Thought I'd post a few pics from out Assynt trip last week.
Trout fishing was fairly good, we fished Asynt twice, Ailsh and a few puddles with funny Scottish names. Very few sea trout about at the usual marks but we did turn up some nice pollock.
Week started off with a days trout fishing (read playing with new toys) on the Ness, once again the conditions were not great but we caught a few reasonable trout
Hamish trying to break my new Helios 15'er
Bumpy second day on Assynt, this is about as cheery as "boat bitch" got all day
The boats really are not the best in a blow, getting any sort of reasonable drift was almost impossible but we did get some nice trout that day
So bumpy I'm really pleased I had my strap on Orvis inflatable boat seat with me, despite the piss ripping I got for it.
Nice Assynt trout on a Blue Zulu.
Fished Ailsh on the last day, most of the day was flat calm and quite hot, midgies and clegs everywhere but, considering the conditions we did quite well. Beautiful fish in Ailsh and we saw some decent specimens moving although most of those caught were average highland loch size
A very flat Loch Ailsh
Most productive trout flies for the week were lime sedgehogs, Claret spangles, blue zulus and and the H-LOB, this is a new top secret pattern tied by the boat bitch.
Whilst the trout fishing was good fun, my main reason for heading up north or to the West of Scotland is to fish in the salt. Sea trout were thin on the ground this year so we spent a good bit of time chasing pollock....
Nice bend in Wills TCR9
Hamish into a nice fish
And the fish, superb pollock at 6lb, the best we managed between us
My best of the trip, 5lber that put up a great scrap on my 9wt Helios
Average size from the best mark, size fish varied with state of the tide. We were getting the fish on everything from small clousers to EP baitfish patterns fished on Rio Outbound type 8 sinkers or heavy Teeny lines.
Newly hatched dragonfly, not really fishing related but quite cool to see.
Feeding time at the zoo!!
Top trip, think Kev & Stuart are away up there this week. Kev, I'm holding you to your promise of pictures!!!
Cheers
Ben