Chapter 2............
Our resident man with the whistle – PhilB – blew for the off and lines were carefully fed before first put in on the white stuff where the float was gunna bury straight away.........
Hum.......... but it didn’t
In fact it didn’t bury after 5 minutes either
Nor 10...........
Nor 15...........
What was going on?
I shouted upto Mark O to enquire how many he’d got by now.
‘Aint had a touch yet’ was his response. ‘Nobodies had a bite up here’
A look on other lines and other baits also failed to produce any slight movements to the floats in question
After a hour I gave Cotti a bell. ‘How many lb you got?’
‘Aint had a bite yet’ was that familiar response
Ditto a call to MrV
‘Great’ I thought........first outing in 2013 and its gunna be a dry un’
Just past the half way mark I was dragging a worm around when up trotted the Milky Bar Kid.
‘How many you had?’ enquired the Milky Bar Kid
‘Aint had a touch’ I informed him. He stood for about 20 seconds and believe it or not, was I hallucinating? The float slid away...........
A lift and fish no 1 was on...........not the kinver I expected but a welcome 3oz roach was carefully but quickly netted.
This was followed by a text from MrV which asked – ‘Fancy an early bath?’
The fish magnet that is the Milky Bar Kid trotted off to see how they were doing on the Lindon Road section. He reappeared a few minutes later and reported they were having one a chuck
Off he trotted back to his peg............only to wander past again 20 minutes later all packed up – he’d enough of a grueller for today.
Bite no 2 followed shortly after as snuper Snowie spotted me netting it.......
‘You must be having a few as you aint been around with the camera’ he shouted from the top of the bridge. To be honest, being Billy No Mates, I was reluctant to leave my peg in case me gear either vanished or ended up in the cut.
With the news that they were having a few I’d better get my head down and play chase up.
The next hour was a bit of a haze as I slipped on a caster............ ::)
The float buried time and time again...........first 2oz fish then a steady stream of 4oz’ers with the odd half pounder. I just couldn’t get the rig back at em quick enough ..............could I catch ‘em up on those low numbers after all???????????
Then PhilB blew the whistle for the end and woke me up
The beamies came down the cut and this was the tale of the scales as the gruellerites were weighed in...............or not as the case was
PEG
20 MIKE E DNW
19 KEV ASH DNW
18 TREVOR B DNW
17 THE MILKY BAR KID DNW
16 MRV DNW
15 COTTI DNW
14 BLUES4EVA DNW
13 CHOPPY MASTER DNW
12 MARK O 0 - 7 - 15
11 TK 0 - 4 - 8
10 SNOWIE DNW
9 KEEF DNW
8 OBI DNW
7 BIG BAZ DNW
6 NUMPTY 3 - 15 - 6
5 CARLOS 3 - 15 - 6
4 TRICAST62 3 - 15 - 0
3 BIG COL 5 - 0 - 0
2 PHIL B 1 .3 .12
1 TAVERN CHAMP 8 - 0 - 0
So a second win of the series for the Tavern Champ, coming off end peg 1 again.
Better keep an eye on him for the next ‘un.
And talking of the Tavern Champ – here he is with his net of caster fish
Ah well, the grass wasn’t that greener after all .............so 'by demand' its back to The Extension in a fortnight