Silt Road: The Story of a Lost River

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"I spent much of my childhood living a short walk from the Wye and it was from there I caught my first ever trout, my first 'big' chub on floating crust and where I learned how to trot and how to catch minnows and bullheads in bottle traps, and indeed white-clawed crayfish by hand (no alien signals around in those days...).

It was a delightful little river back then - at least those bits you could access were - and it helped to shape my young angling world and taught me much about nature and the environment.

I couldn't wait... I've just this minute downloaded the book to my Kindle and can't wait to read it, it sounds like a real gem.

Editor"



I knew the stream too in childhood, as my Dad knew "Old Man Dashwood", as Charles Rangeley-Wilson does now with the current incumbent, Edward. At a certain, lofty, dim-distant level, paths cross and everything is connected, to the Wye, to the Towy in west Wales, to north Norfolk, to the Rio Gallegos and the Chico spring-creek in far-south Argentina and other places past and present - both Charles, a man I haven't met, and I (and a few others) know this....

I have a copy of the book, bought a few months ago from the Caught By The River people and not yet read. Currently in one of several large cardboard boxes of books and papers I have here marked "Thames & Tribs, Books, Diaries, Corres., Fishing & History". Might get around to it...

Sounds like a great read about an unexpected topic. I would not have heard about this book without this review being written - thanks!. Just need to get a copy now...

Wye Flashback.

Year: 1979, June to December.


After coming back penniless from a 9-month-long fishing trip through India, I needed a job.

"Something that earns me enough, but doesn't interfer too much with my domestic fishing..." was the requirement.

So I got a driving job - Transits and their Bedford equivalents - with Sanderson's Paints and Fabrics of Uxbridge.

Fred, the Transport Manager, the man who ran Sanderson's fleet of delivery vehicles, large and small, said "As you're last in, Paul, you're getting the round nobody wants - Thames Valley and Chilterns. Lot of driving, but once you know it, you can be back by lunchtime but, so long as you check out the paperwork and any returns properly, plus keep your van clean, I won't mind if you clock off and go...."

Perfect.

By week two, having learned the round - Uxbridge - High Wycombe - Thame - Oxford - over to Abingdon and Wallingford sometimes - I'd stop at home a couple of miles away, load up a bit of my fishing tackle, then away!

Thames Barbel (Rose Revived); Thames at Bourne End, Marlow, Henley ... River Thame chub ... Wye....

I often had to deliver rolls of fabric to some very run-down-looking but still thriving upholstery and furniture-making workshops on the banks of the Wye on the eastern edge of that even then fast-changing town.

Behind one of these workshops (glorified brick and wooden sheds), in the little urban river (with, I seem to remember, a park / playing field opposite), I saw a simply enormous brown trout.

So a fly rod was included in my van gear for the next few days, ready for the next delivery to those artisan furniture people in HW.

I got the fish in three casts - a 23-inch brown, a hen (5 to 6 pounds?), showed it to the guys who were watching me utterly bemused, then put it back. Lovely fish. A 'real' one, too. Perfect fins. Not a stockie. One of my most prized captures.