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This is a dedicated thread for discussing article: Then: Memories of Essex angling haunts
Then: Memories of Essex angling haunts
- Thread starter FishingMagic
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geoffmaynard
Content Editor
Brings back some memories. Eh Fred?
Ah, Raphael Park, gudgeon paradise!
This certain place created probably the most important early imprint in my brain of the of the possibility of huge fish in town waters.
I was perhaps three or four years old at most, and we ( the family) found a massive pinkish fish, dead on the bank.
The leviathan, I now know to have been nothing more than a three or four pound carp, was absolutely mahussive to me.
A GIANT!
I can still picture it now. In my mind it is as clear as day
One fine morning 'they' will invent something that can retrieve memory pictures and print them.
Then I will post them here!
This certain place created probably the most important early imprint in my brain of the of the possibility of huge fish in town waters.
I was perhaps three or four years old at most, and we ( the family) found a massive pinkish fish, dead on the bank.
The leviathan, I now know to have been nothing more than a three or four pound carp, was absolutely mahussive to me.
A GIANT!
I can still picture it now. In my mind it is as clear as day
One fine morning 'they' will invent something that can retrieve memory pictures and print them.
Then I will post them here!
geoffmaynard
Content Editor
Rufus? An Essex Boy! Surely not.
Oh yes indeedy! Born Billericay Hospital, 61, raised Bas'vegas', 61 - 75, Romford 75 - 2006.
Coventry since then...
I now class myself as ex Cockney domiciled West Midlands,
It's best up here. Essex has lost it for the time being, sorry to say.
Everyone up here say's, Hello!
What's better than that? You tell me...!
geoffmaynard
Content Editor
I won't disagree mate. I have to go back to Romford every week to tend to my old mum who's in her 90s. Not so very nice these days. When I compare the place with Rugby where my best mate moved to there's a world of difference in friendliness. You're in a good spot.
It does indeed Geoff.
Many an hour spent there in the 60's, on that concrete bowl,catching some lovely roach and of course the gudgeon .
I perfected the art of my hempseed fishing in that very place. But, I was seriously damaged, or my pocket money was, by the loss of tackle caused by the single grain munching carp that frequented the place.
Never fished for them though.
They always did great crusty cheese & tomato rolls in the little tuck shop place...funny the things you remember..init?
On my 4 or 5 visits a year for the London boozy re-unions, I get on the same 174 from Harold Hill to Romford station and stare out of the top deck as we pass Raphael Park, not many fish it nowadays though, Cliff !
Loads of Essex girls pushing prams, or walking dogs though.Posh area then, and still is probably.
Many an hour spent there in the 60's, on that concrete bowl,catching some lovely roach and of course the gudgeon .
I perfected the art of my hempseed fishing in that very place. But, I was seriously damaged, or my pocket money was, by the loss of tackle caused by the single grain munching carp that frequented the place.
Never fished for them though.
They always did great crusty cheese & tomato rolls in the little tuck shop place...funny the things you remember..init?
On my 4 or 5 visits a year for the London boozy re-unions, I get on the same 174 from Harold Hill to Romford station and stare out of the top deck as we pass Raphael Park, not many fish it nowadays though, Cliff !
Loads of Essex girls pushing prams, or walking dogs though.Posh area then, and still is probably.
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Cliff Hatton
Well-known member
Fred: Remember '62-'63 when a mini drove onto the ice? (And off again!)
You lot may also have fished South Weald?
I blagged my uncles season ticket for the bottom lake, as he wasn't using it, and fished a full season (in the early eighties) off the back of it after the famous carp population. Paul the bailiff wasn't stupid, he probably knew what was up, but he never said a ****y bird. I cut my carp teeth there - I think I had four or five that season up to very nearly twenty pounds.
Then the bolt and hair rig appeared on the scene and suddenly those in the loop were catching them all day long. The girlfriends would catch more in a day than I could in a week...
At fifteen, I was somewhere off the loop, of course. No girlfriend either. I started stalking them after that! More productive.
Good for the girls too...
I blagged my uncles season ticket for the bottom lake, as he wasn't using it, and fished a full season (in the early eighties) off the back of it after the famous carp population. Paul the bailiff wasn't stupid, he probably knew what was up, but he never said a ****y bird. I cut my carp teeth there - I think I had four or five that season up to very nearly twenty pounds.
Then the bolt and hair rig appeared on the scene and suddenly those in the loop were catching them all day long. The girlfriends would catch more in a day than I could in a week...
At fifteen, I was somewhere off the loop, of course. No girlfriend either. I started stalking them after that! More productive.
Good for the girls too...
It would have been easy to do too, Cliff, there was some thick ice about,some of the shallower ponds lost a lot of fish.
Rufus, a bit earlier than you but, South Weald, Berwick Ponds, The Chase, SE essex carp fishery Ockendon and later The Warren at Stanford le Hope .
Oh and holidays at Point Clear (nr St O)
Rufus, a bit earlier than you but, South Weald, Berwick Ponds, The Chase, SE essex carp fishery Ockendon and later The Warren at Stanford le Hope .
Oh and holidays at Point Clear (nr St O)
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Fred , The Warren was where I learned how to fish. We used to cycle there from Basildon, over One Tree Hill and down the other side in the dark and arrive at the Little Warren and fish for crucians and tench at dawn.
Had a massive catch of big bream in the main lake, a catch that to me at the age of thirteen, was stupendous. Not been there for years but the last I heard it became a big predator water after that 50lb record breaking pike was found dead in the margins.
I fished all the other lakes you mention too, with the exception of SE Essex carp fishery.
Had a massive catch of big bream in the main lake, a catch that to me at the age of thirteen, was stupendous. Not been there for years but the last I heard it became a big predator water after that 50lb record breaking pike was found dead in the margins.
I fished all the other lakes you mention too, with the exception of SE Essex carp fishery.
geoffmaynard
Content Editor
And that bike ride from Harold Hill to Stanford Rivers to fish the Roding through Olde England and those country corner shoppes. 10 year olds riding a 20 mile round trip on a kids bike with those little 14" wheels. The fishing there was superb. Go guesting upstream and dap for chub with grasshoppers. I caught my first fish on a fly there, a dace on a Greenwells Glory off a bubble float.
Passingford Bridge and Abridge were our spots on the Roding......and the ride back with no lights!
I saw my biggest brace of roach (ever) on the guesting part at PB, a clumsy juvenile cast soon moved them off never to be seen again.
I saw my biggest brace of roach (ever) on the guesting part at PB, a clumsy juvenile cast soon moved them off never to be seen again.
Cliff Hatton
Well-known member
Geoff, Fred, Rufus...you certainly take me back! Geoff, I think you have in mind that little thatched sweet-shop, on Noak Hill Road, I think it was (the same road as The Bear, but further toward its junction with Wrightsbridge Road which, the last time I saw it, had been taken over by the jungle!) Doubtless the little shop had specific opening-hours but as kids we left it to chance - often disappointed then to find it closed just when a Jubbly was sorely needed. Contrasting with the magical, pastoral - Elizabethan - feel for that area was the wealth of bike parts to be found along the waysides...you could easily collect enough bits and pieces to build a bike in an afternoon! Doubtless ALL readers will have a soft spot and wonderful memories of their childhood haunts; certainly for us 'arold 'illers the Dagnam Park Woods and environs were very special indeed...The White Lady of the Woods...the bomb-holes...the mansion ruins...the ocean of Springtime bluebells...the black and orange salamanders...I wonder if that ancient, protected, propped-up oak still survives?
Anyway, Geoff, Fred...gotta go...gotta catch 'Wally' before he drives off!
Anyway, Geoff, Fred...gotta go...gotta catch 'Wally' before he drives off!
Gary Cullum
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Lovely
Lovely piece of evocative writing Cliff - a 15 pounder was indeed a huge fish back in the sixties. Pure home grown, English thorough-bred carp. magic. A twenty pounder set the world alight in the early 60s, and big name anglers of the day would travel hundreds of miles for a chance o fish for one. Gary
Lovely piece of evocative writing Cliff - a 15 pounder was indeed a huge fish back in the sixties. Pure home grown, English thorough-bred carp. magic. A twenty pounder set the world alight in the early 60s, and big name anglers of the day would travel hundreds of miles for a chance o fish for one. Gary
I hope you didn't get run over by "Nobby Brussels" in your rush for your Jamboree Bag, Cliff!
Cliff Hatton
Well-known member
OMG!! 'Nobby Brussels'? Who he? Did I miss out on a vital part of life on the 'ill?
He was the old boy who sold fruit and veg out of the back of a removal lorry and toured the streets, Cliff.