flightliner
Well-known member
there was a time and place in the past that you could go back to as an angler, when and where would you choose ?
The 60,s on the Essex Roding on the Collier Row stretch. I didn't appreciate how good the chub fishing was. The innocence of youth.
From places I actually fished at the time.
Flowing - The Loddon and Kennet in the 60’s and 70’s – loads of big roach.
Still – Billing, in the late 50’s/’60's, the same strain of carp as Redmire (stocked approximately the same time, 1930’ish but more of them to over 40lbs in the 60’s) and you could actually fish there (on a day/night ticket) without being a member of the CC club...........
Some of my friends fished it in the 60/70s it had a reputation as a very hard water from what they said to me about it.
Apart from the normal gin clear gravel pit water, pond weed, lowish stocking, all fun of the fair, a scale train going around the perimeter, a swimming section, boats and Buddy Holly music blasted out the speakers it was a doddle
Seriously I don't believe that 'all the fun of the fair' was too much of a problem, there was plenty of space for everyone. It was, as I mentioned above, a gin clear gravel pit that often had a lot of weed - i.e., as now, you had to work for your fish (you weren't going to catch every session but when you caught they were often 20lb plus) and many used to give up. It was usually the same faces that you saw long term and, of course, the added bonus of a night ticket was introduced around 1960.
Tinker, yes I still drive past there when I visit my parents. We camped in a farmers field near there. I don't think many 11 year olds would be allowed out camping on their own nowadays especially as we didn't know where we would be pitching up until we got off the bus and asked permission.The WHITE BEAR good perch as well. It is some ones house these days no longer a pub. The Chub fishing is still good if you know how to fish the Roding a lot bigger than the used to be but not as many.
Tinker, yes I still drive past there when I visit my parents. We camped in a farmers field near there. I don't think many 11 year olds would be allowed out camping on their own nowadays especially as we didn't know where we would be pitching up until we got off the bus and asked permission.
Why we fished Billing tiik was that the were no large carp in the Colne Valley pits then. Savay was probably the first stocked, around 1950 I believe, but they were obviously small in the early days and rarely caught. In fact Savay was two pits until the late 50's and I still bump into one of the guys that dug it - well into his 80's now.
Another world another time.
---------- Post added at 12:41 ---------- Previous post was at 12:32 ----------
Again some of my friends were members Long Andy Dennis Wilkins who was a close friend of the two fellas that drowned in the boat accident. I visited a couple of times with Dennis I am not sure if Bernie Eary another close friend of Dennis Wilkins was a member. I remember the first time I was told about the Savay rule book. The RULES what ever Peter says