Jeff had reportedly gotten into a few over-sized gold fish cruising & tailing a few weeks ago. A week later I made a quick scouting run out to have a look and sure enough, carp were everywhere! The mud holes that had appeared vacant of fish over the past few months were suddenly teeming with big, fat, golden beauties! The days had been getting longer, the weather warmer, and big gold tails were waving. With spring in the air, the 7 weight came out of the closet and when the weekend arrived, off we headed to trudge through the sludge.

Here today, gone tomorrow. Or is it the other way around? Either way, when we arrived and found the first pond void of fish we didn’t lose hope and simply headed for the next sludge-hole. It appeared empty too, as did the next spot, and the one after that.

Just as we’d turned around, ready to retreat to “Old Faithful”, a bubble trail moving through the water caught my eye, and then another, and another. After 30 minutes or so of unsuccessful attempts to intercept the invisible targets with our flies, my indicator finally took a quick dunking and the line went tight!

Woo Hoo! Fish On!

After a long and delicate tussle with 5x tippet (still not sure what I was thinking) Jeff some how, with an equally delicate touch, managed to get the whole 10 – 12 pound fish in to the little trout net without breaking the light leader.

And that was it. Until next time…