Warwickshire Avon - Breadonomics and Buffoonery

There are few things in angling quite as satisfying or quite as nerve-racking as watching a great slab of floating crust drift lazily towards a summer chub that has already spotted you before you've even spotted it. Clear water has a habit of making an angler feel like he's wearing a fluorescent jacket and tap shoes, while the chub sits beneath an overhanging bush looking as suspicious as a home office inspector at a cash-only car wash in Coventry.

Chub have earned their reputation for caution over generations of surviving everything that rivers, predators and anglers can throw at them. Every shadow, every misplaced footstep and every badly aimed cast is carefully logged in that thick skull of theirs before they make the unanimous committee decision to disappear in a puff of silt.

Yet for all their apparent paranoia, chub possess one wonderfully exploitable weakness: greed. They can spend five minutes inspecting a crust with the concentration of an art critic before suddenly deciding that if they don't eat it immediately, another chub surely will.

That's precisely why floating bread is such a deadly summer tactic when the water resembles polished glass. Instead of trying to convince a wary fish to grub about on the bottom, you're simply offering what looks like an easy, natural meal drifting straight into its dining room. No Heath Robinson tactics here, a hook and a piece of bread. 

The beauty of surface fishing is that you become part angler and part theatre audience. Every drift carries the possibility of a fish rising with all the stealth of a submarine or all the subtlety of an overeager Staffy chasing a sausage.

Of course, presenting the bread is only half the battle. The other half involves resisting the overwhelming urge to strike the instant you see a pair of white lips appear beneath the crust, because chub have an uncanny talent for making you look ridiculous while they calmly mouth your bait and spit it back out.

Summer chub are often at their most relaxed during warm, settled conditions when insects, seeds and all manner of edible morsels are constantly dropping into the river. In those moments their guard, though never completely lowered, slips just enough for confidence to overcome caution, and that's exactly the opportunity the patient floater angler waits for.

Stealth is everything, mind you. Crawl if you must, wear dull clothing and avoid skylining yourself on the bank, because the average clear-water chub seems capable of detecting a badly tied shoelace from twenty yards away.

When it all comes together, though, surface fishing for chub is one of angling's purest spectacles. There is no quivertip to stare at, no electronic gadget to beep, just a drifting crust, a widening bow wave and the sort of heart-thumping anticipation that reminds you why people become hopelessly addicted to rivers in the first place.

And when that great bronze flank finally rolls beneath the bread before engulfing it with glorious confidence, you'll almost convince yourself you've outwitted the cleverest fish in the river. The truth, of course, is that the chub simply forgot to be suspicious for five glorious seconds which, thankfully for us, is usually about four seconds longer than we actually need.

People often tell me how lucky I am because I finish at lunchtime on a Friday. What they conveniently forget is that by then I've already ticked off forty-three of my forty-five hours, so it's hardly an early finish. It's more like being let out for good behaviour after serving a full sentence.

The good news is there is finally some light at the end of a very long tunnel. In another four and a bit years I'll be hanging my work boots up for good after forty years of graft. I suppose you could call it early retirement, although after four decades of work I think I've earned the right to swap deadlines for dawns on the river.

To be fair, work hasn't been all doom and gloom over the years. I've had some cracking jobs, met some brilliant people and built up such a good network in angling that I'm forever turning work down these days. I never imagined I'd reach a point where I'd rather spend an afternoon watching a piece of bread drift downstream than earning another few quid, but that's exactly where I've ended up.

Anyway, enough about work because fishing is far more interesting. I headed over to the Warwickshire Avon where Nic from Avon Angling was guiding Patron and blog reader Richard Clapp not too far away. Before long they wandered over looking suspiciously pleased with themselves, which is never a good sign when you're still waiting for your first proper chance.

They had managed around eighteen fish in just three hours for something like sixty pounds of fish trotting maggots. Sixty pounds is an incredible catch by anyone's standards and the aerial footage made it look like somebody had tipped a giant pan of chub soup into the river but you will have to wait for the video. Everywhere you looked there seemed to be fish, and they were certainly making the most of the bread going in.

My own session wasn't quite so hectic, but I wasn't complaining. I managed three lovely chub from around the weir, the best going four and a half pounds with the smallest around the three-pound mark. They're such spooky fish that once you've caught one from a particular spot, the rest disappear as though somebody has sounded the underwater fire alarm.

One fish came from the slack water after I'd watched the smaller fish demolish every floating crust I threw at them. 

I changed to a slow-sinking piece of bread and that proved too much for one decent chub to ignore. It drifted down naturally and the fish confidently took it without a second thought, which unfortunately turned out to be a very expensive mistake.

Later on I wandered beyond the weir and stumbled across a group of big chub in what could only be described as a suicidal swim, yes I took a video, but didn't bother trying to catch one. 

They happily shared almost an entire loaf of bread between them without showing the slightest bit of caution. Greedy doesn't even begin to describe them, and if bread had feelings it would probably have reported them for bullying.

Not far away several big bream were cruising lazily around some lily pads. They looked settled and catchable until a narrowboat came chugging through with all the subtlety of a bulldozer. 

Within seconds every single bream had vanished, leaving me wondering whether they'd swum off or simply evaporated.

We eventually wandered back towards the weir, chatting away about fishing, rivers and all the usual nonsense that anglers somehow find endlessly entertaining. 

Sometimes the company is every bit as enjoyable as the fishing itself, especially when everyone is catching fish and taking the mickey out of each other. It certainly beats talking about work.

Back at the weir the smaller fish were still attacking every floating piece of bread that landed on the surface. I flicked a slow-sinking piece right over the top of them and watched it drift gently beneath the commotion. A decent chub calmly peeled away from the cover and inhaled it without hesitation, proving once again that simple fishing often works best.

All in all it was only a couple of hours on the bank, but it was time well spent. Good company, a handful of lovely chub and plenty of laughs are more than enough to keep me smiling. Roll on the next trip because if retirement is going to look anything like this, those remaining four years might just fly by.

Warwickshire Avon - Salt-Guns and Salamandroids

Well, if the Met Office are to be believed, Stratford-upon-Avon could be nudging 40 degrees this week. Forty! That's not weather for Warwickshire; that's weather for lizards, tourists with regrettable sunburn, and blokes who insist on wearing socks with sandals. I spent most of the morning wondering whether to fill the bird bath or simply climb into it myself.

The talk everywhere seems to be air-conditioning. A few years ago, buying an air-conditioning unit in Britain felt about as necessary as owning a snowplough in the Sahara. Now I'm finding myself browsing appliance websites with the same urgency normally reserved for bait orders and discounted fishing tackle. The nation's gone from discussing drizzle to comparing BTU ratings in the space of a fortnight.

As for the fishing, common sense may have to prevail. When the river feels more like the warm shallow seas of Ayia Napa than a flowing watercourse, it's hard to justify chasing barbel around. They fight like demons at the best of times, and in these conditions with lower oxygen levels you can't help but wonder who's really enjoying the experience. Probably not the fish. Probably not the angler either once he's melted into a puddle on the riverbank.

So, for now, the rods may remain in the garage after this session while I seek refuge in the shade, clutching a cold drink and keeping one eye on the thermometer. If this carries on much longer, Shakespeare's birthplace will need palm trees, and I'll need that air-conditioning unit after all.

Now ordinarily, I’m a man of absolute peace. Give me a lukewarm flask of tea, a pack of maggots that are crawling suspiciously faster than they should, and a quiet swim on the Warwickshire Avon, and I am content. But during a recent heatwave session on a sneaky stretch of the canal, I wasn’t just doing battle with the local zander. I was the primary target for a merciless, bloodthirsty squadron of Warwickshire mosquitoes. 

I’m talking about the kind of airborne pests that laugh at insect repellent. After stopping counting at about 35 bites, I sat on my chair, scratching like a dog with fleas, and thought: there has to be a mechanical solution to this biological warfare. Enter an engineer mate of mine. Engineers don’t look at bugs the way normal people do. They don’t see an annoyance; they see a ballistics deficit.

“Mick,” he said, eyes gleaming with the manic energy of a man who spends his lunch breaks analysing stress-strain curves. “You need a laser guided Bug-A-Salt 3.0. It leverages compressed spring kinetics to atomise standard sodium chloride crystals. It’s pure mechanical genius.” Naturally, I was sceptical. As an angler, I’m used to precision mechanics the buttery click of a high-end centrepin reel, the perfect taper of a carbon Avon rod.

But watching an engineer examine this plastic fly-swatter alternative is a different sort of entertainment altogether. 

When it turned up a few days later I was practically drooling over the tolerances of the pump-action mechanism and the fluid dynamics of the salt hopper.

“Look at the safety cross-bolt engagement,! Look at the elevation on the Patridge sight!”

Then a massive horsefly landed squarely on my bait box, eyeing up my red maggots like a hungry Brummie at a kebab van. 

I racked the pump a satisfying clack-clack that felt like closing the breech on an expensive piece of kit sighted down the barrel, and pulled the trigger.

Pfft!

No toxic spray. No chemical stink to ruin my hookbaits. Just a tiny puff of table salt and one very neutralised horsefly dropped onto the towpath without a single splatter.

Clean execution.

If I can’t bait-boat my way out of a mosquito frenzy, at least I can anti-air weapon my way through it. It leaves a pinch of salt on the grass, but frankly, if a few grains land in the water, I’ll just call it pre-baiting for the next incoming shoal. I might even try loading it with fine garlic salt next time give the canal roach a bit of seasoning before they even see the hook.

Tight lines, and keep your hopper dry.

Anyway over a week now into the river season and, as is traditional, I found myself undertaking what sounded far grander than it actually was: a reconnaissance mission. In reality this involved driving around Warwickshire in a Suzuki Jimny looking for somewhere nice to sit and occasionally throw bits of fish food into a river.

This new venue (to me)  in question came recommended by a blog reader whom I've bumped into on a couple of occasions. Hi Baz !!

This is hardly surprising as we both seem to suffer from the same affliction: an overwhelming desire to avoid other anglers. 

If there were a syndicate called "The Society for the Preservation of Peace, Quiet and Not Being Bothered" we'd probably both be committee members.

The stretch itself ticked all the important boxes. It was less than nine miles away, fifteen minutes from home and involved a route consisting mainly of country lanes narrow enough to make you question whether modern vehicles were a mistake and be thankful the Jimny is unconventional . 

Most importantly, it offered that rare combination of solitude, wildlife and the realistic possibility of not hearing somebody else's bite alarm rendition of a submarine emergency.

What had really piqued my interest though was the untapped zander potential. The thought of improving my personal best had lodged itself firmly in my mind. This is dangerous because anglers are remarkably skilled at convincing themselves that fish they've never seen definitely exist and are probably enormous.

Google Maps only tells you so much, but what I could see looked promising. Better still, the entire 600-metre stretch was accessible by vehicle. The little Jimny would be in its natural habitat. Some people buy four-wheel drives to conquer mountain ranges. Mine spends most of its time transporting pellets, flasks and unrealistic expectations, but unlike many 4x4 users these days, it often does what it is designed to do.

Being able to park virtually on top of the swim is a massive advantage for short sessions. The older I get, the more I appreciate a fishing venue where the walk from car to river doesn't require expedition supplies, sherpas and a farewell letter to loved ones.

There was no rush. Dusk wasn't until after 10.00pm and with the heat wave kicking in soon about the best opportunity I had all week for a dangle, leaving plenty of time for a proper look around. I checked the water temperature which was 23 degrees 😯 I wandered from swim to swim, peering into the water with all the confidence of a man who was largely making things up as he went along. Every crease looked fishy. Every glide looked fishy. Every snag looked fishy. In fact everything looked fishy, which was fortunate considering it was a river.

I scanned the deeper in a few areas and it's a fairy uniform depth with lots of character, lily pads and weed in lots of area but clean gravel also which was nice to see.

Eventually I settled on a swim that looked suitably fishy. I can't adequately define what "fish" means but experienced anglers will understand. It's a bit like house hunting. You walk in, look around and immediately decide whether you'd live there despite having absolutely no logical basis for the conclusion. Well, ok I confess I had a few swims to try from Baz. 

Tactics were kept pleasingly simple. A concentrated patch of bait delivered via a PVA bag, some homemade paste making its appearance again and, on the hair, an ever-reliable Robin Red pellet. It had served me faithfully last season and I see no reason to abandon a successful partnership. Unlike several football managers, the pellet has never let me down.

To get things started I introduced a bait dropper full of hemp and small pellets before allowing the swim to rest. This sounds wonderfully tactical and scientific. In truth it mainly gave me an excuse to sit down, drink cold water and stare at the river whilst pretending important things were happening beneath the surface.

The jungle drums on the WBAS WhatsApp group had been beating loudly since the start of the season. Rumours suggested the barbel were preoccupied with spawning activities when the drawbridge came up on the 16th and therefore maybe less interested in my carefully prepared offerings. They may well have more pressing matters on their minds than helping me improve my catch reports, but to be honest with the water temp as it is, they can wait for a while. 

It's difficult to compete with romance.

Still, I remained optimistic. If sure the barbel still could well be engaged in their annual bout of bukkake despite waiting over a week since they had been spotted on various rivers, that or chilling in the weirs because of the heat, perhaps a bream might wander past or a nice bream, Chub are wonderfully accommodating creatures. While barbel often behave like celebrities surrounded by security staff, chub are more akin to that bloke in the pub who'll happily stop for a chat with anyone.

Anyway as the evening settled and the shadows lengthened, I sat quietly beside a stretch of river I'd never fished before. Not that much traffic noise. No crowds. No distractions. Just birdsong, flowing water and the comforting knowledge that somewhere beneath the surface there might be a specimen fish, absolutely nothing whatsoever.

Which, when you think about it, is one of the many reasons fishing remains such a splendidly ridiculous pastime.

With the heat of the day finally ebbing away, it was surprising just how quickly the water temperature dropped. Over a couple of hours it shed more than two degrees, helped no doubt by the steady rain that accompanied the first part of the session. Despite looking promising, very little happened early on and the river remained stubbornly quiet.

Things livened up when the bats emerged. For the best part of half an hour they seemed intent on colliding with the line, rattling the rod tip often enough to keep me guessing. More than once the tip flicked round in a way that would have convinced anyone a fish was attached. Eventually dusk deepened and the bats moved elsewhere, leaving the river to settle once more.

Not long after came a proper whack on the rod. The tip sprang into life with a series of sharp knocks, though nothing really committed itself. A strike connected with something, but the culprit proved to be a tiny chublet whose ambition far outweighed its size. It was quickly swung to hand and admired before being returned.

Another fifteen minutes passed without further action, so that was that. Even so, the stretch looks full of promise, particularly for predators, and I'm keen to spend more time exploring it when conditions improve. For now, with the heatwave set to tighten its grip again, it's a case of sitting it out and looking ahead to a cooler weekend.

Canal Roach: Trapped in a Sisyphean Loop - Pt.5

There are moments in life when you begin to question your own sanity, and mine came somewhere between the carrot shelf and the reduced meat section in Aldi. Now, I’m not saying I’m easily excitable, but when you see perfectly respectable vegetables—carrots, garlic, swede, and potatoes (8p) practically being given away like unwanted raffle prizes at a village fête, you do start to wonder if you’ve accidentally wandered into some sort of alternate universe. 

Naturally, I filled the basket with the urgency of a man preparing for the apocalypse. Then came the beef—half price, £7 a kilo, practically winking at me. It was destiny. That beef didn’t choose me, I chose it… repeatedly… until it was in the trolley.

Of course, all this bounty would usually signal one thing in our household: the sacred Sunday roast. A ritual so consistent that even Ben knows to loiter strategically near the table around 5:30pm. However, fate had other ideas this week. 

While the wife and kids were likely dreaming of crispy roast potatoes and gravy lakes, I had other commitments—namely, a jaunt to Brum to meet my mate Simon. Plans included a few drinks (purely for hydration purposes), some Korean food, and an ACID house gig where 808 State would be twiddling knobs with the sort of enthusiasm usually reserved for men assembling flat-pack furniture. The legendary Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath would be our playground. Roast pork, therefore, has been unceremoniously postponed to Monday. The family will survive. Probably.

Now, before all that urban revelry, I had a far more noble pursuit in mind: fishing. The South Stratford Canal has always been a bit of a favourite—intimate, peaceful, and just the right amount of “I might actually catch something here.” But in a rare moment of adventurous thinking (clearly a mistake), I decided to try a different stretch on the Grand Union Canal. 

It offered a bit of shelter from the wind, which, after the previous night’s visit from what I’ve decided to call Storm Dave, felt like a sensible move. At one point the wife and I stood outside with a glass of wine, staring into the gale like extras in a low-budget disaster film, fully expecting the roof to take flight.

I arrived at the canal at the ungodly hour of 6:30am, which for me is essentially the middle of the night. Spirits were high, optimism intact, and my back… well, my back had other plans. In a spectacular display of athletic incompetence, I managed to tweak it while getting the tackle out of the car. Nothing dramatic, just enough to remind me that my body is now less “elite angler” and more “fragile antique.” Still, onward we marched—or shuffled—into battle.

The first swim is usually a banker. A few casts, a bit of groundbait, maggots doing their thing, and before you know it, you’re into a nice run of fish. Not today. Forty-five minutes passed with absolutely nothing happening. Not even a courtesy nibble. It was like fishing in a bathtub. Normally I’d have moved on much sooner, but the combination of sunshine and a mildly broken back made sitting down seem like a tactical masterstroke rather than laziness.

Eventually, I embraced the inevitable and went on the rove, trying swim after swim with the same result: absolutely naff all. The predator rod sat there looking decorative, the maggots remained insultingly untouched, and I began to suspect I’d somehow offended the fishing gods. Perhaps they’d heard about the Aldi haul and decided I’d had enough luck for one weekend.

In a final act of desperation, I headed to a known zander spot. The “last throw of the dice” scenario. A smelt went out on a circle hook, and for a glorious moment—finally—the float twitched, dipped, and sprang to life. 

Fish on! The zander, clearly unaware it was supposed to behave like a zander, fought like an overexcited chub, darting about under my feet as if auditioning for a circus act. I guided it in, heart pounding, net at the ready… and off it came. Gone. Vanished. Probably laughing.

To be fair, it wasn’t a monster maybe a 2lber, but it would have saved the blank and restored some dignity. Instead, I was left staring at the water like a man who’s just dropped his last chip down the side of the sofa. One final swim on the way back to the car yielded exactly what I’d come to expect by this point: nothing. Not a bite. Not a flicker. Not even a fishy insult. Just me, my thoughts, and a growing suspicion that maggots had suddenly become deeply unpopular overnight.

So there we have it. A morning that promised much and delivered the square root of absolutely nothing. Still, there’s always next time… assuming my back recovers, the fishing gods forgive me, and Aldi hasn’t sold out of everything worth eating.

And if not, well, there’s always Monday’s roast pork to look forward to. Assuming the rabble haven’t staged a revolt by then.

Warwickshire Avon - Magniloquence and Marginality (PB Content)

Fishing, I have long suspected, is a sport designed specifically to test the structural integrity of a man’s optimism. It lures you in with pastoral promises and then batters you about the head with wind, rain, rising water and the occasional two-ounce gudgeon that hooks itself in the nostril and looks at you as if to say, “Really? This is what you came for?” And yet we persist. We watch river levels like Victorian astronomers scanning the heavens, convinced that this time this precise alignment of rainfall, temperature and domestic scheduling will produce something magnificent.

The week in question had been one of those dreary, damp sagas where every river within sensible driving distance had decided to impersonate a minor ocean. The Arrow and the Alne were not merely up; they were exploring neighbouring counties. The only sliver of hope lay with the dear old Warwickshire Avon, which was high, yes, but not yet in the sort of mood where it tries to repossess your landing net. It was creeping upward, slow and ominous, like a cat preparing to leap onto a shelf full of heirlooms.

Now, I am not a man prone to gossip, but when Nic of Avon Angling was messaging me 24 hours before and  he'd “bagged up” to the tune of 30lb of chub, including a brace of fives and a four, trotting maggots one listens. One leans in. One abandons all previous life plans and begins reorganising the boot of the car with the urgency of a Formula One pit crew. “Get out there,” he said. “It’s great conditions.” Which, translated from Tackle-Shop Optimism into English, means: “You might catch something memorable, provided you don’t drown.” I tend to fish maggots now rather than bread for chub as it's less messy for starters but it just works when the conditions are right. 

As luck would have it, I finished work at midday on Friday. This is the sort of blessing that should be commemorated in stained glass. However, fishing time was to be rationed like wartime sugar because my wife had yoga at 5:30pm, meaning I needed to be home by 5:15pm to assume control of the household orchestra, conducted entirely in the key of chaos. Thus the window of opportunity was narrow more arrow slit than bay window.

Undeterred, I selected a stretch known for barbel, reasoning that the double-figure temperatures might have stirred them from their winter sulk. It was a 45-minute drive, which in angling mathematics leaves approximately 23 minutes of actual fishing once you factor in faffing, tea-pouring and the ceremonial staring at the river as though it might offer guidance. The upstream gauges were rising at a pace best described as “ambitious,” but hope is a stubborn weed in the angler’s garden.

Upon arrival, the car park resembled a modest trade fair for waterproof clothing. Vans lined up like damp pilgrims. Two of my favoured pegs were already occupied by men who clearly shared my hydrological obsession. I performed the customary wander hands in pockets, nodding sagely at nothing in particular before trudging downstream to a wider, steadier stretch. Here, the river flowed with a lovely, even pace. Upstream looked like it was auditioning for a disaster documentary; down here it was positively civilised.

Trotting it was, and then a go for the barbel at the end.

I fed maggots for a good fifteen minutes, sprinkling them with the reverence of a man sowing the seeds of destiny. A size 20 Guru hook nominally a 20 but in reality something closer to a 16 unless you’re measuring with electron microscopes adorned with two bronze maggots. First trot: nothing. Second trot: the float dipped with purpose and I lifted into a solid, reassuring thump.

A chub of about a pound and a half.

Reader, after a run of blanks that had me contemplating selling my rods and investing in a set of golf clubs (imagine the horror me discussing handicaps rather than hooklinks), this felt like redemption. Next cast: another. Then another. 

The float buried with cheerful regularity, and soon I was in that rare state of angling bliss where you stop thinking about river gauges, domestic curfews and existential dread. In the first hour I landed six or seven chub of similar stamp solid, silvery, obliging creatures with faces that suggest mild disapproval.

And then, just as I was congratulating myself on my tactical brilliance, the float vanished in a manner that suggested something far more serious than another pound-and-a-half specimen had taken an interest. I struck into what can only be described as a moving sandbag. No rattling head shakes, no frantic darting just immense, implacable weight hugging the bottom.

“Barbel,” I whispered to myself, because hope is incurable.

I coaxed it upstream, rod hooped, heart thundering. Inch by inch it came, resisting with the quiet authority of something that has paid its council tax for decades. And then, in the olive-green water beneath the rod tip, it surfaced.

Good grief.

It was a chub. But not the sort one casually swings in while discussing the weather. This was a chub that had clearly made excellent life choices. Long, broad-backed, pale flanks gleaming in the muted light. When it saw me it bolted, as if suddenly remembering an urgent appointment elsewhere. I managed to turn it somewhere between panic and prayer and gradually it conceded. Into the net it slid, vast and magnificent, like a bronzed log with opinions.

On the bank it looked even bigger. The sort of fish that makes you glance around to ensure witnesses are present. Surely this would be a new personal best? The scales were produced with trembling hands. 6lb 1oz.

It didn’t beat my all-tackle PB. But it did nudge past my float-caught best by a 6 ounces. The narrowest of margins it didn't beat my overall PB, but in angling terms that’s the difference between “quite pleased” and “insufferable for at least a fortnight.” I admired it in the rain because of course it had begun raining properly now, the heavens choosing this moment to re-enact the Great Flood before slipping it back to sulk beneath some tree roots.

With the maggots becoming increasingly enthusiastic about escape and the swim beginning to resemble a developing wetland, I switched to the barbel gear. By now the river was rising with alarming enthusiasm. The margin crept closer. The bank grew softer. Each step made a noise like a sponge contemplating its life choices.

I persisted.

A two-pound chub took the barbel bait with surprising gusto, followed by a bream that bit like a steam train and fought like a resigned cushion. 

The water continued its climb. Debris sailed past with increasing frequency twigs, leaves, possibly someone’s garden furniture. 

I fished right up to curfew, glancing at my watch with the anxiety of a man who knows yoga ends promptly and children expect dinner with alarming regularity.

No barbel came to the net.

And yet, as I packed away in the drizzle, boots squelching, net dripping, I felt absurdly content. 

Because fishing is not, in truth, about the relentless pursuit of whiskered leviathans. It is about moments. The float sliding under. The sudden, immovable weight. The sight of a truly exceptional chub materialising from coloured water like a myth made flesh.

The Warwickshire Avon will likely be over its banks tomorrow, strutting about the floodplain like it owns the place. I will no doubt be poring over gauges again, convincing myself that floodwater barbel are not just possible but practically inevitable.

I will probably get soaked. I may blank. I may once again threaten to take up golf.

But somewhere beneath that rising water swims a 6lb 1oz chub that, for one glorious Friday afternoon, made all the damp socks, frantic dashes home and hydrological obsessing entirely worthwhile. 

And that, dear readers, is quite enough to keep a man gloriously, hopelessly hooked.

Warwickshire Avon - Grockles and Grammaticasters

There’s something inexplicably comforting about knowing you could knock up a pepperoni pizza mid-session while waiting for a chub to inhale a 14mm halibut pellet. The Jackery Explorer 1000 v2 what a name, like it ought to come with its own cape had arrived, and with its 1500 watts of fishless potential, the River Wye trip now had the culinary support of a high street takeaway. Sam won’t starve, that's for sure. Airfryer, kettle, USB fan, and possibly even a disco ball if the barbel get frisky.

With Sunday’s gastronomic angling expedition prepped, I fancied a few hours at a local stretch to scratch that barbel itch. Arriving at a well-trodden haunt, I was relieved to see just two cars in the carpark a rarity, like finding a tench in your garden pond after a storm. 

Alas, within minutes of picking a peg with a “hot” reputation, a fellow angler appeared who seemed to be auditioning for Swim Wars: Episode III – The Peg Spreader. Not content with one pitch, he baited three like a Victorian land baron claiming territory. A bit much, I thought, so I gathered my gear, muttered something unrepeatable, and wandered off in search of solitude.

The weir it was then clear, shallow, fizzy with oxygen, and free from both peg pirates and loud social media live streamers. 

I baited with some trusty groundbait and pellets, then let it rest while I had a saunter along the bank, which is where I bumped into Jon Pinfold. After the customary bank-side natter (which in fishing time equates to two cups of tea and the synopsis of three seasons’ worth of barbel blanks), he headed off downstream, and I trudged back to the foamy sanctuary of the weir.

The first cast in and the bait was getting instant attention. That gentle rattling, the kind that screams “I’m not the fish you’re looking for” echoed up the line. A suicidal gudgeon proved the point, followed by a roach with delusions of grandeur. Evening crept in, and I decided to double down with two 14mm halibut pellets, because nothing says “come hither Mr. Barbel” like a bait the size of a gobstopper.

With the centrepin poised, ratchet armed, and tea in hand, I relaxed into the last hour before dark. Then, a tug not a full-blooded wrench but enough to get the ratchet moaning briefly like an annoyed pensioner on a mobility scooter. I struck... into air. A chub, most likely, cheeky sods. Then, just as I’d re-entered that contemplative space where your brain flits between philosophical musings and wondering what happened to Wagon Wheels, all hell broke loose.

The rod buckled, the ratchet sang its song of war, and the fish surged. This, I thought, this is it. The barbel of prophecy. The one. The beast. The holy grail of whiskered dreams. But then... a lolloping swirl on the surface. And I knew.

Bream. 🙈

The barbel’s doughy, silt-loving cousin. It wallowed like a drunk grockle at an open mic night, and while the fight had lasted all of fifteen dramatic seconds, it was clear the finale had already been written. Five pounds and ten ounces of pure heartbreak. A fish shaped disappointment. Covered in the sort of slime you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy’s sleeping bag.

I fished on for a bit, more out of principle than optimism, fed a bit more bait, and hoped in vain for redemption. It didn’t come. On the way back to the car, I met Jon again who’d had a lovely evening bagging up on chub, naturally.

Back home, the bream slime was a pungent reminder of what could have been. The clothes went straight in the wash before they walked there on their own. Honestly, I don’t know what it is about bream mucus, but it seems to bond at a molecular level to anything it touches like some kind of piscine superglue with notes of corpse flower and disappointment.

Still, with pizza planned for Sunday’s session and tea on tap, hope springs eternal. Because that’s fishing. One moment you’re dreaming of barbel, the next you’re reeling in aquatic bin-liners. But we carry on. Because somewhere, beneath the gin-clear water, a barbel waits. Fat, wary, smug.

And probably laughing.

Transient Towpath Trudging - Pt.129 (Bread Munchers & Magnet Fishing)

Now it all started with a very optimistic plan: Sam and I would rise early, hit the canal marina at the crack of dawn, and gently pluck bream and hybrids from the water like serene, fish-whispering Zen masters. You know, just two chaps enjoying the quiet simplicity of angling, one with nature, rods in hand, sandwiches in pockets. A pure and noble pursuit.

Except we both needed to be prised from our duvets.

By the time we eventually rolled up to the canal, it was less "crack of dawn" and more "brunch with boats." The marina was alive with the chaos of holiday hire boats meandering about like oversized bath toys set loose by excitable toddlers. There was more engine revving and dodgy reversing than a learner driver's convention.

And, of course, all that boat activity stirred up the canal water. The tow was all over the place, so Sam had to stick his rod so high in the air it looked like he was trying to get a signal for canal Wi-Fi. He spent most of the morning adjusting his setup like a frustrated TV aerial technician in 1998.

Still, we gave it a good go. We baited our swims with bread and groundbait, settling in for what we hoped would be a replay of my last glorious bream-catching session. I had visions of thick, bronze-bodied bream sliding smoothly into my net while Sam looked on with the kind of jealousy only fishing buddies can muster.

What actually happened was... absolutely nothing.

Not a nibble. Not a bite. Not even a suspicious bubble. Just us, sat there like a pair of over-equipped statues, quietly pretending we weren’t losing the will to live. And to top it off, the towpath was heaving – like Piccadilly Circus on a Saturday, only with more Lycra-clad cyclists and less regard for personal space. One guy even managed to walk straight through our swim while loudly announcing he was training for a triathlon. We wished him luck and quietly cursed his calves.

Eventually, we reached the universal angler’s conclusion: Sod this.

So, we packed up the rods, took a deep breath, and pivoted to Plan B – magnet fishing. If you’re unfamiliar, magnet fishing is like fishing, but instead of hoping for scaly creatures, you’re trying to haul centuries-old junk out of the murky depths with a magnet that could probably ruin your phone from ten feet away.

We headed to a spot near the locks and bridges, prime magnet fishing locations, which is code for “where a lot of stuff has been accidentally (or drunkenly) thrown in since 1793.”

The sun had come out by then, and the skies were so blue it almost looked Photoshopped but don't be fooled. It was still cold enough to remind us that the British spring is more of a concept than a season.

After a good hour of flinging the magnet into the canal and pulling out increasingly disappointing bits of nothing, Sam finally struck gold metaphorically speaking. He reeled in a solid chunk of metal: an ancient-looking rivet, encrusted with history and canal gunk.

We both stared at it like archaeologists discovering an old Roman toothbrush.

“It’s probably from the South Stratford Canal itself,” I said, with all the confidence of someone who definitely didn’t just make that up. “Built between 1793 and 1816.”

Sam, beaming, declared it was going straight into his collection of tat , a proudly eclectic museum of mysterious metallic odds and ends. One kids’s rubbish is another kids’s weirdly shaped talking point.

So while we didn’t catch any bream, or even see one, the day wasn’t a total loss. We got fresh air, a bit of sun, and the thrill of possibly tetanus-inducing treasure. Not to mention the deep satisfaction of knowing we beat the triathlon guy to the best lockside bench.

All in all, not a bad way to spend a slightly disorganized, thoroughly entertaining morning on the canal.

Moral of the story? Always pack a magnet. The bream might ghost you, but the tat never disappoints.

And here was the prize !!

I don't think I'll be able to retire on it anyway 😃Still Sam went home happy and that's all that mattered !!