Another place…..

On the move yet again…..this time to Bordeaux. No fishing there…well I am not sure if there is any in the area…actually it might be fun finding out.

We have just returned from Chatsworth and a very swollen river Derwent. However, it was just possible on all three days to catch fish though using methods that might have got Charles Cotton a littel exercised! It was a technique that I learnt on the trip to Norway and I will be describing how Espen employs his deadly technique in a future issue of Fly Fishing and Fly Tying…I think they call that a “teaser” in the trade! Certainly it caught me fish in near impossible conditions….conditions ordinarilly I would have just not bothered to fish .

I guess we will at laest have the wine to go with the fish in Bordeaux…but just what fish will there be?  Watch this space!

Back from rainy Norway and into rainy Chasworth

After a very intriguing few days in Norway amidst on of Europe’s truly last wildernesses…it is back to the reality of “show-time” and the Chatsworth Country Fair. A fabulous event that could be sunny, might be windy and is invariably all of these things  and raining, too. We all love it: that crowds do, too. The English are odd that way.

The problem has been the river: it is the colour of dark tannin infused mahogany, swollen, lapping the edge of the casting platform and to add to everything, I am supposed to catch trout to order!   I have managed to do it on Friday and today…I am really not al all  sure about tomorrow/to-day….so if you want to see a grown man probably burst into tears whilst trying to wade and catch trout….you know where I will be! Mind you, thank goodness for Espen, Norway and a brand new technique of fly fishing in tricky situations….all will be revealed in the forthcoming Fly Fishing and Fly Tying magazine….it is the “code breaker” when conditions are devastatingly tough… a bit like now, really. Better get some rest, I think tomorrow’s dawn and catching trout in front of an audience are both going to be greeted with a degree of caution and impending pessimism!

A splendid start to the day……

Midge and I (well the dog does actually make the key decisions in our establishment…) decided that the morning looked good for a wander along Hambledon Hill – of course we both got caught in the showers. Midge being slightly better protected than me…labrador coats seem to shed water better than fleeces.  No matter.

What was intriguing though, and sight of sheer joy; was to see tiny fragments, of what looked to be sky, lift from the ground and dance into the air. the lower slope of chalk-downland was alive with Adonis blue butterflies. If ever there was a sight that gladdened the spirits then this was it. Fanatstic. The wonder of nature. Fragile toughness at its best.  Off now to fish the Frome and Piddle – a nice’ish day for it.

I also could not resist this image taken by my dear friend and very noted coarse fisher Jan Porter at the Broadlands show – the title, I guess, should be: ” man eats fly line in utter, abject, frustration in the Test”

Jan suggested making sandwiches  in future.

All the fun of the Broadlands Fair.

This weekend was one of those magical late summer holiday weekends – not so sunny as to be difficult: not so hot as to be stupefying. Cool enough to feel comfortable and enough rays to perk up the skin tone. The estate at Broadlands and the river Test  looked her magical best.

The downside? none of we assembled demonstrators could catch anything. Because of previous fair indiscretions (barbecuing  trout without permission) Bob Nudd (who thrives on catching fish in his spot), the very splendid Jan Porter, David Woolsencroft Dodds and I were relegated hook less, fly less, baitless and everything else that might even vaguely enrapture a passing fish Tsk.  Still, it did not deter the fine folk that bothered to watch. and I would truly like to thank all the lovely people – fishers and non-fishers alike – that said such nice things and bothered to watch me during the casting and cooking sessions. Your fantastic:  and very appreciated. I am also attaching a “shot” proving that there can be some glamour attached to fly fishing – Mattha (the doyen of English lady competitive fly fishers on the left and  Gilly Bate ((right) one of the most ebullient and personable guides in the South )  prove that it doesnt have to be Whiskers and macho.

Pike fly fisher David WD in the other image proves that it does……

your choice.

Happy Monday.

Show Time. Broadlands on the fabled Test.

Given that my current web site situation is in limbo and poorly, I am using this glorious facility to update stuff.

It is Broadlands show in Romsey, Hampshire  this weekend . The left hander goes into casting action…and a bit of cooking. The scene should be fabulous and see us casting on the lower reaches of the River Test. it might be fun to see Bob Nudd try and land a summer salmon on pole. Bit more of a “pull” than his large bream from a similar event the other month.   Full report and images tomorrow.

But please if you have a mo…come along and have a chat.

and there I was thinking…….

Life is a very funny thing.

Just when you think “Ahha….sorted”.  It jolly well  isn’t..

There I was, happily whiling away an hour or so on the train, get off at Woking to get the  coach to Heathrow…bags of time… de dah… de dah…and then…nothing. Nothing is there. No coach; OK an ambulance with sirens and lights going, but a coach? Nope. The one that was destined to take me to the airport had – for some reason or another – been cancelled. Of course the next coach would have made me too late to get my flight.Thus good folk in cyber land I am sitting at home pecking away at the keyboard thinking that Midge and I might go fishing on the Frome tonight. All the stuff is packed and I at laest know where it all is!  So Norway is delayed and the lovely man there is frantically trying rearrange everything.  I am not sure I am able to publish my true feeling towards the rail air service! I will leave that to your various futile imaginations…I will however let you all know how Midge and I get on, along the River.

Rover and Out.

Given that my last piece showed remarkable, left handed typos……look, my typing is pretty rubbish anyway; but left handed, and it spirals into catastrophe. I am just in the throws of packing for Norway and an adventure…to, well that’s it, I don;t know. Anyway I will report in due course. Can I thank all the lovely people that have been so kind to me over the last two weeks and showing their concern over my injuries, It really has been a tonic. Thank you SO much.
Also: I discovered very fabulous cheese at the Peover show yesterday Mrs Bourne’s Cheshire (well it would be, wouldn’t it) . Glorious. simply utterly delicious.
Also fished with Son Alex last Friday in Devon and our great friend Lewis…what it is to fish around young people. It makes me feel young, too…and then I like in the mirror. Ho hum. Tight loops

Alex doing what he does best - catching grayling!

and another thing……

I was typing that last piece to the sweet refrain of AC/DC’s Highway to Hell…it seemed suitable somehow!!!

Now back in the land of Chalk and Labradors

Well that was interesting.
Just out from the Cottage Hospital in Shaftsbury (as a post script can I place on record – for what its worth – just how valueable these wonderful caring places are to small rural communities. What have the governments of the day got against these fantastic and efficient and I might add, functionally, establishments?) It would seem that my brusgh with the Colrado sky has rendered my tyoing one handed and I am back to left handed casting again due to my right hand being in a splint. Bummer. Nothing serious. But it just goes to show how important is to live life …you jsut don’t know what will happen next. Go fish I say: and be nice to folk…….

And another thing…..

Here are some images of the fun packed day