the hook.

So, my early spring sessions come to an end for a while down in the valley.
Roach, rudd, carp, chub, crucian an eel and a very good 3lb perch to show for my expeditions.
I'm convinced there must be bigger roach and perhaps perch, so I'll be back to test the water of the three ponds in a few weeks time.

What time do you call this?

Crack of sparra's

It's 4:30 am, and I'm wide awake for the second morning, to the sounds of the song thrush and the wren.
I don't know why I'm awake, but I did go fishing yesterday afternoon down to the triangle.
It was one of those frustrating sessions where nothing was in the right place and little things niggled, and I dabbled!
Too much fishing?
Probably not, probably something to do with our big trip!
Anyway, I wasn't going to write this trip up but I've already had two cups of Assam, so here goes.

We dug over our "orchard" area and removed a good crop of a creeping buttercup and found some worms!
So I thought,why not?
I fished a different swim, it was 8 foot in the edge, so the deep end.
Tried it at all depths, and all I could get were small rudd, not a touch on the bottom, I think the fish are in the shallower, warmer areas.
 So I moved to the opposite corner where I had about 6 feet in front of me, just where the trees finish and was immediately into a carp and a chub.

 

The carp all seem to be around the 7lb mark, most I've caught so far, have digs on the flanks, or have had scales damaged, not certain what that is, hope it's not an anglers id!!
They give a fair tussle on the Aspindale, but I think I've damaged the Drennan landing net handle, where the net screws in.
 I shall need to have a look at that, it's gone floppy, mind you it did give a crack as I lifted into a carp with probably too much of the handle extended.

I fished until the sun went below the horizon, not certain about this pond yet, I was hoping for a sign of roach, or even another good perch but no show..
Which brings me back to my dabbling. I took along a box of soft lures with the intention of practicing drop shotting.
Nothing to report, but I'll give it another go when my mind is in the right place, it turned out to be  a few casts with no real thought.

As I have to, I drove past the pub on the way home, thinking, shall I drop in?
I didn't, instead settled in front of the tv with a bottle of wine, a packet of crisps, a chunk of cheddar and fell asleep!
Now I know why I'm awake!
A wasted dawn,should have been down the pond instead of making this up as I go along?
Nah,I'll leave it to the weekend anglers, but,  if I'm awake Monday at the same time,who knows?

Tight lines to my readers, and have a good weekend