On that front I have been thinking of dusting the gloves down again and have been thinking of joining a local team and playing the odd game and have been delighted to hear that in my forties I can qualify for the local veterans team. I always thought there was a chance to play again at a sensible level as there were professionals still playing the game like Graham Hick and Teddy Sheringham in the Premiership who are both a similar age but now they have sadly retired. I listen to sport now and see that guys now playing at the best levels are the sons of people I used to watch. I am sure in my mind that I can still dive across first slip to take the thick edge but I think in “real life” that I’ll let the guy in the slips have a go for it!

The other thing I’d be thinking of trying was cycling but I just think it is so uncool. I have to admit it is nice to see a bunch of people getting out and doing some excercise but when they are riding 4 abreast and holding up the traffic thinking they are doing a good speed it can be annoying especially when I am in the truck and have trout to catch.

Emma and I recently walked to a nearby village where the Tour of Britain cycle race was passing. It was all very exciting but we had walked 4 miles to see something that passed us in about 1 minute but as least we had a lovely walk.

Fernworthy

There were a couple of guys standing there in their cycling regalia which looked in my mind ridiculous and then another one of them turned up and I listened while they talked in a technical language that sounded like gibberish. Emma and I talked about it on the walk back and we came to the conclusion that people would have probably said the same if I had stood there in my waders and had started speaking to another fly angler. That is the great thing about hobbies and pastimes. There are so many some might be of interest to some people but not to others and once you get into them they are great no matter how silly we might think as an outsider. That having been said my new Simms jacket is rather stylish….well, at least I think so!

Fernworthy Brown

I met up with Howard the other day to fish Fernworthy. The wind was pretty similar to what I had exeprienced at Colliford the week before. I used the same set up, a 6wt rod with intermediate line and black tadpole and it worked really well. I caught quite a few fish and once Howard tied on a tadpole so did he. I fished the lee side again and the fish were pretty well bunched and liked the fly with really short, brisk strips. I did have a couple on a fry pattern too but tadpole was the fly of the day.

I am just back from a couple of days fishing the chalkstreams and they have some seriously low water. It meant that the grayling were bunched in big pods and we also saw a few pike on the edges of the pods just keeping an eye on things. I’ll be writing more about this soon.

Westcountry grayling are back on the menu this week so with temps dropping I’ll be sure to keep the knees warm.

My good friend Jim Williams has a new version of his site up which is worth a look with agreat blog too.

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Colliford is one of my favourite stillwater destinations and at just under 1000 acres is always an interesting proposition with plenty of water to cover and as there are no boats you get to have a good walk too.

We pulled up and two things struck me. Firstly, the low water. This was no big surprise but the second was the white horses that the wind was whipping up that were crashing into the bank at the far side of the car park. We thought the wind would be a little lively but with the lake being perched up on Bodmin Moor it was always going to be a little worse.

Anyway, it was a day’s fishing and wind wasn’t going to get in the way. We both rigged up our 6 weights, Dave with a floater and me with an intermediate line. Floating lines are usually the norm but I like to fish a black tadpole and move it a bit and the intermediate keeps my fly a little lower in the water.

When I fish Colliford I like to get myself on the lee side of the wind as I often find fish there. I remember guiding there in conditions only slightly less windy and fishing the lee where the wind hadn’t rippled the water. The unbroken water was only a small area but it was like a bonefish flat as we walked along shin deep casting to rising fish with a dry fly

That was the plan. We fished the carpark bank frst though as the wind was on our backs here. Dave had a fish swirl at his fly almost immediately. I had a lively take from a stone and lost my fly and that was about it. We decided to head over to one of the bays and try where there might be a bit more shelter. The wind was a bit like the stuff that can blow up in NZ and Dave had to hang on to his cap as it was blown off a few times.

After a walk and a few M & M’s (they seem to have taken over from Hobnobs as they are easier to transport) we hit the new bay. It was a bit more sheltered but still a little lively. We split about 50 yards apart and had a go. Distance isn’t really an issue on the brown trout lakes as the fish can often be close in but  I like to alternate and cast one straight out and then one parallel to the bank. I did notice that there was a drop off and and so made sure that I fished my fly right in case I got a fish following right in.

I kept working the water but was watching Dave. He was having some fun spey casting his line out and firing it a good long distance. It was a pleasure to watch. I whacked one out and felt just the slightest touch and struck. The fish shook and then decided it didn’t like what was happening. I managed to get it in, get a quick photo (not a very good one) and then slipped it back.

It was that sort of day. We had to work hard for fish but felt we did ourselves justice. Dave had brought some excellent pasties and we sat on some rocks, had a breather, chatted and enjoyed it all. I guess that is what it is all about.

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Dartmoor School of Fly Fishing Fly Fishing Kennick Lake and Guiding on Dartmoor

The other thing is that I have got back is tying a few flies. I haven’t had the time to tie as many as I would have liked and I have relied on a few shop bought patterns and the last few of my “specials” that have lurked at the back of the fly box. I have never carried many patterns as I don’t feel the need and I much prefer to tie one on and make subtle changes rather than going for something completely different. The change up fly will be the same but might be a little smaller, or perhaps even bigger, or just a little darker. Often this will do the job as the river is telling me what is hatching, or not hatching. So the clues are all there.

Geraldine casts for salmon

I have been giving the flies I have been using some thought and in some cases I have tweaked them just a little. I really like this part of fly tying. Sometimes I’ll tie 1/2 dozen identical copies (or as near as I can get) and then sometimes they sort of mutate a bit and I start thinking what if I tie a trailing shuck instead of a normal tail? This can be really good fun to do and  is great when I sit at the vice, look at the flies and think, yup, they look good. It is even nicer when the trout give them the thumbs up. The only downside of this is that when I am experimenting I only tie a few and we all know that the life expectancy of a fly decreases when you only have a few in the box and the trout are biting hard on them. Then there is always that tree that wants to grab them.

I’ll put in a few of the new ones as I am out fishing with a good friend of mine in a few days and I’ll give them a go. It sounds like the good weather we are having is on the turn now but it will be good to be out there. I spoke to Ray (the Dude) who was hot footing it back to Denmark after a trip to Miami and he reminded me that we were wetting a line in Montana this time last year. I think it is OK to get a bit sentimental about that but I tend to let go after a while. Still banging on about a trip like that after a few years means you need to go on a new one and we have one in the planning. That’s the great thing about fly fishing there are so many great adventures you can embark on. Some may be a long way away but some of the best ones can be right on your doorstep.

Paul with a Taw trout

So is it the end? No way. As I said at the beginning there are still a lot of fish to catch if you know where to look and I can’t wait to go after them!

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This trip was different for a couple of reasons. Firstly that we decided not to fly. I am a little tired of the stealth costs of flying, especially when you are lugging a lot of gear with you. For this reason it made sense that we took the new fishing truck out to stretch its legs and I have always wanted to drive from the bottom of the country to pretty much the top.

The second reason is a pretty significant, and special one. It was to be Emma’s first fishing trip. I can’t really write how exciting this was to me and all the way up my fingers were crossed that we would have a good one.

We decided to split the upward leg of the journey by leaving on Saturday, staying in Kendal in the Lake District and then heading up to Banff on Sunday. Bar the usual traffic problems on the M6 we checked in to the hotel on Saturday night had a good dinner and excellent breakfast the next morning and headed north. That was, of course, before we made the obligatory stop at John Norris in Penrith. They very smartly open on a Sunday and the place was jammed full of fishermen making the trip up to Scotland who were eager to stock up on a few last minute essentials and even a few I saw who were getting completely kitted out for their fishing trips. It really is a nice store with friendly, helpful staff. It sort of reminded me of a store in Colorado The Dude and I visited a few years back that was the sort of place you wanted to visit before hitting the river.

As we made it just over the border into Scotland we passed over the Clyde as it snaked under the motorway. I think it was the third time we passed over it and looked to the left and it looked just like a stream from Mid West America. I really, really liked it!

When we got to the river on Monday it was just dropping, having come up a little. In my experience what usually happens is that after it has coloured it then goes a really dark peaty colour before clearing completely. As we are pretty much at the bottom of the river it means that the fish will run through pretty quick and so the top of the beats is the place to fish. That is where we started. We did see plenty of fresh fish along with a few coloured ones but no joys.

Circle Spey

On Tuesday we were towards the bottom and again we saw some fish but we didn’t really feel like we were in the game. I did have a trout followed next cast by a small sea trout.

Wednesday we were back at the top and in the afternoon Emma and I had the very top beat and the water was starting to just about clear a little. I was fishing a pool lower to Emma but heard her let out a yell and saw the rod briefly buck before a fish came off. I ran up quickly to help but the moment had passed. That was only before I had got back in and again Emma was briefly attached to a fish. The really nice thing was that she just laughed it off and made another beautiful cast.

Covering the water.....

It looked like the fish were on and not long after my line went tight and I lifted into a fish. I was guiding Paul just before we made the trip and he described the salmon he had caught as being plugged in to the electricity. That sounds just about right. Emma netted the fish, abeautiful hen, perfectly which we admired briefly before letting her continue her journey upstream.

One for me....dig the hat!

Thursday and we were back on the very lowest beats. Again Emma cast and fished beautifully and again was briefly attached to a fish that just didn’t stick. I had another small sea trout but despite covering the water well that was it for us.

Friday and the water looked really good but it felt a good deal cooler. Morning was quiet but after lunch it warmed a little and Emma chose her fly and decided the pool she wanted to fish. You know what? She was dead right as the line went tight and she lifted into a fish. I was standing by the truck putting an intermediate tip on my line as I had done with hers as we had fished fast sinkers all week.

The fish was hooked on the lip at the very tail of a pool and Emma expertly played the fish, keeping it under control. I headed out with a net and after a while the fish was netted. We thought we would keep the fish as it was a cock fish and Emma’s first salmon and so after dispatching, we hugged each other and I don’t mind admitting that I had a tear in my eye. It was the perfect moment and after all of the hard work Emma had put in she had been rewarded.

The reward for all of the hard work!

We had planned to fish the morning of the Saturday but thought that we would make the drive home in one go and so didn’t hit the water.

There were so many highlights of the trip but the main one is looking upstream and seeing Emma smile as she watched her line swing through the pool or being upstream of her and hearing her sing as she sent out another beautiful cast.

I don’t think it could have been a better trip. I think that the spinner outfished the fly that week but we wanted to fish the fly. It isn’t a snobbish, or certainly not an elitist thing – we just enjoyed making a nice cast feeling we were covering the water.

The other thing was that you don’t need a whole load of tackle or gear. As long as you can cover the water efficiently you are in with a chance. All we did was use a variety of differing sink tips and had doubles and various tubes. Emma used a Skagit set up which made life easy when you coupled it with a Circle or Double Spey.

Sometimes we get all hot under the collar with technicalities but there just isn’t always the need. We could easily say the Skagit line can land a little heavy on the water but when Emma had her first two takes it was in shallow, relatively clear water and the fish didn’t seem to mind too much. They are the ones who decide if we have done things correctly or not and they certainly don’t care how nice the loop was on the cast or if you have the latest “must have” fly on!

All in all though the fishing wasn’t the easiest but it was the most enjoyable. The truck was excellent (fishingmobile V.3), the food and accommodation outstanding and Emma, thank you so much for making this such a wonderful trip, I don’t think it could have been more perfect.

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He had flown into Heathrow so we thought it only right that we started with a day on the chalkstream and so we headed to a venue that we have spent so many happy times fishing. I went up early as we were going to fish the next day and stayed in the most excellent Grayling House B & B. Grayling House is owned by Rick and his wife Lorraine. I remember the first time I stayed there and Rick answered the door in a Simms fishing shirt and I knew I was in the right place. The rooms and breakfast are also stunning.

Rick pops one back

As The Dude wasn’t due ’til later I asked Rick if he fancied a fish for a few hours, which he leapt at. We strolled up the river casting to rising fish and caught a few nice ones. As well as running an fantastic B & B, Rick is an excellent fisherman, fly tyer and great company on the river too. If you are in the Salsibury area look them up, it is worth it!

The Dude had arrived and had sniffed us out on the river and as it was dark we thought it best to head to the pub for dinner and a few drinks.

Another one for Dude

End of day grayling

Next morning the sun was out and the fish were rising. Dude was in to fish straight away and I watched him pick up trout and grayling. I got into the river and followed him upstream, thankful that he’d left me a few fish to catch. There was one run I was watching him fish and it looked to me like it was almost a fish a cast!

As with every proper fishing trip we ate some junk for lunch then had a tailgate dinner which for Ray was a Chinese and for me one of the best fish and chips I think I have ever had. It looked as though things were getting cooler and quieter at 7pm but the bugs and the fish got a second wind and we fished on late before heading down the A303.

For the Devon leg of the trip I wanted to show Dude some places he hadn’t fished before, so on the first day we headed to the river that shan’t be named. It was cloudy with some light rain when we left home but when we got there the cloud stayed but it warmed. Perfect. I hung back and watched Dude get off of the mark and then went up and found some water to fish. Dude told me he had been reading the latest Gierach offering and he had mentioned that when fishing with a buddy he would leave 3 large stones in an obvious place where he had got in so that his fishing buddy knew where to get out. We tried it and it works really well. The day was perfect and we fished long and hard and just had a packet of chocolate biscuits for lunch.

A fish from the nameless river

under the tree Dude!

A fish for me from the nameless river

Planning for the last day was easy. We had always planned a trip up to Dartmoor but other trips had got in the way, so this was to be the destination. Weather was ideal and the first stream we headed to had some great pocket water that I know the Dude likes to fish. After a sausage roll (we’d had a barbie the previous evening so there were a couple left over) we fished Cherry Brook. I love Cherry Brook. Although small it is easy to think that there are only small fish in there but I have seen some real hogs that have come after smaller fish that my guests have hooked. I even let out an expletive when I saw this and spent the rest of the day apologising!

Picking a pocket

It is also easy to think that you need to fish tiny flies on Dartmoor. While this is often the case, the monster 14 1/2 incher we had the other week was on a size 14 and Dude fished a 16 on the first stream we fished but we did go down to a 20 for Cherry. The fish don’t read the books!

Dartmoor trout

We walked, talked and fished. It was such a good day with rising fish and we headed back for an ice cream and last look at the river. Where we stopped there were people, dogs and just about everything else and the fish were still rising just beside them I guess they just get used to it all. The hardest part would have been trying to make a cast with all the tourists about.

Cherry Brook trout

So that is the trip. It was great, as ever, to fish with Dude I miss him so much now that he lives abroad but we are already planning another trip. His daughter Mia is showing an interest in fishing and Mia if you are reading I hope you’ll join us one day!

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I have been doing a fair bit of casting tuition over the last few weeks and a phrase I seem to be using a lot is “the line follows the rod tip” it sounds obvious but if you can get a student to grasp that from an early stage it really does help and make a difference. By just demonstrating a forward cast and showing an exaggerated low stop with the rod tip right at the water conveys a lot especially when the line hits the water like a bag of spanners. You can do the same with a back cast too. You use excessive wrist break and the line follows that rod on a downward path into the grass.

Richard gets to grips with single handed speys

I was also teaching an advanced angler the other day who is going to be fishing one of my favourite rivers upcountry and wanted some help with learning some slack line casts. Again, using the same phrase of line following the rod tip he was soon making wiggle casts with ease and putting mends into his cast whereever he wanted. We had great fun coming up with combinations for the ultimate drag free drift.

The drag free drift maestro!

I know there are lots of other elements involved to make a good cast, but this was one that seemed to crop up a lot of late and worked really well with the learning process. I’m from the school of keep it simple!

The trout season is almost upon us and the wind has shifted from the chilly North Easterly we have had of late. It is still blowing a bit but I’m just in from some gentle pruning and making sure access points are all looking good for the off….can’t wait!

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Something like this has happened over the last few days to me. I was at the hotel talking to some early season salmon anglers who turned out to live just where my parents do. No big coincidence there but next day I was at the hotel ahead of pruning some of the banks when Nick the hotel owner showed me a copy of a book they had left behind for him to read. It turns out that one of them had “liberated” it from a hotel he was staying in while on a trip to San Francisco.

The book, called Where to Fish, is a 1953 edition and just inside is an advert for the hotel where we are based: the Fox and Hounds. It even says that it was possible to get a train from Waterloo Station in London direct to Eggesford. This probably doesn’t either sound much or mean a great deal either but Eggesford Station is now just a little provincial station where a 2 carriage train stops once an hour.

So this is a nice little start to things. Next though,yesterday Emma and I decided to take the train from Eggesford to Barnstaple instead of making the drive in. It is a great journey for the fly angler as the train follows the Taw all the way. I think it was a little embarrassing for Emma as I jumped from side to side of the carriage as the river turns and twists its way to the sea. It was great to see the water I work on from a different perspective and further down the river I even saw a couple of anglers out on the water.

We did a little wander around Barnstaple and decided to head back. We quickly darted into WH Smith as I like to keep up to date with the fishing magazines and as we walked out of the door I saw a little section of local books. The cover of one had a guy fishing on the cover so I called back Emma and popped back in.

I flipped open the cover and saw that it was a collection of essays regarding fishing trips a gentleman had made over his fishing career. The one that caught my eye was 20 odd pages about fishing the  Taw at the Fox and Hounds. At  over 200 pages and in hardback the £2.99 seemed pretty fair and made it even cheaper than all the magazines, so I bought it.

When we got home I sat down with a cup of tea and opened the book at the Fox and Hounds chapter. The next spooky bit was the the writer first visited the hotel in 1953, the same year as the book I picked up the other day.

I have to be honest and say when I bought the book I was guessing it was going to be one of those “it wasn’t like that in my day” sort of affairs, but it wasn’t. It probably won’t mean much to most people but I read the chapter intently as it describes the fishing down all of the beats. It was so nice reading about pools that I have come to know so well and see how the writer used to fish them. I even picked up a tip on how he used to fish one of them!

I don’t think I would have noticed this book unless it was placed right by the door as I hardly ever go in the book section at Smiths.

The writer, Peter Harvey, was born in 1921 but the book was published in 2006 so I have contacted the publisher to see if they can try and put me in touch with him (if he’s still alive as he’d be 90 now) as I would really love to talk to him about the times he used to fish on the water so my fingers are crossed that he gets my message. I’ll keep you posted.

The book has some other sections about his fishing experiences so I’ll have a read of those too. It probably won’t mean a lot to a lot of people but just in case it does here are the details.

So, there are just 11 days til the trout season starts…getting excited?

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The new flies mean I have had to do one of my favourite things – tidying the fly boxes. As a guide I don’t actually carry loads of flies when I am working. I have a box that carries all the dries and then one that carries subsurface patterns from spiders to bead nymphs and just about everything inbetween. I then keep a sort of Mothership fly box in my truck that I can replenish supplies with should I need them. I plan on travelling a little lighter this year and have made a few purchases that I’ll write about a bit later.

Pete and his first trout

It has been good seeing guests this early in the year for casting sessions, including some newcomers too. I have been watching the temperatures pretty closely as there have been times when the lake has been frozen, but other times when the fish have been going mad on the small windows where a hatch takes place. I bought a new rod last week and wanted to try it out but when we got there the lake was frozen. Nightmare…..perhaps tomorrow……

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I’m not one for huge distances these days but having the tape measure allows me to check on my tracking. If you want to throw any sort of distance you want that rod to track as straight as possible. When you are carrying a lot if line and your tracking is out it is like having a brick tied to the end of the fly line and makes the task a lot harder than it needs to be. As a right hander, tracking problems can often highlight themselves when the line lands on the water and a right hander usually has the end of the fly line hooking to the left or has the line laying from where the rod has stopped across the body and continuing to move from right to left.

The tape measure gives you a good clear idea of how straight the rod is moving and I sometimes let me back cast drop on the grass behind me to see that it is nice and straight. You’ll see that your best casts always run parallel to the tape.

It is fun to do and, although it doesn’t lend itself to fishing conditions too well, the ability to hit 90 to 100ft casts consistently and with ease will make the real life fishing casts of 50 to 65ft all the more simpler.

The really cool thing is that Emma has been coming out and watching and then joining in with a few casts. It is a dream of mine that she comes fishing a bit more and things look more like that will happen. It is easy to try and force things a little too quickly so I have also been careful not to interfere too much but she was casting away and throwing some pretty mean loops. We had set a target which she met and then the next day she said she wanted to try and beat it again. I didn’t cast but stood down by the end of the measure to see how things were going and to shout some encouragement.

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The next thing I know I see the leader pass over my head and another PB was reached! All this has happened because she has started to double haul. Now my memory isn’t what it was but I don’t remember teaching her to haul! It turns out that she had watched me doing it and mimicked it. The great thing was that it was spot on and worked perfectly. I just let her get on with it and she was carrying a nice amount of line and hit a very creditable 72ft. Clearly I started saying that she would catch fish anywhere in the world with a cast like that but I managed to calm down a little and, like before, we’ll keep taking small steps. Great casting Em!

It was great to meet up with my good pal Jim Williams on his home waters. No wonder the grayling of the Coln have so much to fear. I love watching him fish a longer rod and light line, he is class in a glass!

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It is Missoula in Montana. Of all the places I have been lucky enough to visit in my angling life this is the real deal as far as I am concerned. It has everything; good people, great rivers, a great feel and some damn fine coffee shops! One even had a fly shop attached which meant we could have breakfast, coffee and then do some shopping. It doesn’t get much better than that.

As ever, I was accompanied by Ray (The Dude) who is the best company I could wish for and has been present on all of the very best overseas fishing trips. He knows the town and the fishing, and a childhood friend John lives there and has his own drift boat.

The Dude, John, driftboat and lunch.....perfect!

The thing I loved about Missoula was the sheer variety of fishing that was on the doorstep but despite being Montana’s second biggest town with a population of 75,000 it never felt busy and a 10 minute drive out of town you were in fishing country. We ticked off some of the rivers I’d read about and then dreamt about, The Bitteroot, Blackfoot, Clark Fork and Rock Creek and started a bit further afield on the Big Hole which was a special day for so many reasons that I’ll be writing about in the very near future.

On the way back from the Big Hole we fished the Bitteroot for the first time and I think I can speak on behalf of the Dude when I say we were smitten. We happened to sniff out an excellent fly shop in Hamilton and got talking to Sean the owner who pointed us to some water at the edge of town. If I wasn’t on a fishing holiday I might have felt a little dubious about being sent to the town water but how spot on was Sean? Right on the money! First pool I fished was stuffed with fish and I managed browns, rainbows, cutts and whitefish on a NZ set up. Sean you are the man!

If you are ever in Montana drop by his store you won’t regret it. The nice thing was that he’d just dropped by to check out some things and had the day off. I was even more pleased to hear he was going fishing and we managed to bump into him again as his drift boat came to the parking ramp just as we were starting to hit a spinner fall.

There is loads more to tell you about, which I will in time, but it was great to meet John and to get a couple of days fishing with him and to see the Dude at the helm of the drift boat. Great work matey!

Although trout fishing has stopped here we have grayling and pike to get to work on and I need to dust down my permit flies. One of those would be a great way to finish 2010 and think we might have a few new surprises for you for 2011!

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