Mullet, Bass and a Trip to London!

The first trip out on the same weekend after I had the large chub on the third day of the season on the Thursday, my friend Oscar invited me out on his canoe sea fishing on an estuary down South targeting mullet and bass. After a lovely overnight stay at Oscar's grandparents, Oscar and I prepared ragworms, lots of bread and lures for our targets. We arrived at a marina and saw a big singular mullet of at least 4lbs circling around and sifting the bottom of the water. Our excitement levels hit the roof and we went off to launch the canoe as quick as possible. We decided to troll some Rapala plugs on the tail end of the canoe and it wasn't long until we were hitting some nice school bass. After paddling around looking for shoals or singular feeding mullet and not being successful, we carried on the trolling I had an amazing take from obviously a better bass with the rod absolutely arching over. After a decent battle, the fish started to dive down under the boat causing a lot of strain on the line and unfortunately it got away which was huge blow. The rest of the day was enjoyable with a few nice little bass being culprits to our lures, however the fishing in general was frustrating for our target species, the thick lipped mullet and of course the better bass specimens.

Oscar's Lure Outfit

A week or so later, my mum informed me there was a University taster day at one of the Universities she works at part time, the LSE, thinking about my interest in Politics and History I thought it was certainly worth a visit. Knowing I was going to be London I contacted my friend Steve Dedman who had kindly offered me a session on his local river, the Wandle. Unfortunately the day I chose was the hottest, most humid day of the year so far with everywhere being and feeling unbearable. After the taster day I made my way down to Wimbledon from Waterloo and got on a Tram to the location where Steve invited me to fish the Wandle. A short walk from stop, and there was Steve welcoming me in his warm manner. We both agreed that it wasn't easy conditions in the slightest and it was going to be hard going for sure. I was taken to a pretty swim walking upstream and after firing pouch falls of maggots for a few minutes I started running my float through. I was hoping that the presentation achieved would be tripping along the bottom where hopefully a better barbel or chub could see it. After a tiny little roach, bumping a gudgeon and a small chublet we made our way downstream. The outcome was very similar with a chublet or two being culprits to the maggots. After a few minutes at this, Steve suggested that I would go up to the same swim as before and start feeding and running through again hoping possibly a better fish could have come out with the light levels and temperature starting to drop. Sadly, it wasn't to be but a slightly better chublet which pulled the string a fair bit was a result of sorts.

A Chublet Consolation on a Tough Evening after a long day!

Tight Lines,

Tom Aldous