Confessions of a Rainbow virgin – day 7.

Friday was a good day – I’d landed my personal best mirror late into the hours of big fish Thursday and despite having not slept a wink on the Thursday night I felt great! The weather didn’t show signs of improving today and eventually the lack of sleep caught up on me – I was ruined by 7am in the morning!

Slipping back the chunk after the photos.

 Just after first light with the pictures done of my new PB, I redid the rod fished over the bars in 9ft of water with exactly the same rig that had nobbled the 57-pounder – double tiger nut with an Enterprise Immortal plastic boilie 10mm in the middle – spaced out a bit like a kebab rig. 

The rig that nobbled the 57-pounder - the only difference was the Immortal boilie was white!

From the start of this trip I’d set my stall to try and winkle a bite off of each spot so with 2 nights remaining I needed to speed things along a little and try and tempt another bite off this spot but with sensible bait application. The biggun’ had crapped out in the recovery sling exactly what I needed to see – a mix of hemp, tiger and boilie poo – exactly what I’d previously baited the spot with! She must have been having it away munching her way down a 60yd baited stretch in the deep water, between the bars, enjoying her free meal before, BANG - I’d hooked her! I just love it when a plan comes together!

The 40lb Power Pro mainline braid and my aging Shimano Aerlex reels performed without fault - this combo was awesome in fact!

For the record the rig that nailed the 57-pounder had been out there in position for the best part of 4 days – so you kinda see where I’m coming from when I say I needed to speed things along as I only 2 nights left to get another bite from that spot! I was so confident with the baiting and rig positioning previously that I really couldn’t have done anything any better, so it was just a case of waiting until a chunk came along – which she did! In the back of my mind the longer the rig was out there – the better the chance of a biggie and that’s the way it worked.

On re-doing the rod, I dispensed with any form of PVA bag and just trickled in ½ pint of hemp and crushed tigers, 10 brazil nuts halved, two handfuls of pellets and 20 halved boilies all scattered in a 10yd area – that was it. With this plan sorted and the rod re-done my mind moved to which rod might go next – that was two rods I’d had bites from and I had two to go!

To the left of the ducks is a small island with an overhanging tree - the spot was just underneath this branch.

My banker rod going into Friday night was my left-hander. I’d hatched another plan earlier in the week on a tasty little spot that I’d been told about by a mate. On Tuesday morning I’d been out in the boat and investigated an overhanging tree that just looked like a really likely ambush point. After tying the boat into the tree I had a good feel around with the prodding stick and the bottom in one particular tight spot close to the edge of the tree was 7ft deep and rock hard – that’s the feeding spot then! I baited with 2kg of chopped boilies along with a good mix of hemp, crushed tigers, Tuna amino liquid and mixed pellets. In total I baited with 5kg of wet mix – all of which I poured straight down onto this little hard dinner plate I’d previously found.  With the spot baited I decided to leave this as my fifth spot and come onto it later in the week if one of my other four spots wasn’t looking likely for a bite! This move to bait and leave was to become a decisive move but I’ll get to that in a minute as to why!

On Thursday morning I decided to move one of rod that I was fishing out over the bars (the other rod on the bars eventually produced the 57) onto this left-hand spot. This new spot was only 40 yards down to my left but it required a bit of careful positioning with the boat and generally it was an awkward trap to set but after 20 minutes of faffing around in the boat and another kilo of my hemp/ pellet/tiger/boilie mix over the top my hookbait was positioned and the trap was set.

Life jacket at the ready closest to the rod I thought my go next - I was right!

As darkness descended on Friday evening I was absolutely dead on my feet and decided to half zip the bivvy door down to keep the damp evening air out of the bivvy and try and catch up on some much-needed sleep. I crashed out a 6.30pm only to awake an hour later feeling like it was 6am in the morning. I resigned myself that sleep just wasn’t going to happen, got the kettle on for a strong coffee and sit there in the semi-darkness of my bivvy and listen for fish. As I was supping on my brew I heard a fish roll over the spot down to my left – game on they had finally found the bait! Suddenly I wasn’t tired as the plan hatched on the Tuesday was starting to come together. 

 

8pm and whack the left-hand rod alarm went into spasm-mode and I’m doing battle once again. With the clever use of a bankstick placed on a shallow bar opposite the actual spot my plan was to crank from my end and pull the fish away from any danger and out into open water and then go and deal with it in the boat. The plan worked perfectly - I made 10 turns on the reel and with Tim’s help I manoeuvred the boat through the shallow gap between the islands and off I disappeared into the evening mist for another open-water boat battle. As I approached the area I could see that my float was well away from the overhanging tree and the fish was just plodding around deep down in 9ft of water. I lifted the line from around the bankstick and was then in direct contact with the fish – she felt a pretty decent one too. A couple of lunges later and a few efforts to spin the boat I caught my first glimpse of a battle-scarred common in my headtorch. She had a distinctive mark on one side of her flank and seemed pretty peeved that I’d managed to extract her from her feeding spot. Two deep lunges later and up she came and into the net first time. I was elated – my baiting tactic had worked, the rig positioning must have been bang-on and the simple use of a bankstick had given me the line angle to pull the fish away from the snag and out into open water!

I beached the boat on one of the shallow small islands and took a closer look - she looked at least 40lb but I was faced with a dilemma of how to get me and the fish back to the bank. The shallow bar between the two islands directly in front of my left-hand rod was too shallow to get through with the fish held by the side of the boat. Decision time…what to do? Then I figured it – unhook her in the net, roll down the net and place her on top of the unhooking mat that I’d laid in the front of the boat. Well it worked a treat and I was able to get enough speed up with the motor to lift the engine as I got to the shallow bar to drift into my mooring point – I must be a dead jammy git as it worked first time with a little assistance from a bankstick as an oar!

Tim presumed I’d lost the fish but I soon explained that the carp was secured inside the boat inside the mat, he laughed and congratulated me on my improvisation to get around a fairly tricky problem. After letting the fish recover in the sling for a few minutes we weighed her and the needle spun past 45lb and came to rest at 49lb exactly! Holy sh*t I’d just landed a PB common too, less than 24hours after landing a PB mirror – what a trip this was turning into, a red-letter one for sure!

Second personal best in less than 24 hours - this time it was a 49lb common!

Tim did the honours with the photos once again and nailed em’ - the fish was a real old warrior with well-healed battle scars on both flanks, certainly a distinctive carp moe than a pretty one! She behaved perfectly for me as we did the pictures and with her returned to her home I shuffled back to bed a very happy carp angler indeed!

Well this entry concludes my confessions of a Rainbow virgin blog! I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my ramblings as much as I have putting them together sat on my laptop in my bivvy on the banks of one of the most amazing carp lakes in the world. This blog was all about what was going on in my mind as it happened, when it happened, blow-by-blow written at the place it was all going on. I can’t really sum up this trip in one poignant sentence so I’ve decided not to even bother trying – the way I see it, I fished well, I had a plan, I stuck to it and it eventually paid off for me. The best bit for me isn’t about the PB’s it’s that this Rainbow virgin ain’t a virgin no more – now I’m a Rainbow angler – job done, can’t wait to go back! Thanks for reading, Jerry Team CC.

Home time - but this time by plane!

Special thanks to Pascal & Nadine Jousseaume, Tim Paisley, Frank Warwick, Lewis Porter, Scott Day, Martin Locke, George Csonka, John Lilley, Matt Rand, Andy Pethick, Paul Musson, John Walker, Dave Chilton and Lewis Read for all your help and support before and during the trip!