Almost all of us predominantly fish alone and put all of our efforts, time and money into out witting carp so the social gives us a chance to let our hair down and have a laugh together which in reflection is my angle on this article so for now I won’t be looking into bait, rigs and location but the aspects of carping that can be sometimes over looked. One thing I’ve noticed from organising and taking part in these socials is that all the people that have got involved have been grade A, genuine, nice, friendly, social people and we are lucky to have this sport, passion, past time to bring us together. The power of social media these days is phenomenal, before the days of Facebook and twitter I personally only had a handful of half-hearted fishy friends. Today I speak to over a 1000 full on hardened capers of all levels daily thanks to the internet. This hub was the birth of the twitter social, an event inspired by likeminded anglers talking fish through our phones and laptops wanting to meet and fish together. Our first event at Broadlands mid spring was a huge success attracting some great anglers far and wide along with the bait company cultured carp baits and the online angling gazette who joined in the fun, supplied some prizes and even gave us a write up. With distance playing a factor for some we moved venue for vol 2 to vale fishery in Evesham and with it came another great group of people
The best thing about it all is even though no one’s actually met before we all know each other so instant banter, laughs, beers and a family feel for the group. With me and the misses landing first and somehow miraculously not getting lost we quickly set up camp and got acquainted with the bailiff Kev. I’d like to mention what a top bloke this guy is with years of angling and fishery management experience under his belt he made us all feel so welcome I can’t recommend his lakes enough and I look forward to seeing him again.
The rest of the group turned up in dribs and drabs after all getting lost on the way with some taking detours to Gloucester and even south wales. We even had a cheeky visit from mike who attended vol 1. Officially acquainted and fishing shaz kicked us off with a scale perfect 20+ common. I knew Shaz and Dave were the ones to watch with regular catches from there tricky syndicate back home. The order of the day was a healthy circulation of visiting and being visited from bivvy to bivvy and as darkness fell the jammy duo pulled another fish out the bag, this time big Dave with a lovely ghostie.
With Dale and his misses tucked away in the corner of the lake and team “we’re not blanking” in peg 7 smiling to themselves, the Mrs and I picked Bens brain on his self-developed revolutionary fishing app ifishlocator until the early hours. Awaking Tuesday the high winds and sun of the previous day had been replaced by rain. Soak you to the bone drizzle with occasional spells of it smashing down. Bivvy bound and somewhat exhausted from the previous days commute and set up I think we all just kicked back. Dave went on to land another fish in the rain so I checked my rods were working. Late evening your boy’s right hand rod rattled off with a blank saving scraper double mirror. Thank f for that!! With time for more we all settled back down for the second night and boom, my middle rod went off and a nice upper double common on the mat. Shaz kindly done some pics for me as Dave snored for England and my misses kept herself dry and warm under the bag.
The final morning came and as we packed away, passing each other by with barrow loads of wet tackle the feeling that we were at the end of a holiday none of us wanted to end was evident. Massive thanks to all that came and kev for having us. Also commiserations to those who couldn’t make it, rest assured it won’t be the last with talk already of potential venues for vol 3.
Until then keep it fishy. Thanks for reading