With my son Lee
down from Edinburgh,
we decided to catch up on some fishing. Dave Gabe, skipper of the Cheeky Monkey
out of Appledore had offered us a day out on his boat in the estuary, so we
decided that we couldn't let this pass. Reg Talbot, my long time fishing buddy also
joined us as we fished the channel by Greensands.
We expected a
few bits and pieces but were taken aback when we started catching codling right
under the boat. If we tried uptiding or casting downstream, we had no bites but
about 10 yards behind the boat we had a steady stream of bites on the crab
bait. To us, it still seemed a bit warm
and early for codling, but other boats off Lundy had been catching them too.
I was delighted
to catch my first plaice and there was a
stream of bass too, but only one keeper as the others were schoolies.
We were fishing
a spring tide with strong tidal flow, but the bites kept coming until the tide
fell to a level where we had to leave to be able to unload on the quay at
Appledore.
The trip was great
fun and exceeded our expectations so we will be doing it again.
If anybody
reading this is interested in joining any of our trips, let me know and I will
add you on to a circulation list for next year.