Gone Fishin' - 4

After we returned to England from Jamaica in 1975 I went back to coarse fishing, mostly in the company of Tony Hizzard.  He had access near his home to some superb rivers in Shropshire and Herefordshire, such as the River Teme, but also to some good carp ponds.  

In 1979 we took a holiday with the Hizzards in a narrow boat on the Gloucester Avon. In the evenings, after we had tied up and opened a beer, we would fish off the boat, though my memory is that we caught little.

By 1990 I was visiting waters in Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk with Glen, a Maldon friend.  We fished by Flatford Mill, along the Norfolk Broads, above, in artificial stocked ponds in Essex, and 'enjoyed' night fishing for bream in the side-streams in the valley of the Chelmer.

The Hizzards continued to visit us and Tony and I spent hours together fishing but the largest fish we caught during our Essex years were pike. This one came out of the Chelmer, caught by Tony on live bait: we cooked and ate it but I can't pretend that pike is my favourite fish.

Our move to Scotland returned us to ideal fishing territory.  The lochans of Ardmurchan had wild brown trout, the larger burns and rivers had sea trout and salmon, and the sea had a wealth of fish, but I never really exploited them.  It wasn't until we returned to East Anglia that I did a little more fishing, this time in Mark Sutton's company....

....casting off a sometimes windswept Felixstowe beach for whiting and bass, though we never caught anything big enough to take home for supper.

Looking back, I've never landed anything remarkable but I have enjoyed a great variety of fishing, and the fishing has both taken me to some memorable places and involved me in some exciting adventures. If I had to choose a favourite it would be....

.....the rainbow trout fishing in Inyanga National Park in Rhodesia in the late 1960s, partly for the memory of a trout lightly fried in butter and for the skill and patience it required to catch them, but mostly for the beauty of the rivers, the Matenderere and the Pungwe, and their surroundings.