Arren's Lake.Essex.
Sunday 14th July 2002.
A lovely warm summers day promised a decent days sport on this rural Essex venue noted for it's winter time bags of rudd & roach,however at this time of year the carp enter the equation, and if they aren't in your swim you ain't going to win.
I drew peg 19 and they weren't there!!!!!!!
However fishing a power top 2 with a no12 elastic (just in case Mr Carp decided to put in an appearance) a busy time was had with the small rudd that refused to be fed off.
Averaging about 1oz apiece they kept coming at intervals all day,and come the final whistle,rolled the scales around to record a weight of 32lbs 12ozs.Only good enough for 10th on the day but a pleasant days fishing all the same.
Kids Day at Gold Valley.
Saturday 20th July 2002.
For the 2nd year running i had the privilege of travelling down to Ash to help out at a kids fishing match at Gold Valley.
This is organised by Gary Hamilton who is the captain of Fox Match Banstead.
It's a fun day out,more than a serious match with the emphasis being on making sure that the kids have a good time and catch a few fish, the proceeds of which are donated to a charity of John Raison's choice.
Arriving nice and early it was straight into the clubhouse for a full english breakfast to set us up for the day,then into the tackle shop to collect the bait.
Then it was back into the clubhouse for "The Draw".
Now at this point we had forgotten to allow for the enthusiasm of a group of youngsters,and by the time everyone had drawn and Gary got up to announce the rules etc, he was speaking to an empty clubhouse as the cavalry charged off to Syndicate lake 
Syndicate Lake.....
At least we had plenty of time to set up,as the all in was at 10.15am.
Fishing with me was young Patrick Corneille 6˝, and the idea was to keep it simple,just a feeder rod and a 6 mtr pole.
It was a gorgeous day, real t-shirt and shorts stuff and it was straight out on the feeder to try and get an early carp.
"Come on tip,go round"
Well!!!!!!! The best laid plans and all that.This turned out to be the day that the fish didn't want to play,but we soldiered on,and after about an hour the tip sailed round resulting in not the expected carp,but a bream of about 1lb. Still we were off the mark and it was soon followed by it's twin brother! At least we were catching, some others were not so fortunate.
15 minutes till the lunchtime break and BINGO!!! Mr Carp decides to try and take Patrick for a swim,but after a dogged tug-o-war Patrick wins with a nice 5˝ lb common nestling in the net.
And now the civilised part,all back to the clubhouse for a spot of lunch & a cold beer before the start of the 3-7 shift
Wanting to try the pole in the afternoon,first put in on the 6 mtr line and CRASH-BANG-WALLOP, Patrick is briefly connected to a real lump until the hookhold slips 
Try as we may for another,the only fish to oblige for the rest of the session were a few hungry roach & perch.
With a ˝hr to go the heavens suddenly decide to open and soak everyone,but it can't dampen the kids enthusiasm come the weigh-in.
"What does it weigh?"
Young Talen couldn't lift his net,so enlisted some help..
and he got his Dad and Gary to help show off his biggest Carp
So back to the carpark for the results and Presentations.
1st Talen Hamilton 38lbs 6ozs.
2nd Rachel O'Leary 23lbs 8ozs.
3rd Joe O'Leary 21lbs 8ozs.
4th Charlie Shephard 21lbs 5ozs.
5th Robbie Clampitt 15lbs 10ozs.
6th Cameron 15lbs 8ozs.
7th Mike O'Leary 12lbs 15ozs.
8th Roxanne Finch 11lbs 12ozs.
9th Patrick Corneille 11lbs 8ozs.
10th Kenso (Belgium) 11lbs 2ozs.
11th Abbey Tingley 11lbs 0ozs.
12th Cloe Tingley 5lbs 8ozs.
All the children received a reel & goody bag of fishing bits, with the 1st & 2nd getting landing nets and bait waiters to go with everything else.But the biggest prize of all were the smiles on everyones faces at the end of the day.
Thanks again to Gary Hamilton for organising the whole thing,and rest assured i'll be there to do it all again next year.
Brookhall Lake.Tiptree.
Sunday 4th August 2002.
Having survived yet another Little Chef "Early Starter" we arrived at the car-park for a 9am draw,to be greeted by Betty the Bailiff.
Now anyone that listens to Keith Arthur's program "Fishermans Blues" on TALK SPORT (1053/1089AM) on Saturday & Sunday mornings will have heard Betty,and her weekly chats to Keith, and perhaps the story of her Cormorant Hound.
Betty assured us that a draw on the bottom half of the lake was what was needed, as the fish tend to follow the wind and it had been blowing in that direction for the past 4 days, and that the fish were being caught up in the water.
Brookhall Lake (looking from the car-park)
Need i say more,into the hat and out comes peg 28 (just about the longest walk, and the furthest away from the desired pegs)The ironic thing is that had the wind been blowing in the opposite direction,this peg would have been an absolute flyer .
While setting up ominous black clouds were gathering and the odd clap of thunder could be heard. Now call me a coward but the idea of being attached to 14˝ mtrs of one of the finest lightning conductors known to man wasn't on (especialy when i saw some fork lightning in the distance).So i decided to go with a feeder and waggler (and Norm's "Secret" bait).
The swim really looked a picture
but apart from a few little rudd worrying the bait nothing was forthcoming,and all the time the sky was getting blacker, so out with the brolly and out with the feeder as the heavens opened transforming the scene into something akin to "Carry on Noah"
In amongst all this i managed to connect with 4 carp and 3 tench (Nice One Norm )
The most savage take of all coming from a male tench which weighed 3lb 14ozs.People have said to me that tench don't fare well when they have to compete with carp,and this fish was long enough to be 5lbs+, but was one of the thinnest tench that i've ever caught (food for thought)
That Tench.....
Thankfully the rain stopped about an hour before the end of the match,but then again so did my bites so when the scales arrived i recorded a weight of 24lbs 2ozs, which was good enough for 5th on the day, which to be honest was better than i had expected.
Now all i need to do is spend the rest of the week drying my kit out!!
Framfield Fishery. Spring Lake. Sunday 19th August 2002.
Well we all assembled in the car park at Framfield Fishery, which is a complex of 3 lakes set in the countryside just outside the town of Uckfield in Sussex.
Today we were to fish Spring lake,which is the main match lake, and is mostly stocked with carp (what a surprise)
Spring Lake.
Anyway it transpired that there had been a cock-up on the alarm clock front by the secretary. So there we were waiting for the Drawbag and scales to arrive.
Anyway after a short delay and a lot of ribbing on his arrival out came the draw bag.In goes the hand and out comes peg 43.
As i arrived at my peg one thing became glaringly obvious, I couldn't reach the island,which was about 20mtrs away,also in previous seasons this swim had a large bed of lilies to fish to on the right hand side. NOT ANY MORE!!!!!
Plumbing up i found 12 inches in the margins and only about 2˝feet at 13mtrs.For the margin swims i set up a dibber on my margin pole.These swims would not be touched until i could see the mud being disturbed by feeding fish.
On the 13 mtr line it was to be 2 simple rigs,both to fish banded pellet.1 just 18inches of line and a hook (size 14 PR22)and the other a Drennan carp2 float set at dead depth to target any fish that followed the constant stream of pellets down to the bottom.
I also set up a feeder rod,but this would only be a get out of jail option if things went horribly wrong. (more often than not at the moment
)
Peg 43.
Anyway at the off and two good handfulls of hemp go into the margins on each side along with some corn to await developments.Out to 13mtrs and into a rhythm of 5-6 pellets every 30 secs.
Straight away the 2 pegs to my right were into fish as they could reach the island.
If that wasn't bad enough i had the beginnings of a headache that was to get worse as the match went on (No it wasn't due to drink 
)
After about an hour on the up in the water rig along came carp No1,
a pretty little ghost/common and things were starting to look up,a steady stream of small carp followed it to the net,and while not setting any records a worthwhile bag was building.
With an hour to go the headache 
had got so bad that i was forced to stop fishing and lay down (either that or fall off my box)
Come the weigh-in and it soon became apparent just how well the day had gone.Top weight caught by John Tyler was 136lbs,2nd was Michael Vincent with 124lbs 4ozs and 3rd was Mike Davis with 103lbs 2ozs.
My level 46lbs was only good enough for 11th.
In total 19 of us weighed in a total of 1041lbs 14ozs for an average weight of 54˝+lbs per man, Fantastic fishing by any standards.
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