Bobbin’ for Trossachs Monsters

“You know what we have never done?” I said to Alex as we discussed a plan to go fishing on Sunday “Whats that?” said Alex with a slight hesitancy in his voice as he knew this was the start of another crazy wack plan. “We have never been towed around a loch in our float tubes by an enormous Pike”

“Let’s do it” he said – only with an extra word that kind of sounds like kicking.

So we met at Venechar at around 1000 and got set up – I got talking to some Irish chaps in a camper van and we spoke about the differences in fishing practices in various countries – some of the practices I kind of doubted. I mean I know Polish fishers get a bad wrap but do they actually catch hundreds of immature bream and roach and then grind them to a pulp before eating them?

Anyway, we got the tubes set up and walked to the loch. There was a couple of chaps deadbaiting for Pike and I asked them where there lines were so we did not disturb them – they appeared a bit shocked that we were going out in the tubes with the gusting wind but I assured them we would be fine.

We fished hard around the first bay with enormous flies and I am pretty sure I spotted a very big swirl on the surface which I am pretty sure was a very big Pike taking something from just under the surface – we spoke about that Pike a lot as quite frankly it was pretty much the only action to be had at this loch.

After we got back ashore after totally blanking we had some fairly tough decisions to make – do we head to another loch, stay and fish for trout or come up with an alternative.

While we decided, Alex got out his legendary frying pan and stove and proceeded to make us sausage, black pudding and haggis doublers.

He then ate a wasp.

That’s right, he actually ate a friggin wasp. The damn thing had got in his can and after drinking it he chewed on it for a bit thinking it was a bit of burnt black pudding – he then spit half of it out in his hand.

He said his mouth felt funny. I am just glad it didnt sting him – I reminded him of the horrific experiance of when he got a hook stuck in his lip and I had to tear the damn thing out. The last thing I wanted to do was go through his pockets for spare cash and transfer his gear into my car before the ambulance showed up try stuff something down his throat while his face swells up to twice its size and save his life in a very manly fashion.

We decided to head to a different loch and continue our hunt for Pike – surely the Pike would be feeding at another loch right? I mean we have actually caught a lot of pike in our time so it is not as if we are newbies at this game.

OK – so this time we were even more sure – this place looked like Pike City – I mean it was just perfect, it had weeds and lots of it.

However, the water stayed like glass with no splashes amongst the weeds and no takes to our flies.

I put on a gurgler at one point and pulled it through the weeds – any pike worth its weight in roach flesh would have went mad with those gurgles however the gurgler came back unmolested.

Eventually the sun was off the water and the temperature plummeted a few degrees – we finned back slowly to the shore.

“This is the second time I have blanked this year” mused Alex as we dragged our tubes up the shore – “..and both times I was with you” pointing out the obvious common denominator. He reminded me of our early season trip to my highland river which turned out equally as disasterous.

To be fair we always meet up at weird times, I mused, when I thought about it later and decided to rectify that next season.

“Wanna meet up and during the winter and do this again?”

“You betcha” I said.