Penultimate Day of the River Season

I'd been informed the Derwent looked to be at a reasonable level, so headed down there. My mate couldn't make it today so I was on my own, or self-isolating as everybody calls it these days. Sure enough it didn't look to bad when I got there. My initial intention was to fish some slacks below the weir, but it was tanking through and there was very little slack water. Another angler was catching roach and grayling on the feeder in one of the deeper slightly slower swims.. After a bit of a natter I returned above the weir to fish the two slacks I'd fished last time I was here.

After a bit of plumbing around a float legered roach was drop in the downstream slack. As I was setting up the second rod the float disappeared and I was into a powerful fish. After a bit of a protracted  battle when it got into the main current it was in the net. 106cm and 19lb 2oz a nice start to the day. Comparing photos when I got home showed it to be the twenty form the previous visit here. Had it spawned, or had it struggled to feed during the floods?

A little while later the first of the heavy showers passed over, so up with the brolly. The angler from below the weir appeared, apparently the speed of the current ha increased massively and even a heavy feeder was been swung round in to the snags. We assumed the sluices by the weir had been opened. This also caused the down stream slack to change shape and the upstream one to shrink. When I went to reposition the upstream bait it was snagged. Having wrapped the braid round the handle of the pliers I proceeded to pull, but instead of the hooks bending as they usually did the braid parted at the knot to the wire trace. Not something I like to happen, but it was Friday the 13th. Nothing else happened until late afternoon when the downstream float popped under. Again I contacted with something heavy, but everything went slack. On retrieving the rig the wire trace had parted. Measured against a new trace it appeared to have gone just at the upper hook. This is 40lb Carboflex, a wire I've never had problems with before. I've had 7 strand stuff from various manufactures fail before, presumably from kinks, but this stuff is very very had o kink. Hopefully with the hooks been barbless the fish will be able to dislodge it.

Tomorrow is the last day of the river coarse season, my mate and myself have yet to decide what to do and with it been a weekend we suspect there may well be  a few others fishing. There seems to be a group of people that only fish the rivers on the first and last days of the season and always seem to be in the best swims. Quite why I've taken part in this ritual for so long I have no idea.