Funny How It Goes

Isn't it funny how things turn out sometimes. Take our fishing match on the 21st March this year. With the match being fished from 90 mins after high tide to 2 hours before low tide on the largest ebb tide of the year I felt chances of cod were pretty slim with my best chance being from 9 until 10 pm (the last hour of the match) at Boggle hole. I arrived at Boggle at 6.30 and had a quick look at the conditions, the high seas of the previous 2 days were now subsiding and conditions looked near perfect, but with the mark I wanted to fish inaccessible until around 8.30 I had to find somewhere else to fish and pass the first 90 mins of the match. I decided to head back into Robin Hoods Bay and fish one of the marks up there so I set off on foot and arrived there about 6.55pm. I baited and cast into the heaviest coloured water I had seen at Bay in some years. The storms of Monday and Tuesday had really given the bottom a good stir up and the conditions looked good. Thinking I had little chance of a fish at this state of tide at this mark I propped the rid in the rest and set about passing time until I could get to where I felt there would be fish later in the evening. No sooner had I put the rod in the rest I had a tiny bite - Undersized codlings I thought to myself (there has been so many of them about this year). I picked the rod up and stood with it for a while. A few seconds later I felt a slightly better bite and wound down - as I did so the rod pulled right over and as I struck I knew I was into a half decent fish - As it landed next to me I could see it was a nice cod of around 3 pounds. Looked at the watch and it was 5 mins past 7. Only five minutes of the match gone, what a start I thought to myself.

I quickly added a few more worms to the pennel rig and cast it back in. Again within minutes another bite which ended with another cod of around 3 pounds in the bag. The same happened again twice more and by 7.40 I had 4 three pounders in the bag, but by this time the water in front of me was getting rather low. I cast back in and struggled for a bite for about 15 minutes. Just as I was thinking the bait must be about high and dry (the big tides ebb out fast on the shallow marks around here) the rod went over again, the fish must have swam with its back half out the water to get at the bait. As I struck I felt the fish was on but immediately the line went light and I knew I had dragged the bait out of the fishes mouth. When I got the trace back I noticed the bottom hook of the pennel had entangled with the top hook and was upside down which had meant there was nothing for the fish to get caught on. I wish I had a pound for everytime this happens with a pennel rig.

Realising it was pointless to cast back in I headed out onto the scars at Robin hoods bay, but after a couple of casts I realised the fish had vacated the area and as it was about 8.45 it was now time to head into boggle hole. Having got 4 fish in the bag already and now going to the place I was most confident about before the match began I now fancied I had a good chance of another couple of fish and taking the bag weight over 20 pounds. I got cast in around 9pm and immediately my line was heavy with loose weed (it can really be a problem at this venue). Needless to say I spent most of the next hour casting back in and suffering the same problem of weed on the line meaning it was impossible to fish. I never got another fish. I got to the weigh in at Whitby and weighed the 4 fish I caught early on for a total of 12 pounds.

In analysing the nights fishing I thought to myself - Funny how things turn out at times. Id ended up with 4 fish from somewhere I thought I hadn't got a chance and the mark I thought was a banker produced a blank.