VIADUCT HOLIDAY - DAY 6 TODBER MANOR FISHERY

 A longer trip offsite today to Todber, though Geoff Francis and Chris Ollis had both decided not fish this match late on as they didn't fancy the fast fishing on offer. We were headed to Ash Lake which some said would not be such high weights as seen on Homeground and Hillview, but 250lb needed apparently.

The drive to the fishery was no bother (unlike last year which was a nightmare) and it was nice to arrive in good time. Tony Rixon and Jason Radford were joining us for this match, and Tony kindly had some scales but requested help with the weighing in at the end as it is too much for one person. Martin Rayet was the main source of info as he fishes it a fair bit, he also did the pegging which was spot on. I got peg 62 which is the first end of the lake you come to, I was told by Guy Manton that the peg was worth 200lb all day long. 

I was told a feeder was a good bet to start on, so I set up a method feeder with a mix of micros and Thatchers gbait to mould to it. Before the start I cast the feeder to get clipped up, first attempted when, ahem, a bit too far and it was stuck. I walked around to the far side and managed to get it free and throw into the lake. Whilst here I spotted that a bot of the bank had been cleared before and just a few loose bits and bobs needed removing, glad I walked round now. I was soon clipped up proper and happy with it. I set up a rig for fishing hard pellets at top set plus two, and two margin rigs, one for meat and one for hard pellet.

We started at 11am and I cast the feeder out and it landed well, so much so that after 30 seconds a carp was pulling the rod in. Next cast same result, and for the first hour I was having a decent time of it, a couple of casts went a bit long and hit the reeds, but the feeder always came back and sometimes dropped in nicely lol. I then had a cast that went well into the reeds and was a bit shocked, I looked down and saw the line had come out of the clip, bugger. Had to happen just as guy came up to watch me on his lunch break lol. Luckily a couple of casts and I was back sorted. Then a carp got in the reeds for the first time and although I got it out the hook was straighten so had to change. Guy told me to feed more pellet up to a little bush to my left and soon a few carp were mooching here, I was loathed to come off the method though as I was doing well. Woody on 64 was struggling with about 20lb, I had 65lb on the clicker, but Martin R had 90lb on his short pellet line. When I heard Glenn had over 70lb I thought I had better try short to speed things up as the method was not as effective I thought.

I had fed meat in the RH margin, pellet left (both on top set, and the pellet up to the bush. I saw a carp in the meat margin so went in there and did 7 or 8 carp quite quickly, these were similar size to those on the tip, 1 to 2lb mostly. Woody was trying to sort his margin out after he had tried fishing shallow, and was just starting to get a few lined up. My meat margin died, and it never came back to life, even when I tried to change it to pellet. Over to the LH bush, there were carp there but they were very shallow, and I pushed my float down to the hook length and even then I still fouled some, I wasn't catching anywhere near fast enough and was in danger of losing the plot as you know at this venue a bad hour is bad news. Woody was now flying but I was sure I was on par with him, and I started to get carp on pellet in the close RH margin. I stayed here for the last couple of hours but knew I wasn't catching as well as Woody.

When the match finished I had 225lb on my clicker, Woody said he had 250lb which I guessed was about right.  Here though are the results...

1st Woody 309lb 7oz (on meat over micros and meat, much bigger average stamp of fish)

2nd Tony Rixon 304lb 14oz (all shallow on long pole)

3rd Martin Rayet 272lb 8oz 

4th Gary Bowden 242lb 15oz

5th Glenn Bailey 239lb 8oz

6th Me 222lb 15oz (only 2lb out on my clicker, that's a win for me PMSL!)

7th Gordon Cannings 176lb 3oz

8th Mark Tanner 69lb 1oz

Jason DNW

A little clip here of Mr Rixon trying to educate Mark Tanner on the art of bringing your fish to the weigh net lol.

Pictured is the star of the week, Martyn "Woody" Woodington. He smashed it out of the park every match, and on many different methods too, man of the week, some results that, think he had a free holiday on us lol. We might have to call him Dick Turpin from now on, seriously though well done mate, brilliant.

On Friday a few stayed and pleasure fished. Martin helped Chris with how to mug fish on lodge lake, Chris had a strange way of playing the carp, we didn't laugh. Here he is striking a pose with a lump on.

I had a lovely week, got my pools money back and a little more, which is always nice. But that's just an aside. Out with your mates fishing (in lovely weather), enjoying the wonderful scenery and wildlife, and having a few beers and putting the world to right and laughing, laughing so much, it is simply fantastic. Spending a week in a wonderful lodge at Viaduct with good friends is something I look forward to every year.

Off for a couple of weeks due to Dad and work duties, hopefully will get a chance to see a bit of river fishing soon.

VIADUCT HOLIDAY - DAY 5 CAMPBELL SHORT POLE

Wednesday on holiday always means the short pole match, top set and 3 sections of pole is the maximum you can use, no shipping on sections, and no line longer than the top set. Some people question why limit yourself, but I guess it is a tradition and if you don't like it don't fish it lol. Anyway we had 18 anglers on the bank today including some heavy hitters, it would be interesting.

I always prefer a peg on the near bank, so 110 to 119, so was really happy when I pulled out 115. We were all amazed though when Woody did not get peg 110 lol!

115 platform is out a little further than the other pegs so an advantage on the distance front. Normally I would fish for carp, but the day before 60lb of skimmers came off the peg and so I quite fancied going for the silvers again even though I had an ace silvers angler Mat Rowe next to me on 114 and Ryan Jordan on 111 who was going for the skimmers and Paul Faires on 126. I had Glenn Bailey on next peg 115 today, so fishing the paste against him would be a challenge hence going for silvers. I only set up silvers rigs to start a couple of 4x12 one strung shotted and one bulked for soft pellet, and another for fishing corn in the margin. The silvers anglers have been catching big weights in close, so I started at top set plus one, but after only 2 small skimmers it all seemed wrong. I went out to full length and fed a line to the left with pellet and a line to the right with meat. Today I fed some micros with my baits as I had picked up this was working for the skimmers.

After an hour I had about 10lb of skimmers, but Ryan and Ben Haag on 112 were catching skimmers faster than me, Ryan on worm, Ben on meat. Mat Rowe was catching steady. On the carp front Dan White on 121 was mugging carp from the off and it was already game over on that we all thought.

I guess after 3 hours I had about 20lb of skimmers, but I was sure I was well behind the three to my left, and Glenn who had not had one carp but some good skimmers on paste. It seemed Dan was the runaway winner, and the only other person in my section with some carp was Woody on peg 127. I made a tactical decision, even though it appeared there were virtually no carp in front of 114 to 116 (I had lost one, Mat had lost one) I wanted to go for carp and try and win the section money, hoping that Woody being on fire might frame. I got off my box and got new rigs out, paste and a margin rig (mugging was not an option as the light was awful). 

As seems to happen here, a few carp started to appear coming in range, and with about 2 hours to go I got my first carp on paste. I had an odd skimmer on the paste but after a wait would get a carp. Meanwhile Glenn could only catch skimmers on paste where ever he fished! I kept my eye on Woody and was willing him to keep catching carp shallow and frame, but Vic Bush on 129, Gary B on 130 and Ben Haag all had some fish. I managed one carp from the margin on double corn to go with my paste fish. I only lost one carp on the paste a fouler just before the all out, so not to bad on that front. When the match ended I thought I had a 100lb in total, Glenn never had a carp and only hooked 2 which both came off.

As normal the scales started the weigh on on 110, Mat Long flexing his muscles on the weigh sling today. Ben Haag was admitting to 140lb, Woody a bit less and When Vic had 142lb I was thinking my plan had failed. However, Ben took a look at his silvers net and was concerned he had more than 50lb, which would mean that his net would be disqualified, but the scales would decide that! Woody did well to catch 157lb 8oz (he's good at underestimating) but was well beaten by Dan White who had 279lb 5oz. My skimmers went 26lb and with my carp I had in total 102lb 11oz. 

As it turned out Ben did have to many silvers in one net, so he lost that, and he chucked his carp back too, oops. With no other weights to beat Woody I knew I had got the section money, so the change was worth it and worked.

1st Dan White 279lb

2nd Woody 157lb

3rd Vic Bush 142lb

4th Gary Bowden 133lb

Mat Rowe won the silvers next to me with a lovely 62lb 4oz of simmers on corn, with Ryan Jordan 2nd with 55lb 3oz. Glenn eneded 3rd but no money with nearly 39lb of accidental skimmers on paste lol!

For some reason I had no pictures today, I think the sun got me or something, though to be fair I was in the shade most of the day. It was nice getting back to the Lodge though and having a cool can of Thatchers.

We went to the curry house which has never let us down, the portion size is large (too big for me) and food tasty, but you need to take your own drinks, so bottle of Malbec for me.

We retired back to the Lodge (most of us) and chatted for ages, though the endurance test was all too much for some, sorry Gary lol.

VIADUCT ANNUAL HOLIDAY - DAY 4 AVALON FISHERY

 Breakfast was in the M&M cafe in Somerton (went in here Monday to Friday) with the good lady Mandy making sure we were well fed, and breakfast was always ready within a few minutes. It isn't a long drive to Avalon, and I do like driving in this part of the world as there is so much wildlife around. When I got to the fishery I could already hear and see some carp were spawning, that wasn't going to help the fishing I thought.

Vic Bush had given us both banks nearest the car park, with peg 1 having recently won a match it might be OK, I also thought the opposite end pegs would be good as would 44 which had carp showing all the time in the gap. I drew peg 46, not on my list of what I wanted. We had 13 anglers fishing today in total, and once again Gordon was next to me on 48 on the end bank, on 44 was Mark Tanner. I did my best to convince Mark to fish in the gap with his favoured pellet wag but he was having none of it and fished to the right of the gap.

It was a hot and sunny day with no wind where I was, I thought it would be a tough match and with no maggots or casters it would be carp or nothing as I thought the bream would be off eating carp spawn. I had an island I could chuck to, the point looked inviting and so I set up the lead and pellet wag to fish here, also a paste rig, a shallow rig, mugging rig and a margin rig. A lot of options covered today.

Vic had told me that shallow fishing had been the best of late and with the weather the way it was it was likely to be the same, so I started fishing shallow with pellet, even though there were no signs of carp in the peg. I gave it an hour shallow and had just the one 2oz roach, a look deep on the paste was a waste and I never had an indication. I saw a ghost carp come through and tried to mug it, hooked it and it went off and sanpped 0.19. Onto the pellet wag and I nailed a carp second chuck so was off the mark after about 90 minutes, but any thoughts of a decent run were wrong and after I got snapped by a carp I never had anything else for ages. I chucked the lead as I had seen a couple of carp caught on it, but again this was no good. I was going nowhere and there appeared to be no fish in the peg. Gordon only had 1 carp, but Jon Darby on peg 1 had landed a number of carp from the end bank. Mark Tanner had about 5 carp on the pellet wag.

I got bored and went for a walk, Mark was getting plenty of indications on his pellet wag and the carp were still showing themselves in the gap. Glenn on 42 had not caught on his paste but had had a couple of carp on lead and wag. Chris Ollis was catching whitebait and Gary B had a couple of carp shallow. I went back to my peg and tried hard for another hour and not a sign, went for another walk. Glenn was playing a large carp caught on paste but hooked in the tail, he played it for a long time until eventually his top set exploded, oh dear. Gary B had a few other carp. It seemed the only other anglers catching were Jon and that man Woody again who was on peg 11 catching on the pellet wag.

Back to my peg and I noticed the the bay I had opposite me was now going into the shade and a decent number of carp were appearing in the peg, I think they were the ones that had been spawning earlier and were now moving back out into the lake. It wasn't easy casting into the arc of the bay but there were odd fish there. I fished with renewed enthusiasm just to try to get a bit of sport, I got a few carp, and even mugged a brute off the rod end lol. It was never enough but I ended up with 56lb 6oz. That actually overtook Mark on 44 who slowed up and had 52lb 14oz. The only angler who beat me on my bank was Gary who got second with 74lb 8oz.

Winner was... yep Woody with 131lb 3oz all on pellet wag, Jon Darby was third with 70lb 11oz. A bit gutted I missed out on a pick up, I think had I fished in the bay for the first 4 hours I may have had a few more carp, but we will never know. Chris Ollis bag of whitebait weighed 9lb and that was all that was needed to win the silvers.

A picture of my best two carp here. Whilst it was a tough day I was able to listen to lots of birds I hardly get to hear these days, cuckoo and willow warbler are much more scarce than they used to be. Thankfully this area has been well looked after and managed to encourage many birds to breed here, and I hope they return year after year.

The plan for the evening changed completely, and I got confused, I ended up back at the Lodge on my own, everyone else had driven straight to the pub lol. I jogged up the footpath and into town to get a cool pint of Thatchers and another decent meal in the White Swan.

VIADUCT ANNUAL HOLIDAY - DAY 3 MATCH LAKE

 Today it was just the nine of us fishing against each other on Match Lake, we had a leisurely 9:30 draw which was good news for me I was struggling with, let me say, loose bowels! There was a lot of talk at the draw about what pegs would good and what would be bad, but fish have fins and we are often proved wrong lol. Anyway I got myself an island chuck in the form of peg 45, and had Gordon next peg again on 44, with Woody on the bottom bank 47 a peg he has done well from before. The parade of anglers set off for the lake, or should I say caravan of anglers..

As I began setting up I was off back to the Lodge to get to the toilet, this set me back setting up and I was a little rushed. I put up a 4x12 rig for 13m and pellet, a couple of margin rigs and the straight lead for the island. I put off setting up a pellet wag as I thought this might be more hassle than it was worth and was short of time. No silvers prize today, just the top 4 being paid out, nice and friendly.

I have done well on this lake before by starting short and did the same today, but sadly it was not to be with just a couple of small skimmers and a tiny tench. Woody got off to a flyer short on the paste but it soon died for him. I went out to 11m and tried again fishing hard pellet, it was slightly better but no great, another tench couple of F1's and a carp. Gordon was struggling like me, but to his right Gary B was getting the odd big carp on paste. I really could not get the pole going and as I could see fish showing next to the island where I had been feeding 8mm pellets I picked up the lead rod. It was a bit tricky casting as the island forms a point here and I really needed to fish either side of it I felt, accurate casting was a must. It was a bit slow but then I started to get a few regular pulls from small carp. Woody was on the pellet wag and getting carp on that, we both had fish boiling in our peg.

I was getting a lot of liners before I would finally get a pull round, and was thinking I really should have been on a wag, but every time I thought of setting it up I would get a fish, plus Woody was about 4 wagglers down due to catching the island a few times. Eventually I lost the rig when a carp swam into a snag, I decided to quickly set up a pellet wag on my 9 foot Preston mini plus lead rod lol!  It was a decent move as I had a few on it, but then things went weird. I couldn't get a bite, but on at least four occasions when I went to reel in I had a carp on foul hooked. I tried different depths and hook baits but to no avail.

My margins never yielded a bite, and my match was fading away, Woody was catching odd fish in his margin, Gary was still catching on paste, and Martin was catching in his margin on 40. I nicked a few fish on the pole but was never catching well and was falling behind I was sure, Gordon next door had struggled all match and we just couldn't seem to get carp on the pole line.

Match over and I was regretting not having the wag and lead set up, I am sure changing between the two would have added a few more carp and F1's.

The top 4 who picked up money were:-

1st Gary Bowden 140lb 11oz, carp to 14lb on paste

2nd Woody 108lb 6oz

3rd Martin Rayet 96lb 13oz

4th Me 95lb

I only just beat Glenn by about 1 1/2lb so it was tight other than Gary, 2nd place was there for the taking for me, but still had some fun on the lead and wag. The lake fished well and the top 4 had caught on different methods. 

We visited the Globe for a good meal and a few beers, we were off to Avalon the next day so I didn't want a late night.

VIADUCT ANNUAL HOLIDAY - DAY 2 CAMPBELL LAKE OPEN

 Sunday and the Thatchers Gold had a slight affect on me and a few of the lodgers, but not so bad. I drove Gary and Geoff to the Premier Inn in Street for breakfast and back again. Gordon and Martin R were off to fish Tony Rixon's float only at Landsend, the remainder would fish the open on Campbell.

With the carp showing well the day before in 110, 111 and 132 I fancied these pegs, but I went pulled out the opposite end with corner peg 119. Only 37lb of carp came from 119 the day before, but with the gentle wind blowing my way Steve Long thought my peg would be better today. There was to be no silvers fishing in my plan today, all out carp, this despite Woody drawing peg 110 for the second day running!

At the peg I had Nigel Easton on 121 who would fish for silvers, and Ian King on 118. I had three areas of the peg I initially planned to target, straight out in front at 13m, to the end bank on the straight lead, and top set plus 1 in the RH margin. There is a tree up the margin further but I didn't want to go there unless I really had too.

My only real dilemma setting up was whether to fish shallow or deep, some of the paste heads had struggled yesterday, but Woody had caught on the deck whereas Martin R had caught shallow, In the end I would start on paste as I couldn't see many fish in front of me. I fed wetted 4mm pellets at 13m and fished paste made from Thatchers Original groundbait, I also fed 8mm pellets over to the far bank. First drop on the paste and I missed a bite, next drop I hooked and landed a carp, next drop lost a fouler. After this signs of carp ended and I was a little surprised, I worked the line and tried to pull some carp in, but to no avail. Before the hour was out I was onto the straight lead much quicker than I anticipated, I had 2 carp in three casts, then had one which got to pallet 120 and snapped me, but after this had a couple of liners and that was it.

I spent the next two hours without a fish, meanwhile Ian on 118 had taken about 6 carp all from his left margin. I reluctantly pushed a rig up to the tree where I had fed some 6mm pellets, I did get 1 carp and lost a fouler, but that was it. Carp were crashing around the tree and I could see they were spawning, so they were unlikely to be interested in feeding. I tried the end bank on the lead again but just liners and no bites. I started feeding the short margin line with 6mm pellets and hoped this might come good. The only thing interested in my bait it seemed was this friendly duck!

With less than 2 hours to go I was pretty cheesed off, 4 carp for about 24lb in the net, Ian had dried up and then snapped his pole which messed him right up. Back on the lead and it was like a switched had been turned on when I had 7 carp in 7 casts to bring me back in contention as only woody on 110 was catching (others had done so early but had died). The lead slowed up though, and I urged myself to go into the margin, it is a deep margin and I used a 4x16 robust float with a 8mm hard pellet. Initially the float sat there, no liners or anything, but then a fast bite saw me attached to a carp. I had another next drop in and stayed on this line till the end of the match and had about 7 all told. The last 90 minutes were certainly great fishing. I had 148lb on my clicker and again no clue how I had done, but knew that Woody carried on catching and Gary Bowden also bagged up late on peg 129.

When the scales got to me Gary was leading with 135lb, Nigel took the silvers lead with 41lb on 121. My fish when tallied up weighed 146lb to put me into the lead, which I held until final man to weigh Woody put 193lb on the scales for two wins off the peg, well done.

The lake had fished better today with 80lb of skimmers wining the silvers off peg 115 by Phil Denslow.

Results board here.

Another good night was had in Somerton, with a great meal in the White Swan, though the pace was slowed considerably thank goodness!

VIADUCT ANNUAL HOLIDAY - DAY 1 CAMPBELL LAKE POLE ONLY

 I had been looking forward to this week off fishing with the lads for a long time, only 9 of us this year as a few were not able to make it including long time "lodger" Mike Nicholls who is waiting for a hernia operation, good luck with the op and hope it goes well.

I just did not seem to find the time or was it the inclination to do a lot of preparation, but on the day prior I began in earnest putting some new elastic in top sets, tying some hook lengths and making a few rigs. Finished about 9pm, and then packed the van with everything and more than I thought I would need for the 6 matches ahead.

The Itinerary this year was:-

Day 1 (Saturday) Campbell lake, pole only maximum 13m

Day 2 Viaduct open Campbell

Day 3 Our lodges match on Match Lake

Day 4 Avalon Fishery Match Lake

Day 5 Campbell Lake Short Pole Only

Day 6 Todber Manor Ash Lake

I was off to a bad start Saturday morning with a bit of trouble with the old bowels, something that was to be a pain the arse this week, and meant I was not able to meet up for breakfast and went straight to Viaduct. Here I met up with the rest of the reprobates I was spending the week with; Glenn Bailey, Gary Bowden, Gordon Cannings, Geoff Francis, Chris Ollis, Martin Rayet, Mark Tanner and last but by no means least Martyn Woodington. In total there were 18 anglers fishing today with many regulars who would be hard to beat so a good peg would be needed. I didn't think my drawing arm got off to the best of starts when I pulled out 130, and thought it could be tough. Mind you I would have fancied it if I could have chucked the lead out lol.

I soon decided that my best chance of coin was to go after the silvers money, though with Stu White, Rob Eagle and Nigle Easton fishing I was going to need some luck. I went with a few F1 pellet rigs 4x12 and 4x14 with 16 SFLB to 0.11 for soft pellet. If the soft pellet got ragged by roach I would change to hard pellet. I did set up rigs for paste, mugging and the margin in case the carp did turn up. We started at 10:30 and I began by fishing at top set plus 2 sections feeding 4mm pellets (I use Sonubait Profeed) with one of the easy to use Sonubaits 6mm expander on the hook. It was extremely slow here for me and just a couple of small skimmers obliged, I was soon adding another section and fed at 11 o'clock and 1 o'clock. Things were still slow but I caught a couple more skimmers including a flyer. At this early stage Chris Ollis on 129 was really struggling while Gordon Cannings on 131 had a good run of skimmers on meat.

I opened up a third line at 13m and this was just as difficult as the other two lines, and I found if I caught 1 skimmer generally I had to move to another line to try to catch another skimmer. The soft pellet was not being ragged out so I stuck with it, but did try worm and corn without success. I was convinced I was now just fishing for pleasure as I was not bagging on silvers, as recently here 60 to 70lb is needed to win, but with Woody on 110 was getting a few carp as was Martin Rayet on 132 I had to stick with silvers and just enjoy my first day. A little later word came through to me that the silvers anglers were not bagging and I should just keep my head down, Gordon's early bagging had stopped and I could not see a lot of silvers being caught my end. However, the last hour was painful with the skimmers being ousted more often now by the odd carp that was fizzing up the lines I fed and I landed one carp. I came in the margin and tried corn / pellet, no skimmers but I had a couple of pound of roach at least to tick over. I thought I had 30lb of silvers, but no idea if that was any good.

The scales soon arrived at peg 132 to weigh Martin who had a great 155lb of carp, Gordon struggled for 17lb of silvers and 1 small carp. My silvers went 33lb 10oz, and 1 carp 6lb 8oz. Chris on my left DNW. It was going to be a long wait to hear the other silvers weights, but Nigel Easton on 124 came past to say he had weighed 30lb 6oz, one of the regulars beaten, and more good news when I found out I was top silvers weight.

Woody won the match from 110 with 170lb, I knew he had caught but hadn't realised he had so many, Martin Rayet was second and D Basstone was third with 143lb. 

After myself in the silvers, Nigel and Rob Eagle tied for second with 30lb 6oz. At least I know fishing for roach at the end was worth it. A nice start to the holiday with some beer money. Many pegs struggled today, and the venue had fished poor compared to recent days which was a surprise to all.

First night in Somerton was very good and very funny, though I think we forget how old we are when we have a few pints ;-)