One of the problems when you live some distance from a river you want to fish, and have no contacts in the are, is knowing what state it's in. I can look at GaugeMap and see that the river has fallen quite considerably after the recent rain. There's even a web cam, but it's a lot farther down stream. What I don't really know what colour the river is and as it many years since I fished it regularly I don't know if it's at a suitable level for fishing. My local rivers I know from the levels whether they’re fishable or what a sections are fishable at what levels. One river doesn't fish well above 0.5m on the gauge. An other is OK up to 1m after which only certain sections are fishable. At 2m different sections are fishable. Once it gets above 3m you'll have problems finding the bank.
As it looked to be about 6-7" up on when I'd last visited and with se trout been caught down stream I decided to venture up there and attempt to catch one on fly. In the distant past I'd caught them on worm and spinner, which if the experts are to be believed is the only way you'll get them.
On arrival the river didn't look too bad, coloured, but not heavily. There was a noticeable amount of debris dangling from trees high above the river and worse, the long bankside vegetation was all flattened in a down stream direction making waking upstream hard work.
I'd opted for a sink tip and light fly as I thought this might not snag as much as a weighted fly. For couple of hours I wandered upstream with out sight or sound of a fish when I arrived at one of the larger pools. After a few casts another angler appeared from the upstream section. He'd been fishing spinner and had similar results to me. Just as we were questioning whether the sea trout had got this far one leapt over the shallow riffle at the top of the pool. As I'd just poured a cuppa and stared a sandwich just before his arrival I invited him to have a chuck with the spinner. The only thing he managed to catch were a couple of twigs.
We decided there was little point thrashing this one pool and both set off back the way we came but on the opposite bank. After a while I came to a rather nice looking stretch that was unfishable, and nearly invisible, due to the trees from the other bank. At the end of the second cast there was there unmistakable silver flash of fish turning away just as I lifted the fly from the water. Next cast I was in. The fish quickly kitted across the river into the large eddy and using the back current shot towards me at speed as I frantically gathered line to try and keep contact. Much as I suspected would happen it was solid in the tree roots. I maintained a steady pressure as I entered the water, but it quickly became apparent that it was too deep for wading across. Suddenly everything went slack. Retrieving my fly I was quite pleased I'd manage to hook one even if it wasn't landed.
Further on I came across a hedgehog snuffling about. As I tried to get a decent picture of it with my phone there seemed to be an invisible line I couldn't cross with out it curling up in to a ball. One step back and it would unfurl it's self and carry on it's hunt for food.
After a few more casts in various likely looking holes it started raining and was now starting to get dark. Rather than struggle along the river bank I took to the road and made my way back to the car just in time for a rainbow to appear.
Another few days and the coarse season starts, but I’ll be back up here at regular intervals in pursuit of the trout.
It had just started to rain when I got to the parking spot, much as the weather forecast had said it would. This appeared to be one of the occasional showers, occasionally heavy. I sat in the car supping tea, waiting for it to ease off, which it did after 15 minutes. Wandering to the downstream end of the section didn't inspire me with confidence as I didn't see a single rise.
I started with a small foam beetle fished close to the edge or along the tree line as this was a tactic that had worked well after a rain when terrestrials get knocked out of the trees or bank-side vegetation. Didn't work this time though. Nor did anything else for that matter. For two hours I made my way back upstream with out sign of a fish. I tried spiders, goldhead nymphs, dries large and small, emergers, non of which elicited a thing. I even hauled a couple of lures through a couple of the deeper pools.
Back at the car I met another angler who'd had a couple of fish on the upstream section, before the downpour, but nothing after. He'd even tried worming to no effect . He doubted there would be any point fishing until the evening. Seven O'clock he reckoned. He was right. After spending another couple of hours fishless on another section, I caught my first fish of the day just after seven. This also caused a moment of panic. I reached to the pocket where I keep my phone only to find it unzipped,and empty. No sign of it in the other pockets either. If it had dropped out of the pocket the chances of finding were about nil, given the length of the vegetation and the fact I'd been wading as well. After a while I managed to convince myself I'd left the phone in the car.
I carried on fishing, upstream, with the size 16 Foam Dun that had caught the first fish and managed eleven more before arriving back at the car. The phone was on the parcel shelf, not the best place to leave it really. With about half an hours light left i I had a wander upstream and found several fish rising to olives in a largish pool. One problem though, I couldn't hit a take for love nor money. A change of fly and I was in. A larger than average fish, at seven inches. With plenty of fish still rising and a couple looking a bit bigger I thought I might enjoy some more sport. A couple of mallards had other ideas though. Drifting into the pool with their ducklings before panicking and fleeing, wings flapping downstream right through the pool. Nothing stirred after that, so I took the hint and headed home.
The journey home was not with out incident either. Due to a broken tractor on a single track road, I had to take a different route to usual. This involved going through a few wooded areas and the deer were on the move. Several times I had to brake sharpish as they bounded across the road.
