Wet, Cold and Windy

part 1 ... .... but would I do it again you may ask? Absolutely! We hurried to get the camp and rods set up. The weeds and grass were a bit on rough side. I decided to wait until the next day to take my lines in. I would rather do some scouting on the water first because I have my eye on a spot right in front of some reeds, but the thick grass patches might be a struggle when I am on with a fish. Hannes took his lines towards the left across the lake and I sat and observed the water. Good thing I waited with my rods, because the next two days were spent taking out grass, reeds and weeds and losing many fish. 300mm rainBait comboResult It was becoming clear to me that this session would either be one for the books or one to test our tempers. It ended up being both and so much more. Our gear, tackle, mainlines and rigs were put to the ultimate test. We had to place our pods in waist deep water to get better angles for the margin rods and have a bigger area to land catches and drive with the boat. This meant we had to go into the water to strike a rod. Basically, being soaking wet constantly. I finally plucked up the courage to take my lines in on day 3. I lost the first 5 runs due to grass. As Murphy’s Law will have it, most of the runs were around midnight. So, we got soaking wet for nothing basically. Landing only heaps of grass in the landing net. Not even hopping in the boat to retrieve a catch made the task easier. Luckily by the sixth run I managed to make a path of some sorts to land a catch. A beautiful, healthy 10kg Carp. A fruit-flavoured tigernut with a popup cut in half as bait with a handful of boilies over the feed and a few handfuls of maize around the area, was a winning recipe. Landing 3 double digits in 1 day was pure bliss. I had a game plan and was going to stick with it. 2 PB's Hannes, on the other hand, lost many fish. Snags and floating grass islands became a major obstacle for him. With every run on his rods we got into the boat to land the fish. Unfortunately, no luck. Luckily for me, my swim produced very good catches at a decent rate despite fluctuating temperatures. By the time I landed my 7th double digit carp, he was not impressed. Naturally of course. He landed a few young carp on my rods when I was away from the camp but even that did not cheer him up. He kept moving spots and angles to avoid snags and grass but no luck. Eventually Hannes decided to focus on a smaller area closer to the bank. He asked for my opinion regarding bait and I assisted with bait and feeding. We fed the area a bit more than normal to get the fish more active. Just in time before a severe storm hit us. Localised flooding led to the lake overflowing. We decided to call it a night and hid from the storm in the warm tent. Another beauty! By the time the worst part of the storm had passed, a welcoming tone of an alarm woke us just after midnight. Thankfully, it was his rod! He struck and said to me: “this one is big”! Luckily the fish came straight in towards the bank. Due to all the lost fish the previous days, I made sure to go in deep enough to land the catch quickly and safely. After a few minutes, hardly putting up a fight, except for being extremely lazy and heavy, the first fish for Hannes was landed! With added weight of grass around the carp’s head, I immediately noticed this was a true specimen. I removed the grass and rolled the net. When I tried to lift the carp to get out of the water I realised this could be a PB. Carefully I carried the carp to the cradle. When I opened the net and saw the specimen, I knew without a doubt that this is a PB for Hannes. A beautiful, healthy long carp. With a massive head and a black eye. The scale read 16,2kg! A new PB for Hannes in nearly 2years. Pure joy! We decided to sack the fish to take proper PB photos in the morning. We had a coffee, re-baited, changed into dry clothes and went back to bed. Barely asleep, another alarm got our attention. This time it was my rod. Struck and felt a heavy tug. This one had a bit more energy. Giving me a fair fight and landing easy, also covered in grass. In the cradle I immediately noticed the exceptional round shape of the body. Then I noticed the tummy on this specimen. This could be a PB! True’s bob - 14.8kg and a new PB for me! Sacked the catch then tried to go to sleep. The excitement was too much so we just laid there and talked strategy. Just before sunrise my other alarm went off with the speed of lightning. A beautiful long carp gave me a good fight weighing in at 13kg. The sun was up, and we were excited to see our catches in proper daylight. A passer-by was kind enough to snap a photo of us with our catches together. Memories to treasure. We had a photo session as quick as possible and released the carp one by one. We thought this was the highlight of our session – but the best was yet to come! *Continued to part 2 ...