When planning a fishing session with your mates there is always a factor that can change everything, something we cannot and I don’t think we ever will be able to control, that thing that can ruin the best laid plans…. the weather. If Mother Nature want’s to get angry and throw heavy winds at you then there is no escape and that is why it’s always a good idea to have a back up location or 2 in place.

 

We had organised a trip over to Orford Island weeks in advance, the plan was to get over on a good tide and fish a long overnighter, we knew that was when the codling if they were going too would show. With a week to go and excitement building between the group the long range forecast started to put a little spanner in the works, the wind was looking to be blowing up strong North East – East with rain and we know that can spell a horrid night over there. We kept our eyes on the weather leading up to Saturday and after seeing not much change I called it off, we have been going over there many years and I know too well how bad that place can be if the weather turns and I really did not fancy a long cold wet night if it turned out to be just dogs and whiting in residence. Plans were quickly put in place for a road trip down South but Ste (the dandy highwayman) couldn’t do it in the end so it all boiled down to plan C. After checking the weather we knew we had a window before it rained too heavy to get down the cliff, hit it over low and fish the flood before getting home to our warm beds.

 

 

Turning up at Ste’s house, Derek was already there and as soon as John turned up we headed off to the mark. It didn’t take long to get to the cliff top and the once peeking over the top we could see a ripe looking sea, plenty of colour with a bit of surf running, it looked perfect for my target species of the night which was a bass but hopes were also high there may be a stray cod lurking in the chocolatey soup that was in front of us. I was soon set up and ready to get stuck in, i was using just 1 rod tonight, my Vertix Eclipse Vitesse along with 60lb braid to an urfe with a trailing snood fished as a pennel with whole squid for bait. Further up the line Ste and John were into dogs and whiting from the off where as me and Derek sat it out with no bites. Despite there being only 80 yards between the 4 of us I could see the ground was different in front of the other 2, where me and Derek had white-water in front of us Ste and John had more calmer waters. The dogs must have loved sitting on the outside of the turbulence picking off the food being chucked out as Ste was getting hammered by them, one after the other they were queuing up to jump on his baits.

 

 

Low water came and went and out of no where my tip smacked round but I failed to connect, I baited up a big whole squid and whacked it out just behind the frothy, angry looking surf. It was around 15 minutes later my tip banged over followed by a rapidly slackening line, winding down I soon caught up with some weight and through the braid i could feel a fish was hooked. It wasn’t long before a pristine little bass slid out of the surf and after a couple of pictures he was returned to fight another day. The next few hours were filled up with whiting and dogs for all of us with Matty A managing to find a codling on worm baits and Derek picking a little bass off close in, with sporadic rain showers and some slight wind it wasn’t as bad weather wise as had been predicted but at 1am we decided to call it a night and head home.

 

 

Not the best session in the world by any means but we still saw a few fish between us and it was nice to have a little social with the lads finished off with 2 Double cheeses on the way home from maccy’s to warm me up…. Perfect.