Appledore – Shrimps and Sheepskin Fiddlers

Grade II listed and one of the oldest properties in Appledore, Dock Cottage was home for our weeks family holiday. With a prime location and panoramic estuary views over to Instow just added to the character of the property. A large patio area to dine, crab and occasionally fish off I was looking forward to the Easter Break. It's been a long time since Christmas and New Year and the daily grind was taking its toll.

Now Appledore, famous for its narrow streets, colourful fisherman’s cottages and boat building centre dating back many years is a popular holiday destination all year round, but my Twin Brother and his 3 daughters lives down this neck of the woods now having moved from Coventry, so it’s always good to catch up. Especially as a pub crawl is always in order, and shared time away from the kids to put the world to rights.

Appledore has always been a sea-faring place, with free-port status. In the 1580's there were 15 vessels and 115 mariners registered here. Many of these sailors are understood to have helped defeat the Spanish Armada in 1588.

Fishing was a lucrative trade in the 16th and 17th Centuries both in the Bristol Channel and further afield as far as Newfoundland. In the 18th & 19th Centuries Appledore was in the deep-sea & coastal trade and many brigs were used to import domestic goods from Bristol & Liverpool, and coal & limestone from South Wales.

Dock cottage where we were staying was apparently the residence for the owner of the Dock in days gone by. Construction started in 1853 and was completed 3 years later. This entailed the demolition of some alms-houses close to the site, and the construction of outbuildings, rigging lofts, saw mills and smith shops.

When finished, the dock brought work and prosperity to Appledore, not only in ship repairing, but in many other maritime trades, from boat building & sail making to rope making & chandlery. The resulting Dry Dock was 330 feet long, 36 feet wide, and could hold 2 large vessels at once. The first ship to be sailed over from Prince Edward Island, and brought into the Dock, arrived on 17 July 1856.

In more recent times with the onset of World War II in 1939, there was plenty of work: old wooden sailing ships were converted for barrage-balloon defence; motor gun-boats, landing-craft & wooden mine-sweepers for the Admiralty were needed. The contribution of the workers to the war effort cannot be under-stated. History here in abundance.

As I’m typing this though the current dock owners are seeking proposals for the use of the dry dock, as work dried up excuse the pun. Luckily the site is recognised as being of special historical importance, it is Grade II listed, and has the potential to be a Maritime Heritage Centre, which if realised, would contribute towards the general regeneration of the North Devon area. The UK likes to look after its heritage so let’s hope they can sort that out pretty quickly.

It didn’t help that one of the more recent companies to run it were taken to court and eventually prosecuted over noise and also because of water from the estuary was seeping into the dock and becoming contaminated with oils, sludges, paint and dirt from dismantled vessels. Instead of containing any contaminated water, FTD Marine Ltd pumped it back over gates and into the estuary. !!!!

That’s no good is it, so maybe a heritage centre would be the best use for it, a recent proposal and subsequent refusal by the council for flats and large-scale redevelopment of Richmond Dock was upheld by Secretary of State, so I’ll be watching with interest what they will eventually do with it.

Now out of the many watering holes to be visited, the Champ public house is one of my favourites down this neck of the woods, some fine Clearwater Brewery ales on tap (bottled ones are poor), live open mic sessions most evening and barmaids like they should be, you know, a proper pub !!!!

The weather had picked up as well because the 3 or 4 weeks prior, the bitterly cold wind really did hang around far more than I’d liked, and I was ready to pack ones winter coat. But with daytime temperatures in to the early twenties, it really had kicked up a notch. So much so, my Brother would be hosting a Barbi on the Sunday such the upturn.

To be fair we do well for the weather in the UK when we’ve holidayed here despite every year adding to the CO2 issue by venturing to far flung sunnier climes to be able to don the shorts, wear the rays without having to look at the weather app. Get good weather and location in the UK, it really is hard to beat.

We had quite a lot planned for the week round and about, but just being able to get out every day in to the fresh sea air everyday works wonders for mood, especially as the environment I work in doesn’t have any natural light. Fish and Chip always taste better when you’re by the salt, shore and sandbars, but then everyone knows that don’t they.

Being so close to the water, yes I did bring some fishing gear. A float set-up and also a lure rod to trying popping for bass that worked in an area not far from where we were staying.

The float, well hadn’t a clue what I’d put in the hook, I was trying to find some live shrimp when I was down here as I watched a YouTube video with someone catching quite a few schoolies on them.

If I couldn’t get any of them I’d try bread, lugworm or even some artificial living shrimp feathers I’d impulse purchased off of Ebay.

Tide times printed off, tackle down to the minimum, targets in mind !!!!

We were really lucky with the weather with only two shower dodging days, the start of the week reached 23 degrees as expected.

When you've a view of the estuary over to Instow it an ever changing picture they I could never tire of. The boats, the birds, the changing tide and weather. Ben was in his element taking every opportunity to spend time outside.

Gulls, Oystercatchers and other birds were very active , shame the fishing wasn't. To be fair after the 2nd lure fishing trip to some rocks a short walk away where I'd caught Bass before, I decided to fish right off the deck when the tide was up, well for crabs. Where in one particular hour session with my brother and his kids over we managed 33, all falling to smokey bacon.

A bleeny even wanted in on the act, but the other fish were not forthcoming despite trying a few methods to catch something.

A trip to Bucks Mill, Instow and Hartland Quay is was a busy week, it took 2 hours and 50 minutes to get down down without a stop (left at 6:15am) and it took nearly 6 hours with a nightmare service station stop, just before Bristol.

I love this part of the world though, it feels like England from a time gone by, we'll be back. Now need to dust off those Zander rods.

The Close Season Zander Quest Pt.120 – Jobbernoles and Jumbleguts

I've never been great with altitude or even heights, I was persuaded to take a trip up the Aiguille du Midi cable car in Chamonix. Now that features the worlds highest vertical ascent cable, which when you reach the top provides some unbelievable panoramic scenes of the Alps and at 12,605ft, literally takes your breath away.

Once ones body and mind got used to just how high I was, I could navigate around the Central Piton terraces without issue but, but the reality is heights are not for me, unlike these fruit loops that scaled the Shanghai Tower like they were scaling a playground climbing frame.

Now the last time I went to Shanghai and went up the World Financial Center Skyscraper  (looks like a bottle opener) they had nearly completed the larger towers construction which was another hundred odd meters higher still. It is beyond my comprehension just how the human mind can accept what you are about to put yourself through is a good idea and allow you to do it.

You only have to look at YouTube though to see similar videos though. People get off on this stuff, whatever floats your boat I suppose, unless you die on the job of cause,as that will certainly put a stop to your subscribers. then again life is about experiences, not just sitting on ones derriere watching TV, drinking beer and eating bags of chips.

Luckily I've got both ones feet firmly on the ground for this quest of mine. You see the reality is, it's a challenge that I took on that, I began to realise it might not be that easy to bring it to a conclusion. I've continued on with it though because every now and them the humdrum shoolie turns in to something remarkable, something that's gets me reaching for the scales.

An area sheltered from the biting wind with Zed’s tucked up tight against the cover, one fish caught, one lost, and 2 further bites. Out of nowhere this area appeared on one’s radar. To be honest it screamed Zander but with an area further up also producing it was a stretch largely forgotten till I was staring at a blank, and I needed to act fast.

It deserved another go before the waters would warm, the fish up off the bottom….

So I back once more for this short after work session to cover the whole section of thick cover, not just the aforementioned swim . Now with the evenings getting lighter my Zander Quest will be stepped up a gear if that was possible. You see I will soon start fishing evenings in to dark after having ones tea first. Last time I was here I had to leave to appease the clock-watchers despite stumbling on the blank saver at the last minute, me cursing what could have been.

To be fair after getting back the Wife said “You could have stayed you know, you could have got yourself a bag of chips on the way home “

I don’t need to worry about that if I’d already eaten now do I !!!!

So anyway back on track, I’ve a whole section of cover to well yeah, cover .

I love this sort of fishing for Zander, it’s a relatively narrow bit of canal here, so a dainty underarm cast the deadbait is hugging the overgrown, the float easy to see.

Close quarters fishing and when fishing with a sensitive float set-up you can see every little murmur, every little nibble.

It’s a great way to fish for canal Zeds and when that bite eventually comes, can it get any more exciting. You could be attached to a 1lber or a 9lber, it’s only when you’ve felt the first pull, you’ll know.

What amazes me how shallow the canal is on the most part and yet with the surface still, the surface covered in crud, you wouldn’t know beneath the waterline there are beasts (it’s all relative) to be had.

The bigger fish can turn up anywhere as well, my biggest came from some shallow open water, the second biggest in a deeper swim with thick cover. Cover is always a good place to start if you’re a novice and want some tips.

Bait as tight as possible to it as well, the closer the better in my experience !!!!

If you’ve not had a bite within ten or fifteen minutes, it’s time to leapfrog to the next bit of cover.

….and repeat over and over again till you find the fish.

It’s been cold of late hence why Sam hasn't been that interested in tagging along on my usual morning sessions. Despite the milder afternoons and evenings, I'm penning this, up till now I’ve not seen any signs of spawning.

They will be not far off mind you as the weather is starting to get milder, the water likely to be going 12 degrees and beyond in the week following this blog post. I've got a weeks family break planned which may scupper my plans for a proper big one, but I will keep plugging away when I'm back.

Now these Zeds, even the small'uns can cram more food in than you'd imagine, a little like Sam with a bolognese, eyes bigger then their bellies, so even when they are full, they'd give it another go. But then you can also get dainty bites and pinky in the air efforts like older brother Ben when trying to make his ice-cream last.

I feel that time is running out for a proper lunker, but I suspect they are still laying up waiting to be found. One’s carpet bombing approach having rewarded me with plenty of canal Zander over 5lb now, two 7's, an 8 and the best going 9 lb. The 10lber has eluded me thus far, but they are there to be caught, that I know for a fact hence why I'm continuing on with this needle in a haystack quest of mine.

So why are canals largely forgotten about I wonder, I rarely bump in to any other anglers. The Zander may be top dog but there are still plenty of fish to be caught if things with teeth are not your thing. But then look at the fishing weekly’s, pages given over to match fisherman harbouring too many post match fried breakfasts and pictures of bulging keepnets appeasing those that like it easy and given to on a plate.

Canals are not like that for sure, and have changed from days gone by, but come on,they have lots going for them, at least they have character in abundance. There is the intrigue too, what will be on the end of the line, a hot-spot that only you know about, those carp swims you’ve found for next time, that bream swim that was a bite a chuck. Heck, you might even get a bit of exercise as well, and you can even leave your trolley at home.

Banks deserted, waters to myself, yeah, better keep ones mouth shut hadn't I. Anyway way to the session, I just couldn't get settled properly for this session. The length of cover looked great for Zander but after a boat went through quite early on, the water was moving and bouncing all over the shop. The floats were often dragged out of position because of the amount of crud and debris on the surface that was being collected on the line.

Even elevating the rods to keep the line off the surface didn't really help, nor did trying to sink the link and putting the rod tips under the water. Eventually I had a small fish which actually took the bait as it was being dragged along the bottom. To be honest I'd not really experienced the water movement as bad as this before. Even a good 2 hours after the boat went through initially it was still 'flowing'

I decided in the end to finish the session early and give the Zander sessions a rest for a bit. The water temperature was 10.2 degrees and that will rise significantly from next week onward, so with other things on their mind than eating ones deadbaits, I'll have a think about where and when I'm going to start my post tea in to dusk sessions.

The Close Season Zander Quest Pt.119 – Cropsticks and Cundums’s

The working week come to an end, some contemplation, good music, a couple of fishing outings and a couple of large Kirk and Sweeney’s kept one’s mind from straying off the yellow brick road on to the uncertain. Now luckily for me those simple life’s pleasures can get ones mind back on track, and that is generally all that is needed without requiring the lockawayables.

Now the bit of news I enjoyed reading this week was that astronomers managed to take the first ever image of a black hole, which is located in a distant galaxy. Apparently it measures 40 billion km across, is three million times the size of the Earth and has been described by scientists as "a monster". The black hole is 500 million trillion km away and was photographed by a network of eight telescopes across the world.

Try and get your head round that !!!! shame it's not a bit closer to the Houses of Parliament.

Now on a slightly different scale, canal bridges and tunnels can often be inherently spooky places to begin with. Dark, claustrophobic, often damp, moldy, and old, there is a certain innate sense of foreboding and an unsettling atmosphere about these places that disturbs us on almost a primal level, and they make perfect locations for scary tales.

These are places where mysteries reign and where we feel somehow out of place and alone no matter who we may be with.

While wandering under these head covering features of the waterways,where you go from light to gloomy, or gloomy to pitch black may invoke images of ghosts and monsters, it was a tale given to me by a passing towpath cyclist and fellow angler (carper) who recalled a story of sometime massive surfacing and causing a wake of gargantuan proportions.

His finger pointed, area identified, the half empty 3ltr bottle of cider strapped to his rucksack in clear view !!!!

Now these structures, especially the big’uns may already seem unwelcoming and forbidding enough, there are on occasion reports that allow them to live up to their full potential of eeriness, and here I had an account that seemed to suggest something prowling about there in the inky black of these enclosed spaces, lurking and waiting there in the eternal gloom.

Now I thought carp to begin with, but I’ve not seen carp here such the locale, as it seems more suited to the fish with spikey fins and even sharper teeth.

Oddly though, this area hadn’t really jumped out at me as big Zed habitat, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on, so with the tough conditions as they are at the minute I wanted to fish not only within shade of the bridge, but also leapfrog a section of cover around 500 metres long I’d not fished in anger before.

My initial findings were not up to scratch, but when you clutching at those schoolie straws, as I am of late, I need to think outside of the box a little to try and invoke a bite from something bigger than I’ve been catching over the last few sessions. So for this morning session the usual armoury, 2 dead bait rods, overdepth floats, smelt and roach, you know the drill.

It was a very cold morning indeed, a frost on the windscreen I was probably on to a loser straight away. Water temperature down to 9 degrees but fishing for Zander in these tough conditions couldn't be simpler. You need to drop a bait right in from of a fishes noggin. Leapfrog swims and give ten minutes, or maybe twenty max in each.

I covered a good section of the cover and with only one small tentative pull in nearly 3 hours I was staring at a blank. Now right by a bridge was was a section of cover to my left and after 3 boats through in ten minutes I was nearly ready to pack up, but I decided to give a little more because it looked like a fish would be holding up there.

Sure enough the first proper bite and I had to be quick with winding in to the fish because it was heading under some thick cover.Not a huge fish but they are proper aggressive at this of year, so they are great sport when you do catch one.

Only a 3lber but a specimen for a shad chucker. So a blank saved. Now I had intended to get out in the morning as well, but some thick green gunk sat on my chest probably not a wise idea, feel a little run down also, so will try and cram a couple of sessions in next week after work.