And a little bit of that!

Lack of posts do not mean a lack of fishing – several trips to my highland river as well as Clydewards have occured however a lack of time means I am finding it difficult to write for pleasure.

Two nights camping with the kids seemed ideal to get away from it all – just four men together eating man food and doing manly things sounded like just the ticket to blow the lockdown cobwebs away. 

I booked us into the Glencoe Mountain campsite – nice and safe for the kids with a cafe to retreat to if things got hairy as seemingly their was a spot of rain forecast on day two.

First day and night no issues at all. Sure, putting up the tent with the midges was the usual utter hell as you would expect however after donning the midge nets it was done. Rolls n sausage for dinner and then a stroll through the rannoch moor. 

Awesome!

Day two took us to the end of the glen to meet with Alex and his girls for a spot of sea fishing. The rain was fairly chucking it down however I had brought my giant ikea tarpaulin and we rigged up a  shelter.

I think Alex and I were more impressed than the kids though.

The big rods were cast out and a couple of float rods as well – we started to spin for mackies to keep the kids entertained. Kids being kids were hyper and miserable with the rain at the same time – wet feet is what happens when you go in the water over your wellies.

They soon cheered up when we started pulling in fish – mackerel, an eel and a lovely wrasse. 

We gave it a few hours and then retreated to Alex’s caravan. The rain alternated between torrential and merely consistent and we decided that the two big kids should head out for some more action letting the kids watch a movie. 

We scrambled through bushes and fern and along a foot wide path which would have been certain death if you took one wrong slippy step. 

We fished for a couple of hours and as usual Alex was pulling in big Pollack while I was bringing up the wrasse. We spotted a seal which was ok as it didn’t seem to put the fish off. 

I always do very well for wrasse and I think it is to do with the fact that I always use a simple jig head with my LRF gear and let it sink down to the depths.

I have a lack of photos of Alex as I had left my phone behind to dry out – speaking of which I really must get myself a new waterproof camera.

We then witnessed a strange anomaly – there was a disturbance on the surface of the water, lots of bubbles and splashing. We watched it slowly make its way up towards us and it was in castable distance. We surmised that it was the seal attacking a shoal of mackerel and we changed to spinners – Alex had a follow and then caught one. It then got weird as despite consistently going through the “shoal” we got no more hook ups. I tried letting my spinner sink a bit however this did not produce a result. Meanwhile the big bubbles moved away and we were wondering why we did not see the seal pop its head up – we assumed it was under water bashing away the shoal. 

Alex caught a Corkwing

It was only later that we looked along the shore and saw a couple of divers surfacing – I guiltily thought of how I let my spinner sink deep down however I doubt it would have been anywhere near them anyway. We stoated back to the caravan and I gathered my brood together and started the drive back to the campsite. The rain was fairly lashing down and I did worry slightly that the tent may be letting in a little water however I had removed any electronics and was looking forward to some hearty sausage and bacon rolls with a rather nice glass of wine. I was looking forward to getting out my wet clothes. 

As we drove up the driveway my eldest remarked that he had a horrible thought that the tent wouldn’t be their – I smiled and said that I always think that however it was always ok. Ive been at this a long time I told him – the tent was pitched like a pro, nothing was going to be shifting it.

The smile was soon wiped off my face when we found our camp in utter chaos – obviously some kind hearted soul had decided to try and help and piled the fallen stuff over the tent to stop it all blowing away however it was totally mental. 

I looked at the devastation, at the tent in pieces, all the gear fallen over, the rain and wind and started to laugh and laugh. I was reminded of a time when as a 17 year old I had camped in Glen Etive with a girlfriend at the time and a pal with another girl. We had camped on a wee bit of grass next to the river. It rained during the night however we were quite cosy in our wee tent however in the morning we found ourselves on an island in the middle of the river.

Anyway, as I surveyed the wreckage a chap approached with three boys and said “here are three strong lads to help you” It later transpired that the three teenager had literally just arrived after walking 18 miles to get to their camp. I was most grateful and am ashamed to say I did not catch their names.

The gear was stuffed in the car and then a crazy two hour drive home – flooded roads and one 999 call as a car came off the road into a ditch. My clothes were still soaked and thankfully the heating was on when I arrived home – at last I could have that glass of wine.