So I went to the Till and caught f*ck all, that's it. The end.
Ok..... I took a few photos. First let me say I was down fishing as a guest of a chum who had 'won' a charity auction for three days for three rods on the Till, a significant tributary of the Tweed noted for its run of big Sea Trout from early May onwards. We were fishing on three of the beats of Ford and Etal estate
http://www.ford-and-etal.co.uk/what-to-do/fishing If you like drowning worms this is your kind of place, it is by far the best method on this seldom 'fly suitable' water.
Anyway, we stayed at The Blue Bell Inn at Crookham which was damn handy for the fishing
http://www.bluebellcrookham.co.uk/ and I have no hesitation at all in giving it 5 stars - excellent.
After meeting Brian the fishings manager we were first on Upper Tindal beat on Tuesday. By 9am when we arrived at his house it was warm. Anyway, this is pretty much the top of the beat:
By lunchtime it was easily mid-20s, very sunny and worse than useless for fishing, so we went to the pub. Then we went to Kelso, then another pub and a tackle shop or two. Then, for a change, we went to a pub. It was very very pleasant. Useless day for fishing, but fine for drinking. Thus endeth day one.
Day two and we were on the Redscar beat. See my previous comments about drowning worms.
Jim hooked and lost the only Sea Trout of the trip on this beat, on a drowning bunch of worms. He reckons it was 7lb plus and bearing in mind he knows his way around a fish I'd buy that. he was pissed off with losing a fish. I was pissed off with the shit weather (it was now raining and cold, a complete contrast to the previous day) David had had enough so we went to the pub.... but only after we had reconnoitred the final beat we were fishing of Lower Tindal. I couldn't be arsed taking any photos worth sharing of Redscar, it left me that apathetic.
Anyway, we agreed that the final day looked promising on Lower Tindal after our reconnaissance trip so a serious effort to get down before dawn was made. We failed to make it before dawn but we were down on the water for about 5am. Photo of setting up:
Some of the beat where we caught nothing:
More of the same (yes, we caught nothing here too):
I took to taking photos of plants:
And David had 40 winks:
So we went back for a late breakfast, checked out of the excellent hotel and drove home as there were no fish (or very very very few) unless you're into catching smolts (which I am not, I have never seen so many smolts in my puff) or into drowning worms.
The end.
H
PS - Yes, I know the photo of the bluebell needs to be adjusted. Blame photobucket.
