Hooked!

Coltsford Mill fishery near Oxted, in stockbroker Surrey. Lovely spot at all times a year. It’s also a wedding venue. There are ancient stone buildings and carefully tended flower beds and rockeries – here, the incongruent worlds of the fly fishermen and the well-dressed wedding guest converge. You can also see the race and wheel of the original mill – there was mill here in Norman times, probably before that.

There are more than two acres of water and three places to fish. The main lake (tough, large); the willow, smaller, oval and deeper than the main lake, fed at one end by the Eden and, finally, the upper and lower cascades – a slow moving stream, decorated by giant gunnnera plants (prickly strangers which look spookily prehistoric) with a waterfall at mid-length.

I’ve fished here a lot. I won’t say I learnt to fish here because I am only a tiny way along the journey. There are other people to talk to about fishing techniques and tactics, which is invaluable, and many times other fishermen and the guys who work here (Neal and Alan especially) have given me impromptu casting lessons.

The fishery is a good size. You can fish in the next peg to another person or you can find somewhere to be pretty much on your own, so that you can make your mistakes in private. Each piece of water has its own mood. On the upper cascade you can imagine that you have stalked through moorland to some wild, shaded upland river where wild brown trout are hiding. Short accurate casting here – lots of bushes to get snagged in.

On the willow, the experts can cast all the way across to the overhanging hawthorn bushes on the other side, which must be about eighty feet. On a good day I can get a little more than halfway. It’s not about casting, I tell myself (often). It’s about catching fish. There’s an underwater current and a run in the far corner, where the Eden invisibly enters the lake, carrying food. This can be the best spot. But it’s a really long cast to land your fly or lure in the optimum place.

On a bright but cold May morning with a slight breeze, it would be good to be there at eight. I almost never manage it. As usual, you drive down pretty, beech-dappled lanes and through a picture book village. The mill is in the middle of Hurst Green but pretty hard to find first time. There’s the usual hand-made sign and you drive down a long straight track. The first sight of the water catches your breath. In the distance, are the neat buildings where the wedding receptions are held.

Alan greets me. I start fishing, at his suggestion, on the main lake.  I try my new intermediate (ie slightly sinking) line and a hare’s ear. Probably a poor combination. It doesn’t work. Is this going to be a blank day? I have blanked here a few times. Is the temperature too warm now? 

I stroll  to the willow, where, propitiously, a rod bent almost double is a sign of good catch being skillfully brought in. This guy has caught six fish, five of them on the last six casts! He’s fishing on a hare’s ear, which is probably, at this time of year, approximating to a May fly nymph.

I’ve noticed much more flies hatching in the last couple of weeks. This will intensify until the summer doldrums when the trout (which prefer cold water) just loll around sluggishly around in the August heat. I love this part of the summer. Nature is taking off like a rocket. Bright days alternate with dull ones. Is this the best time of year to fly fish? I don’t know because it’s my first year of doing it.

The modest, friendly guy is about to leave his peg, the one where he just caught five rainbow trout, in quick succession. No pressure. Fortunately my hare’s ear is on the line – tensioned against the little ring that fly rods have to hold your hook in place when you are walking along the bank. The fly I chose has a little turquoise flash on it, so it’s not exactly pukah. I’m inevitably going to fail, I tell myself. Our brief handover concluded, six-fish walks away. I try not to fumble, as I attempt to get onto the water quickly.

I’m casting about half-way across. There clearly is, or was, a school of fish there. You can’t see them. The water is often quite cloudy at Coltsford Mill, especially after rain. Second or third cast. Bang. A fantastic take on the hare’s ear, which I am retrieving (pulling back through the water) at moderate speed. 

This is why fishermen and fisherwomen fish – this addictive, exhilarating moment. A two to three pound trout is a frisky, zipping firecracker that will strain a smallish rod to the point that you think that it will almost snap in half (carbon fibre is an amazing material). The fish darts around, running out of options. I’ve almost got this now. I bring the trout onto the bank without looking like a complete arse. I look at my watch. It's 10.30.

Yes, these are stocked fish – fed with pellets to grow quickly and reared solely to be caught, in an aquatic version of Hunger Games. But matching the right food to the right fish at the right time is not straightforward. Even here. It’s a mixture of science, art and (dare I say) instinct. Even experienced fisherfolk can spend hours and hours flopping their fly lines onto the water with no result.

Times like this when the fish gods are smiling are golden. As usual, I put the dispatched trout into the carrier bag that my lunch was in. Whatever happens, there’s one in the bag. Feeling jubilant, I text a friend the good news. This is not a good idea (see later).

Here we go again. Same fly, same spot, same technique. You just know when your retrieve is good and the line is sitting well in the water. Sometimes, you have a sixth sense that you are going to get a knock. The next take, in almost exactly the same spot, is explosive, like a miniature cruise missile.

Flipping heck. Doesn’t mean it’s a bigger fish. Just frisky. At one point, the hooked fish actually leaps out of the water in a spectacular flash of silver. At that precise moment, my phone bleeps and vibrates, indicating an incoming text. Also at that moment, just at the apex of its improbable leap, the fish drops off the hook! Shit! How did that happen? It seems to defy physics. 

I am deflated. I don’t think it happened because the phone went off. That was a coincidence. But incoming message coinciding with the loss of the fish seems like hubris. I feel like a pillock as I reel in the empty line. I can sense, and it happens, that I am going into a dry spell now, especially as news of six-fish’s remarkable achievement has spread across the fishery, as if by jungle telegraph.

Fishermen are flocking to the willows from the four corners of Coltsford Mill, like pilgrims converging on a place of worship. Soon, lines are dropping onto the water all around me. Right, the fish say, we’re off. The guy next to me does land a couple of rainbows in the next hour but the feeding frenzy is definitely over. Is that it? It’s almost midday. I can’t go home yet. But a change of spot is called for. It’s hard to leave a place where you have been successful, even when it has gone dry.

I love the cascades. I love them for the gunnera bushes. They were cut almost to the ground a month ago and now they are back, just as massive and spiky as ever! I love the fact that the water changes every few feet. There are spots between trees where trout often shoal, waiting for food to drop onto the water. You can feel a private, elemental stillness. Often you can detect, with tiny tentative bites that you feel as much as see, that the fish are following your hook through the water. They will take the bait just before you lift the line for the next cast, guaranteed. The daddy (a weird lure with floppy rubber legs, like a crane fly) can work well here. It doesn’t today. An unproductive spell seems to have fallen over the fishery. Except that someone, somewhere, will be doing exactly the right thing and there’ll be a couple of fat silver fish on the bank beside them.

I chat to a lad who is strolling along from the lower cascades, where the stream widens to about thirty feet and you can cast further. Has he caught anything? Yeh, two. What are you using? He shows me his white and green lure. It’s cat’s whisker. I have some of those in my fly box. The cat’s whisker is a modern invention. Purists and people who fish Hampshire chalk streams, where strict protocols must be observed, view them with disdain. The cat’s whisker (like the woolly bugger or the black and green viva, named, allegedly, after the Vauxhall Viva) looks like a tiny fish, not a fly, a pupae or a nymph. It does not even look like a specific fish. Just a fish.

Trout are opportunistic carnivores and, like most wild creatures on God’s earth, they are permanently hungry. Using the cat’s whisker (or the infamous blob, or booby) may not be cricket but non-purist fisherfolk, who do not follow tennis club-style rules, take a pragmatic view – if it works, use it!

I choose another spot where you can cast about twenty feet and retrieve between two trees on either side of the bank. Within a few casts, I’m getting small takes, always near the end of the retrieve. The whisker is working its magic. Obvious really.

I need to make up for the leaping silver specimen that I lost earlier. I flick the line onto patch of troubled water just beyond the trees. I start to pull it back in sharply, attempting to imitate a small fish trying not to be eaten by a bigger fish. This is the bite zone …. Kappow! Game on.

The cascades are an exhilarating place to fish because of the mixture of quietness and kinetic energy. My leader (the short almost invisible line at the end of the floating line) has reduced to about three feet thanks to frequent changes of fly. But it doesn’t seem to matter. Nor does the commotion of a fish being caught. I am on a roll.

The gods are smiling again and I know that I’m probably going to catch another one. I do. It’s the biggest of the day. Now there is a wind knot in my leader, making a weak point where it will easily break. I don’t have any more of the fine but strong line. My arms are aching. Time to stop. I do a selfie with my camera next to a gunnera and I ask the lad who I spoke to earlier to take a picture of me with three fish on the bank.

The picture is cheesy, possibly a bit gory. I have never done a bank shot before. I don’t want to appear like some sadistic trophy hunter or the pale, flaccid guy on the cover of Carp Weekly, who looks like the thing that he has just caught! Is it ghoulish? Well, they are fish, I tell myself, like you see in Waitrose, eviscerated and neatly wrapped in Cellophane. But I caught them.

Do my friends think that I am a freak? I have no idea why, at my time of life (50s) I have been siezed by a almost compulsive urge to do this – to learn a complicated set of skills so that I can catch fish. 
I’ve started to think about fly fishing a lot. Probably too much.

On my way home, I buy a trout smoker from a handy little shop in Beckenham. It works with sawdust and a methylated spirits burner. It’s expensive but a really nice piece of kit. The instructions are peculiar and incomprehensible. So I turn to YouTube for elucidation, like you do. There is always a nerd with a streak of narcissism who has been on the same journey as you and who now wants to share his success. It’s always a man, never a woman.

I’ve become quite good a gutting fish. I can now slice the inedible bits off a trout, without my kitchen looking like a scene from the Silence of the Lambs. Soon, an evocative aroma of woodsmoke is drifting across my back yard. After a few false starts, the smoker works a treat. The fish are improbably seasoned with salt and soft brown sugar (thanks YouTube). I enjoy a pleasurable, reflective moment in my suburban garden as the sun goes down. I went out. I caught something. I lit a fire. I ate it. Sorted.

On my first trip to Coltsford Mill when catching a trout seemed like a really big deal (it still is) I wrote a poem about it. It's a sonnet.

The battle of the mill pond

Armour-plated, living in shadow
you were the monarch of Coltsford Mill
cruising with your shoal of minnows
you were friend to the mayfly and swallow.
Made of cartilage and muscle
you guided your tiny retinue
through their lonely kingdom of mud –
the true lord of hazel and willow.
Testing your royal blood and sinew
you flashed to air like a silver lance
in the last battle that you fought.
The wedding guests glimpsed you.
They admired your aqueous existence
until the day that you were caught.

A little bit of heaven

And so to Spring Hill fishery. Grey Saturday morning, not too warm. Good fishing weather. No grandkids this weekend. 

Feed rabbits. Put rod case, fishing bag and new landing net in back of car. Head for the adventure highway, the A21, by my ‘secret route’ via Penge and Keston village (it avoids Bromley). Going to a new fishery using vague instructions written on a bit of paper offers more excitement and anticipation than the generally robotic certainty of satnav (I have one, but am a reluctant user).

Near Tonbridge, the A21 is midway into being converted into a dual carriageway which has added 30 minutes of annoyance to my Saturday morning adventures for the past two years. When will it end? I go off the A21 at Pembury.

Stop at a garage to refresh with donuts and coffee, thereby thickening arteries. Catch up with texts and voicemails. The modern human is rarely offline. The weather is cheering up a bit but I actually don’t want it to. Warm water puts trout off feeding. Soon I am on b-roads bordered by hedges. Frothy hawthorn blossom is everywhere. The agriculture is not too industrial in this corner of England. Smallish fields, horses and cows grazing. There are villages with ancient cottages clad in wisteria but they are not so cute and twee as to make this into a theme park, like the Cotswolds. Still, this is an affluent part of Kent. The pubs are nearly all gastro, with tables for expensive meals rather than low-slung seats, cozy nooks and corners, an old dog and a local darts team.

What did the instructions say? At the village of Matfield turn left into Chestnut Lane. Where is it? I ask and gain somewhat confusing directions at the lovely Wheelwright Arms. I drive past a large, well-mown village green. A couple of lads are float fishing in the village duck pond, as lads have been doing for centuries. That would be great for me and the grandkids. It’s an archetypically English scene and this village has three pubs (make mental note). Ah there’s Chestnut Lane, which will lead me to Foxhole Lane (hopefully).

Going to the fishery, the roads become narrower, the houses more rustic, many built in weatherboard in the local style. Finally, a small wooden sign take you off the tarmac and onto a road which is two strips of mud. The hedges and trees are beautiful. You are now driving past an orchard in full blossom. You see a bee hive. The sun is out. OK, I forgive it. The lane finally leads takes you to something that resembles a goat track in the Andes plummeting down a ravine. Can this be right? Turn a corner. There it is, the fishing lodge, a timber building in tasteful black.

Lee, the fishery keeper, has the slow, wise manner of a Kentish Bruce Willis. He’ll advise you on flies and tactics – in this case, the trusty hare’s ear and the damsel nymph, without beads so that they don’t sink too deep. We both know that being midday this is the worst possible time to start fishing. On the plus side, this is one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been to.

The fishery is basically three stream-fed lakes feeding tributaries of the River Medway. You go down a steep hill to the lakes. This place feels intimate, secret. Around you are newly-planted oak saplings and bluebells. There’s a tree house. It’s like a beautiful, well-kept garden that is also a woodland. Magical. And this isn’t trout fishing for businessmen in Range Rovers who work in the city. It’s affordable. Even if you didn’t catch anything (a distinct possibility) you would still want to be here. Well I would.

My rod is small and light – a 6/7. The rig (fly fisherman don’t call it that) is set up in less than five minutes. Line, leader (fine almost invisible monofilament) and the fly that Lee has just sold me for 50 pence, the damsel nymph. There’s lots of fly action on the lake, insects, including no doubt damsel flies, are hatching all over. The hare’s ear which has been used since the beginning of fly fishing, looks like lots of insects, Lee explains, which is why it works. It can be deadly. I choose a spot at the bottom of the slope on the near side of the main lake. There’s not much fish action. I can’t see any rises to snap food from the surface, or trout leaping out of the water (they do, often).

There are two other fisherman. One is a black guy! That’s unusual and I would like to talk to him (journalist instinct kicking in). Probably best not to. Their body language suggests that not much is happening. Both are skillfully casting into the middle of the lake. When’s it’s done well, as here (I still can’t cast like these guys) the line uncurls perfectly straight, delivering the fly softly, almost lazily onto water. It looks like Tiger Woods lofting a ball onto the green. The soft landing is important. Trout are easily spooked.

I’m not feeling too optimistic. Might blank today (catch nothing). Oh well. Heaven would probably be something like this – mixed oak woodland next to an orchard, sun shining, willow warblers and chiffchaffs singing, a lake. It can’t be so bad. Lots of casts produce nothing for an hour or so. No-one is catching. Eventually I get some short tentative nibbles … and then … there's a fish on the line. I think. I pull it in. It’s a tiny silver specimen with red around the fins – like what the boys will catch in Matfield duck pond. A roach? I am used to catching those, with floats and maggots. At least it’s something. I feel a muted sense of triumph. I unhook it and put it gently back into the water. The other fishermen pretend not to notice. It’s fishing etiquette. Only if I was wresting with an aquatic leviathan would one of them acknowledge that anything was happening on the bank. They might even help me to land it.

Five minutes later, another one comes along. It’s s bit bigger this time, 6 oz. These small fish (skimmers) are going for the damsel fly near the top of the water. Soon I can feel them on the end of the line. It’s good to know that something is working, but it’s not what I am here for. I start to cast a bit further afield, not into the centre of the water but the dark, weedy margins, where the water is quite shallow. Too shallow?

Suddenly there’s another take, a positive one, like an electric shock passing down the line. Is it another tiddler? No way, this is definitely a larger fish. A trout. Keep the rod up, pray that the line does not break and that the knots you have tied are strong enough. Keep calm or you will get into an awful tangle. Take your time. Let line out and do not play the fish too hard, all the while bringing it slowly in, to within range of the landing net.

Soon it’s on the deck. The fish has lovely mottling that I have never seen before. It’s a tiger trout, a cross between a brown trout and a brook trout (an American species). It’s about two pounds. Small but big enough to eat. Time to deploy the priest – small club used by fly fishermen to whack the fish on the back of the head, with a couple of short, sharp blows. I do so with mixed and complicated feelings and a silent prayer to the woodland gods. My ancestors did this. They paddled small boats and cast lines onto the water. They killed warm and cold-blooded animals in skilful ways learnt from other humans. Does that mean that it’s Ok for me too? I am a modern human (allegedly), with a broken satnav. I eat fish and they have been killed too. That is my justification for what I am doing. I don’t know if it’s a good one. I know that unlike the expense account fattened businessmen in their Range Rovers I would not go shooting …

By the way, the small silver fish that I returned to the water weren’t roach but rudd – a different species with quite different habits. Lee explained that to me, saying the lakes here are full of them. They have upturned mouths, because they like to eat flies – like Piers Morgan. I was still on the lake long after the others had gone. I caught no more trout. By six dusk was manifesting itself. I changed tactics a few times. The trusty cat’s whisker (a white lure made form marabou feathers) yielded a little bit of interest but nothing major. I reverted to the olive damsel. The nibbly little bites started again. I amused myself by using tactics designed to attract the rudd and caught a couple more.

As the light faded, more flies came out. Soon, bats would flit over the water in this sylvan paradise. The trout became more apparent and I could feel that fishing might be more productive. Another tiger or a brown would have been nice. But I was tired and hungry. Time to go home.

Pro-Polish

On Friday morning I got in my car and drove down the A21 and it took me to Bewl Water which is a proper very large lake. I didn't mean to but I ended up hiring a boat with an outboard and I set off with a mixture of apprehension and exhilaration - a true feeling of freedom. I had my fly rod but it's a huge stretch of water and you don't know where the fish are. Lots of Polish voices from the other boats. Polish people love fishing. In some boats were whole families. Four hours.. nothing. I had an inspiration. Go to where the other boats are and fish there. Duh ... 

So I cruise/chug/meander to the other side of the lake, next to Chingley Wood. I put a black beaded fly on my floating line. Within ten minutes I had a really good take but I lost the fish, which happens a lot with fly fishing. People around me, mainly Polish, were spinning for trout. They were catching fish  ... a good sign. I put on another black lure with a metal body which looked like an imitation fish and started casting. It's good in a boat because you always cast with the wind behind you. I am still not a very good caster and it helps. Two minutes later ... kapow ... there's no mistaking a big fish on the line and it's not like hooking a fat carp at the bottom of pond, it has speed and muscle. My rod bent over as I played it (keep the rod upright remember) It sped out into the lake, I brought it in. You don't want to snap the the line. It headed under the boat ... It's a compromise because you need to play the fish hard enough to tire it out but not so hard that the line snaps, which would be terrible.

Another English guy came in his boat by who had seen my fishing earlier and given me some tips. He told me that the Polish fishermen come and ‘thrash’ the water where other people are catching and empty the lake of fish ... ridiculous  prejudice ... they are also said to be poachers and to use drift lines. Poles don't have a good rep in the fishing world ... He saw me wresting with the trout and he said, so there is a fish in the lake then. It was the hardest fighting fish I had ever caught. I was so relieved when I landed it with a rather large net. Three-pounder. It seemed to make sense of the frustration of the rest of the day - the long car journey, the feeling that I didn't really know what I was doing.

Great satisfaction. I know it could be said to be cruel (I killed the fish and ate it later) but it felt like a mini wilderness experience, something that is completely lacking from my life ... challenge, a little bit of jeopardy. Normally, the most challenging thing in my life is the photocopier running out of paper. Later, I drifted into the dam wall and had to be rescued, towed back across the lake in a larger boat with a bigger engine. My head was full of light. Freedom.