River Arrow - Sodality and Solemnsides

Yeay we are back in business thankfully the canal was getting to me I must admit !! Anyway I finished on the Arrow last season, so I thought I'd start on the Arrow for this new season. To be honest I fancied coming for a nose to see what it's like in the 'summer' because I got the chub feeding off the top when it was cold, so I wondered in clear conditions when the river is low and the water warm, were they up for it again ?

As a backup I had some maggots and the trotting gear in the car just to try and bank a few fish from this small waterway. 

A arrived just after 6am and had a fish on first cast but it came off just as I was getting the net ready, only a small chub though, oh well. It didn't take long to get the next bite mind you where I had a massive drop back bite and a fish was on.

It felt half decent too and after a decent fight it was on the net. A lovely condition chub that was 4lb on the nose and was most welcome indeed. Nothing was taking bread off the top so in the end I went on the rove where I managed another 3 chub in different swims.

I has ages left so was looking forward to explore the stretch then I was approached by two guys who were pegging out for a match!!! whoopssss, turns out I should have been invited to join a WhatsApp group where the dates are listed.

They offered me to go to an area above where I was fishing but I decided to venture elsewhere for the last couple of hours. When I returned to the car there was at least another 10 guys who were very chatty indeed and gave me some stories of the fish that have come out over the years. 

So to the Warwickshire Avon for the remainder of the morning where I managed two further chub off the top and also trotted the float for an hour and a half for lots of maggot munchers. An enjoyable morning and those Arrow chub are something else, such lovely condition.

The Arrow wasn't as clear as I thought it might have been the Warwickshire Avon certainly is there, the recent rain has topped the levels up though and it was a nice trotting pace despite nothing big showing really. A quick post this, it's Fathers Day after all, a busy day today. 

Transient Towpath Trudging - Pt.118 (Canal Zander)

Although electric cars have some negatives, depreciation being one of them, there is no denying they are good to drive. My near 5 year old Suzuki Jimny was in at the garage this week for a safety recall to replace the fuel pump and the courtesy car was a Peugeot e208. With 140odd hp and with 200lb'ft of torque plenty nippy enough and makes you realise just how archaic the Jimny is, but then the Jimny feels archaic against any modern vehicle really. 

>200 mile range, a modern interior, the Peugeot design team have certainly come on of late and are some of the most modern looking cars around at the moment. Obviously I driven lots of EV's over the years because of my job but there is no denying as the years go by as an overall package they are improving at a fast rate. Would I buy one, most certainly, even a 2nd hand one, but for now, the Jimny is here to stay. As someone who is a design interior for car interiors, I particularly liked the drop down door that you could rest your phone on to reveal the wireless charger, simple but novel I thought. 

Anyway it doesn't seem over 40 years I lived in South Africa, but it is 👀, our family moved to Pinelands in Cape Town because my late Dad got work as a precision tool maker, where he ended up setting up on his own. I still remember the food though. Bunny chow, often referred to simply as a bunny, is an Indian South African fast food dish consisting of a hollowed-out loaf of white bread filled with curry, which was rather nice and filling I must admit. Springbok biltong and probably my favourite Boerewors.  

Now the the word boerewors translates from Afrikaans as “farmer’s sausage,” an appropriate, if incomplete, description. It certainly is a sausage, being derived from the Dutch verste worst. The Afrikaners, descendants of Dutch colonizers, were also certainly farmers who. And depending on who’s you eat, or who you speak to, boerewors’ flavor profile, like its history, can be as simple or complex as you make it.

Boerewors is a coarse-grind, generally thick, predominantly beef sausage that by law must contain at least 90 percent total meat and no more than 30 percent fat. It is flavored heavily with coriander, cloves, nutmeg, pepper and salt, and then traditionally stuffed into pig or sheep intestines and coiled into six-foot-long continuous rolls. It is a legally protected term, and anything else that does not conform to the meat-content requirement may not be called boerewors; it must be labeled accordingly just as ‘wors’ along with a description of its main meat component, which is often from wild game like kudu.

Now you might find these in your local Lidl, and very nice they are too. Not as overly flavoured as I remember but then maybe my palate has changed since my time in South Africa where we must have had a braai every weekend. Such an outdoor lifestyle and as a kid, it couldn't be safer during the apartheid years, I wonder if it was pleasant day, we could get away with what we used to do as kids. On the weekend me and my twin brother were literally out from dawn till dusk getting up to mischief, and we were only 8 years old remember. 

What the heck is happening with the weather, I've been having BBQ's sheltering under the fishing umbrella just because if I didn't we wouldn't have had one, if I didn't. I decided to go back to the area where I lost a big Zander recently and this time it was out with the big guns, smelt you see I found by trial and error is a bait that Zander take readily. I'm sure the pungency helps in these mostly turbid waters but also the texture. 

The problem is with a roach deadbait you can often use the same bait a few times, the smelt if often one bite that's it, the bait is mangled beyond recognition. I was literally dressed up like it was winter, 12 degrees with a cold wind, the summer clobber just wouldn't cut it, especially when there was rain on and off too. The water temperature was just over 15 degrees so the recent poor weather had definitely put a kybosh on that of late.  

I had a fish on the bank after about 10 minutes on the RH rod which had the smelt on and I thought that was the start of something, but then it couldn't have been more different. Despite leapfrogging the hotspot twice over its whole length those Zander were just not showing at all. Last time I was here the bites were every ten minutes or so, this couldn't be more different.

I gave it a good 2.5 hours or so but the writing was already on the wall and I'm more impatient than  Eddy so I called it a day and returned to annoy the wife who was expecting a peaceful evening . 

A woman goes into a restaurant with 15 kids.

The kids start goofing around while she's talking to the waitress. The mom gets impatient and yells, "Eddy! Stop that! Or else!" All 15 boys suddenly sit down, obedient and quiet.

The waitress asks, "Did you really name all 15 of your boys Eddy?"

"Yup," says the woman. "Makes it easier than trying to remember who's who every damn time."

"But what if you only want to talk to one of them for some reason?" the waitress asks.

"Well, then I just call them by their last names."

Transient Towpath Trudging - Pt.117 (Canal Zander - Lost a Big'un !!!)

We all have our comfort foods don't we, for me to be honest they are few and far between but whatever roast potato I'm making, whether it be for a Sunday roast, or like I did for this evening's meal some mini rosemary and garlic ones to accompany cod, samphire in a lemon and parsley sauce, get dipping in that mint sauce (maybe I'm pregnant 😀). Weirdly I rarely have roast lamb, as I prefer lamb for curries however when I do, I rarely have it with mint sauce.

Oh and a proper doner kebab if I could get one locally, yes even sober believe it or not 😀

Now In medieval time the main export product for the English was wool and created large revenue for the English to sustain various wars that they had at that time which was probably the French, again...

...But their valued wool makers was being consumed by the locals and naturally limited their export of wool, so the law makers at that time decided to make it law that it would be illegal to consume lamb without eating it with mint sauce, which was a far cry from a taste that was acquired at that time and gave the meat a foul taste which they hoped would discourage the eating of lamb.

They did not ban the eating of lamb all together as the royals and upper class English was not prepared to give up that right just yet, another theory of the development of the lamb/mint association suggests that it is a legacy of the roast lamb and bitter herbs eaten by the eaten by the Israelites on the eve of their Exodus from Egypt.

Before I go off on a tangent, what your comfort food ?

Anyway I was back chasing Zander for an evening at an area where some big ones have been coming out recently. Now Zander love a whole roach as their comfort food, and 3-4 inches long is ideal to target these interesting fish that have been persecuted from all sides.

Oddly the first fish that came to the net though was a rare pike that took the bait on the drop I reckon as the bait didn't settle after casting out again from a missed take. I could tell it was a pike rather than a Zander straight away as they go off like a rocket once hooked.

A rather lean fish, but it gave a good fight to be fair and was probably heading towards 5lb I'm imagine as it was quite long despite the lack of stature.

A boat came through at full speed but thankfully I was fishing for Zander not silvers, I must admit despite heading towards 50 sessions since the closed season I'm glad the river season is upon us, as I'm reaching that point that I'm going through the motions rather than properly enjoying it really.

The solitude isn't like it is on the river mainly because there is too many outside influences that are beyond your control, the tipping point the dog owner the other week who couldn't careless on how his dog had reacted to me just sat there quietly fishing. A really did think I was about to be attacked and was fully expecting to defend myself with whatever I could get my hands on. 

Thankfully it never came to that but one of many reasons why the canals are a stop gap really. Still on a positive note it is a natural venue which is bonus so you never know what will turn up, and there is Zander and who doesn't like a Zander, well ok, better not ask that out loud.

Anyway once that boat had gone through there seemed a continuous tow on the water and the CRT had recently come through hacking down the greenery and most of it had ended up in the canal. So hard fishing really, the key was to use the bag to lift as much line out the water as possible.

I had a schoolie drop off at the net an hour in and then bites came after 20 / 30 minutes but they were all small fish. I managed 5 or so and also missed a few bites where I tightened up in to nothing.

That is usually when the fish has a small mouth and it's not large enough to engulf it. Anyway I was planning on leaving due to nothing big showing but then my right hand rod received a bite which was off down the canal when upon tightening up a solid lump it came up in the water where I saw its flanks.

A Hugggggggggggeee Zander !!! I mean over double figures and quite possibly the biggest I'd even seen, where after the first run it just came off 😱 Oh FFS these moments don't happen very often, and I'd just blown it. I fished until I couldn't see the floats but sadly one one schoolie and that was it.  That was going to be my last session on the canal, well for Zander anyway, but I'm tempted to have another dabble maybe.