“Them’s owd rods” said the young angler … As he sat watching his television at his chosen spot.
“Probably twice as old as you” I replied. He was looking at my Chapmans 550’s laid out on the grass. The starboard one had a Young’s Rapidex and the port a Chris Lythe AJP deluxe.
“Where’s your bite indicators?”
“I don’t need any, I’ll wait for the clicking of my reels”… He did look bemused and went on to explain how carbon was lighter and better.
“Have you ever read a fishing book called Casting at the Sun?” I asked. He said he hadn’t and asked what it was. I suggested he spend a tenner and get an edition from Medlar press as the originals were now a ridiculous price. He told me how he’d fished at some of the big lakes and his rods could get a bait out 60-70 yards, and about all the twenties and thirties he had on. He’d only been carp fishing 5 years and was off the France this year for some big 50lb’ers. Of course he’d heard of a Passion for Angling but explained how he put in a couple of kilos of ultra-high protein boilies, set his critically balanced pop ups rigs on a gravel bars…. Beep, beep, beeeerp ,… that’s all I could hear and after an hour he left fishless.
Fish are stupid and my bit of bait lay amongst some free offerings close into the bank.
Soon my left port rod arched over into a fish and the cane bent, the pin clicked away and I was into a fish. The spring sunshine shone as I held firm and netted a lovely common carp.
I felt every movement that fish made as it pulled the line from my reel. The 550 handled it well its softer action subdued its power from tip to butt and the pin gave me total control.