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 Life
on the Africa Pit had been pretty hard for all involved at the
start of the 2004 season. After a hammering of bait before the
season started most people expected the place to be fishing it's
head off come season start.
In
reality, it took nearly a week for the first fish to come out,
even though (or perhaps because) there were about 40 rods out
for the first few days. First fish out was to my friend Geezer
at 27lb something (pictured right).
With a few coming out I was still looking for my first fish
of the season come June. Still plugging away I turned up for a
social session with Geezer for the Friday night, before he
disappeared on the Saturday to work.
We plumped for the Northern side of the lake, with me
installed into the "table-tops" and Geezer in the next swim
round, David Howard, another regular was on the other side in the
"Ash Tree". A few glasses of wine and a good social saw the
evening fly by.
 I was awoken by a strange Tench
the next morning, strange because it was caught on a pineapple pop-up,
popped up 5" off the lead in some weed. Interesting. At 7lb 04oz
I was quite happy because it was a blank-saver and also a new tinca PB.
Later in the day, Jay started to get some action on the
lawns, with one off the bottom quickly followed by a cracking
looking one off the top from in the Car Park Bay(featured left).
This was the signal I needed to encourage a move. With the
point swim empty I was soon dragging my gear round for the final
night of the session in this swim which commands the water
entering the Car Park Bay.
After setting up, and simply underarm flicking the PVA'd bags
out on top of the bar into around 2 feet of water, it was time
to relax and listen to the England friendly on the radio. All
remained quiet in the evening, and soon it was time to turn in
for the night.
I was rudely awoken in the early hours by a run on the right
hand rod, placed on top of the bar. A short fight later and I
was soon bringing a carp over the top of the bar in front of me.
David had joined me to see what the fuss was all about and was
soon doing the honours with the landing net at the bottom of the
steep bank.
We weighed the fish before safely sacking it for the couple
of hours before dawn (nice girl) arrived. At 17lb, "Bones" was
certainly not a whacker but it was nice to get off the mark.
 After
re-baiting and flicking the bait back out onto the bar it was
back to bed for a couple of hours. It was still dark when the
same rod ripped off again, I was in again. This fish gave more
of a fight in the murky pre-dawn twilight, burrowing its head
into the Canadian Pondweed at the back of the bar. Thankfully
the tackle held strong as once again David was on hand to do the
netting honours.
The fish turned out to be a stunning 27lb 6oz mirror, which
was a new Personal Best, as you can imagine I was over the moon.
Photo's were duly taken, the boy's did me proud with the
camera (thanks Jay, David), and it was cast out time again.
Later that morning I also managed to bag a new Personal Best
tench from exactly the same spot on the bar, 8lb 4oz.
After the Tench I had a run on the middle rod, which resulted
in me dropping a carp just before the net, upon retrieval there
was a clump of weed strung around bend of the hook, which can't
have helped matters... It wasn't to be, but I still went home
made up.
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