Part 3 – More Canadian carp and a realisation dawns.
We arrived at the swim about one o’clock and decided that, for the sake of fairness, we would draw straws for the first pick of peg. Luck was certainly with me that day and I ended up having first choice. Well, by now my confidence was growing and I knew exactly the pitch I wanted.
I selected a stretch of river just along from a large basin area. The shape of the bankside really affected the water and a large, clearly defined crease was evident about 40 yards out. Gary had next pick and selected a peg just along from me, opting to fish into the wide basin. Steve, unfortunately, had the runt’s choice and decided to move downstream a little, in the main run of the river. 
I had decided to bait quite heavily and threw out 40 orange-sized balls of groundbait into the river, topped up with a couple of pouchloads of maize. I set up my hookbait with four grains of corn, a piece of high floating foam and tipped the load off with another nice big piece of corn. The rig was cast into the river, just on the crease and, surprisingly for me, the cast hit spot-on first time.
About an hour or so into the session, my buzzer lets out its yell and the spool duly started to spin. I connected with, and landed, a nice common of around 10lbs. A very small fish by Canadian standards, but I was happy with it, considering that I had selected the swim based on my newly acquired knowledge. During the fight I’d heard Gary’s buzzer sound and, sure enough, he’d landed a nice big common and was in the process of bringing it to the net.
Once I’d returned the fish I re-baited my hook and recast to the same spot, hitting it first time again. Wow, was I being lucky or what? The swim was topped up with 10 more balls of groundbait and a tad more maize. This done I trotted around the bush to watch Gary photograph and return his fish.
By this time Steve had given up on his swim and moved across to join Nozza in the basin area, so we all sat down and discussed what to do next. The spec looked good, but it wasn’t really producing as we thought it might. We all had itchy feet and, as the river flow was slowing by the hour, we discussed moving to some of the more recognised big fish swims that had previously been unfishable.
Not a minute had we been discussing the move when away went my buzzer again. Quick as you like I struck into a large, slow moving object which headed powerfully straight out into the main flow of the river. I knew immediately that this was going to be a big fish, the strength and weight that transmitted itself along the line was far greater than anything I had experienced up to that point. By now Gary and Steve had joined me. Steve was doing his best impression of Richard Attenborough and had the video camera in his hand, filming every last bit of the scrap.
A the fish drew slowly ever closer we noticed that a fair amount of silkweed had been picked up by the fish as it tore along the bottom and was sticking to the line as it came in. With the weed threatening to jam in the top eye of the rod, Gary offered to climb onto a nearby rock and to free the weed if possible. Thankfully he managed to clear the stuff and, from his high vantage point, was able to get the first glimpse of the creature.
“Mike,” he said, “it’s big. Definitely over 25lbs. I can see the hook, it’s barely in.”
Bless him, just what I wanted to hear.
“Go on son, give it some umpy for the camera then,” said Gary, laughing.
The fish must have heard him, because at that moment it tore off into the slack water on my right hand side. I automatically slackened the clutch off on the reel, if it really was as big as he said then I didn’t want to lose it – oh, here we go again!
“Don’t slacken the clutch off now,” said Nozza, “That’s what fannies do!”
Thanks Gary, just the advice I needed right about then!
In time I managed to coax it back into the shallows below my feet where it decided to keep boring away, daring me to give just too must pressure for the hookhold to bear. Nothing I could do would tame this chap, with a flick of his head more line peeled off the spool and the delicate process of pumping the lost line back in had to start again.
But, careful persistence won through as the fish made it’s last roll and succumbed to the safety of the net. Gary took one look in the net and said “You’ve done it, it’s a thirty.” As he gently lifted it from the water I caught my first, ever-so slight glimpse of the fish and I knew. I knew that this was it, from that moment nothing I ever did in fishing would be the same again.
It was beautiful, and big. The most impressive creature that I’ve ever seen. Placed gently down on the hastily wetted unhooking mat, the fish lay there, silent, still and majestic. We inspected the hook-hold, “That was never coming out,” said Gary with a smirk, he hadn’t seen the damn hook at all, the toe rag!
The fish was weighed in front of the assembled throng of, funnily enough, English anglers. 28lb 7oz, no not the biggest carp ever caught but immaculate in every detail. Scale-perfect and wonderfully proportioned, big shoulders, massive fins and a nice, plump belly. Fantastically coloured from the dark green of it’s back, through rich creamy yellow on the flanks which brightened to a white underside. A true master of the water if ever one existed. 
After posing for a few snaps the fish was lowered back gently into the water, “Let’s get some shots of it going back in, just dip it in the shallows and lift it back.” Gary suggested.
What if it fights I thought, what if, with a flick of it’s tail, it decides to ruin the finale without even giving me a chance to say goodbye?
I gingerly dipped the fish into the water, waiting for the second when it would make an instant dash for freedom, but it didn’t. I think it knew, it knew that all I wanted was to savour every moment, the moment for which I had waited a very, very long time.
And that’s it, once the fish was returned that was it, over, gone. Forever etched in my memory, the single, defining moment when, after years and years of fishing for carp, I’d done all that I wanted. I was free again, the years fell away and the glint came back, just like the kid that used to fish at Grey Mist for gudgeon, nothing else mattered.
I spent the remainder of the day with a silly grin on my face and a bottle in my hand. It didn’t matter if I caught nothing else during the week, I had satisfied an undefined need in one afternoon. Incidentally, I did catch again. As the river slowed during the week that fish gradually became more obliging and on the last day of fishing I managed to con fish of 21lb, 24lb, 27lb and a 29lb 5oz monster to visit my net, amongst others. We all had a good day on that Friday, Gary caught over 20 fish, with 8 over 20lbs, I think.
That’s how it ended, with the river tempting us by giving a taste of it’s real bounty when the conditions were right. But none of that mattered to me, the 29-pounder was a great fish, but the emotions that I went through on that Wednesday afternoon will never be repeated. At that single moment in time I became a child again. My love for angling has returned, well I’ve always loved fishing. I think it’s more that my eyes are opened again to the fact that the past-time that we enjoy is not just about one single species, but that there is a huge and wonderful world of piscatorial natural history out there, just waiting to be experienced.
And that’s exactly what I’m going to do, look for experiences. All different, never the same. Since I’ve returned I’ve been going potty looking at new lakes, streams and rivers. There’s so much that I want to try. I’ve never caught a river barbel or chub, I’ve never been eel fishing or caught a large tench from a secluded Cheshire Mere. I’ve never deadbaited for large pike on a windswept Northern Lake in a force 9 gale and I’ve never fished for crucians in a lily-covered pool.
All of these experiences I now long to feel. I will still fish for carp, I find them gentle, fascinating creatures but they are only one part of a fantastic patchwork of life that lives, breathes and dies within the lakes, streams and rivers of this country.
I think it’s about time I started to look at it…………
