Chew Valley Reservoir and the River Kenn - North Somerset - 2-3/08/00.

Things could have gone very wrong. I had arranged to meet Walter on Friday evening outside Bristol Parkway station. My train was late and I tried calling him on his new mobile. I had just got a new one myself that morning. On the train, the phone company rang to say they had accidentally allocated me someone else's number. Is this all getting a bit tedious for you? No? Good, I'll continue.

Walter's number did not work. At Bristol, there was total chaos. Thinking I'd missed him, I thought I'd get a taxi. The driver told me it was £18.00 to Walter's place, then said no, it would be a lot more due to a serious accident blocking the M5 motorway. Just as I told him I would rather walk, I spotted Walter parking nearby. He had given me his number one digit short. In any case, the local mobile phone services were overwhelmed and we couldn't have reached each other anyway.

It was going to take us 3 hours to travel the 15 miles to his place, as the traffic chaos was terrible.

A mile along the route, we spotted an Indian restaurant called the Empire of India (what else) and pulled over. It made better sense to wait out the jams and relax instead. The food was passable and many other drivers joined us soon after.

We were up next morning at 5am, and started fishing from the bank at Chew Reservoir at 7am. There were fish rising steadily all along the shore and big hatches of midges and longhorns. We met a local who recommended fishing the far bank with a boat using white lures. A couple of other anglers caught in the hour we were there, but we did nothing despite rises all around us.

It started to rain and we decided to have a cooked breakfast for £3.50 in the Woodford Lodge café. We met a couple in the café who fished. The wife enquired if we had had to buy new freezers to accommodate all the fish we caught. Do we look like trawlermen? At least her husband had the decency to look embarrassed.

We got the boat at 10am, the earliest you can hire one and headed straight for the far bank, mooring for a while. There are long stretches of unfishable bank from the shore and it is very shallow there, only 60-90cm (2-3 feet) up to 36metres (40 yards) out.

After learning to cast again, we tried a drift, casting buzzers, gold head damsels, zonkers, Mallard and Claret and floating fry in teams of twos and threes with no success. The wind kept us drifting shoreward, so we had to motor out a lot and it was difficult to avoid weed in the extreme shallows.

As usual, my casting was abominable to begin with. I borrowed one of Walter's old Hardy rods rated 6. My line is #7, but I did get it under control after a few hours. After about three hours Walter tried a white lure and caught a perch of about 397g (14oz).

Walter and his perch.

Along the tree-lined shore we saw a pair of buzzards and a sparrowhawk there.

A few hours later Walter got a beautiful brownie for 900g (2lb) on the same fly. After  flogging that shoreline to death, we elected to move alongside the island.

Walter and his brownie.

This time the wind was perfectly directed to take us on a long drift past the island using the drogue. As we drifted by, we heard a crashing of undergrowth and a roe deer emerged on the island. It presumably swam or even walked over.

It was lovely fishing weather, cloudy with sunny intervals until a huge rainstorm at 6pm, which lasted for half an hour. Still we had nothing until dusk fell. Then suddenly there were rises everywhere. We cast to fish for ages getting nowhere except infuriated, and then tried a drift further out from the island. Walter caught another trout, a nice rainbow of 900g (2lb). Then another of 1.26k (2lb.13oz).

I began to wonder what I was doing wrong. Was it something to do with pheremones?  I borrowed one of Walter's white lures, but didn't hold out much hope. It was that shade of white that towels turn when they have been boiled together with a black shirt and bright red underpants. I teamed it up with a new pristine white fly of my own.

A few casts later I got into a hard fighting fish. It knocked on the line constantly for five minutes, shaking it's head and diving furiously. When it was netted, it weighed a respectable 1.12k (2lb 8oz). These were all fit fish and well finned. We both missed a couple of fish after that before the flashing light warned us it was time to finish.

It was 20.45pm when we landed and finished for the day. We had fished for nearly 14 hours and the wrist ache from casting all day stayed with me for over a week.

Two tired anglers and the final tally, (not quite enough for another freezer).

As it was late, we drove quickly to the New Inn in Blagdon for a meal of steak and pork fillet. Alas, this time it was very dry and disappointing. A previous meal there in June was superb. Their local Butcombe bitter is very good though.

We rested a bit and got up later the next day, around 9am, taking spinning rods along the River Kenn and in the first 6 minutes caught 3 pike. A local angler called Richard and another angler reckoned there were probably no pike there. Walter had two and I had one. We both lost more, before it got very quiet in brilliant blue skies and hot sun. Back at the bridge we tried one last cast and Walter just missed another. He had a rubber rainbow trout with a Mepp spinner at it's head. I used a bronze/silver Professor spoon.

   Two pike from the Kenn.

Just then Richard gave a yell and we helped him net a deep-bodied bream. It was around 1.35k (3lb).

Richard and his fine bream.

We had lunch at the Bridge Inn at Yatton - Food was Beefeater standard, no local beers.

We tried another stretch of the Kenn after lunch, but got no takes. An old codger joined us and talked about fishing. I gathered he was a bit of an old poacher, from the drift of his conversation. He got really enthusiastic and excitable and talked faster than an aggravated wife. We couldn't make out much of what he said; either his accent was too strong, or he just happened to be the local village idiot.

I decided it was time to head back to the South-East, the land of less benign idiots.