Danish blues

Saturday was bright and blustery, but with a lot of rain promised  for today and  an unexpected afternoon pass out I dropped in just below the noddy gauge train bridge at Buxton. A small bucket of mash deposited in 4 likely looking swims I settled down with a cup of hot chocolate to watch the white painted  tip of a Des Taylor 12 footer take on  a pleasing arc. And begin a dance of gust aided twitches and judders. Would have been a lot worse on the long cyanide straight above the bridge. Either way, nothing decide to sample the cheese paste.

Next swim a very tight spot that in retrospect was just too boily. At times I think the bait was probably just under the surface rather than tucked ever closer into the undercut bank as in my imagining. I have had pike from this spot so more lead next time. Did have a couple of indications of interest though which always quickens the pulse...There were also indications of plenty of dace moving in the far bank eddy and a couple of more trouty  type slashes at something coming off the river.

Next spot down I had jags on the tip from the first cast. This was on quite large lumps of paste on a 4. It seemed that were certainly plenty of dace down there and I mulled over  toughing it out with much larger lumps of paste and hoping a chevin would have something left to go at or scaling down to at least get a hook into a fish, but the smallest hook I had was a 10. I chose this option for some reason which with further retrospect was  a compromise too far and ended up with lots of activity but nothing on the bank and the light had gone and my curfew was calling..

It really hasn't become winter yet despite it being the 19th of January today but when I first started back on the non-tidal Bure in the early 2000's you could have fished down large sawthes of the river with flake in the winter and almost guarantee that it was only a chub  or a hungry pike/stupid brownie that would move the tip but the rebirth of the river now is evidenced by just how many spots do have plenty of varied year group dace and roach and it's a good problem to have to consider using larger baits such as meat to be more selective. The chub are still there despite the otters as early in  the spring the Environment Agency  survey showed a good head of chub up to a very good size from this beat.

Back to today and in my weekend perambulation stopped off at Stalhnm Staithe and two older  chaps turned up, second job after setting up their octoplus type seats was unfurling the obligatory white towel to drape over their knees. A further tour round the boat yard and somewhat amused by the unshipping of 14 metres of very expensive looking pole for a roach that was at the most an inch and a half in length, straight to the white toweled knee....

Easing into 2014

First outing of the year today. Had considered chub, and frozen pastry/blue cheese ready but on top of a lot of rain  glass is rising and first hard frost for a while and clear blue sky, and biting wind. That, and the inevitable quagmire footpath meant pike instead.

Crossed the Ant at Wayford Bridge but no sudden urge to pull in so onwards to Stalham Staithe. For once, fishing virtually from boot of car had a certain something about it. A couple of hours to work some deads around the quay headings. This duly done. One sharp rap on tiny joey being inched back  under one of Essex Scribbler's poly balls  to show for it. That and the scuffed, puncture marked if only...

The two chaps either side of me had some of the usual on the pole, ever present white hand towel as de rigeur

 Elastic and take apart to hand. Ended with his intended skimmer  as a bonus

Flicktip  to hand. 3-4 lb to show for his work

Reading material

Still got this little lot to look forward to:

Best settle down with a bottle of Pedro Ximinez and some strong cheese (saving some for chub paste).

This week I am mostly reading...

Just before Christmas a slim volume dropped through the door. Crowd funded I think you call it. Well. I coughed up some pennies along with a few more to Unbound to get The Lost Diary published.

http://unbound.co.uk/books/the-lost-diary

 "Took the punt out after my meal and cruised gently into the weedbeds where lay, basking, the carp.." Yates writes in his usual languid style, and it's a world you'd like to be in for a while.

Treading similar ground (in fact probably the same foot steps) over thirty years on is this from Stuart Harris or The Sweetcorn Kid from Little Egret Press. The writing is a little  more functional than Yates to be honest, but again you can imagine being there with the green giant niblet as he soaks up the world that is according to Fennel's Priory and that is the writers gift after all.

I've got my eye on a few more Little Egret titles. Who needs the mammon of Waterstones?

Largest Bureboy (him from Peckham) searched me out this collection from Picador,which to be honest was a world away (or the other side of the Atlantic) from my usual nature led meander books which are of the Deakin and Mabey variety but so far has been a fascinating look at how the real wild west was found. Not a straight through read but a chapter snatched on the pot sort of book. Which is where in truth most of my reading gets done these days. A lovely book to hold, and already foxed looking pages. The patina of paper.....

I've also just started to read  this gem which I think was previously from Wye Valley Publishing. but out again as a paperback through Amazon. Two chapters in of 21 and it is thinking about getting into John Aston territory. That is very high company indeed. I am not surprised John Bailey is on board.

New Year approacheth so whisky and more Tom's Book calls....

Cromerama

Several days away with a large proportion of  the family over the Christmas break on the edge of the Cromer Ridge. I won't show the devastation wreaked along the sea front as it is a lot of peoples real life misery. Suffice to say, the sea can be a vicious cruel and indiscriminate force.                                

The North Sea in a calmer mode a few short days later.

Base camp , with the highest floor just below the snow line

Heavy manners reporting restriction in force so not much human interest allowed in the smuggled out footage but the boy Tonton Macoute does what everyone does when faced with a huge expanse of water and a large quantity of stones at their disposal.

Cromer sticks out a battered but resolute square jaw.Tobermory has a lot to answer for but the colour box theme does lift out of the gathering gloom quite well

Perhaps a few more boats, trailers and tractors hauled out than usual as the old bors take a break from the crab and lobster pots

Some fascinating detail can be found  amongst the assorted haulage tractors. Not so much bog shed door blue (Hats off to  The Two Terriers) as North sea tarp.
 

A little less esoteric

Abstraction

And to finish the  industro porn

Finished off with a little  light refreshment

On the Huh. From one of Norfolk's many Beestons. This one reps somewhere  in the PE32 enz but the grain is from Branthill, just above Wells I think. A little yeasty warm out of the bottle but a pleasantly satisfying accompaniment to Blackiston's rather quite good haddock and chips.

Aternative arti shlock (actually I am quite pleased with this)

The blue bottle dead centre of picture adorning the wall was probably an instailation or something

Antics

Couple of hours on the Ant at Stalham Staithe this afternoon. Mixed offering of roach, perch, ruffe and this little skimmer.

The  float  above the half sardine positioned  just at the junction of a dyke dipped and then sped back into the channel at a rate of knots, and following a game scrap this solid pike was in the net. First blood to The
Essex Scribbler poly ball.

The bringer of the big tides that have wreaked such damage glints cruelly over the marina as dusk falls

The surge.

Walcott has been ripped open by the big storm surges. I won't pick over the bones of people's real life misery but this shows just where the sea can go when it wants to:

The hard defences on the horizon did little to hold back the surge and a swathe of debris  runs all the way across the field back to those bungalows. Debris? Propane cylinders and caged water tanks lifted like bath toys. That debris had been through and came from people's houses and businesses The water had then surged along the lane to the right and the seal sanctuary so a good mile inland. Walls knocked over like lego bricks.

New dawn fades

Pre storm dawn

Sun set was a harsh affair, a real pike tooth moon and attendant dog star (or space station , I am never sure) against a cruel dark blue and low strung, vivid red streaks over the coastal bulge with the tide coming in nearly 2 hours early and already topping some areas.

Cold morning warm sky

Friday morning sunrise from the front of Bureboy Villas..wind sending clouds fairly scudding across the sky hence wavy telephone lines.

Maybe's

Usual weekend outing with littlest ones and found some maybe's..

This is a little boatyard just off the Ant. Spent half an hour yesterday listening to the Canaries managing a back to back home win and watching a chap having a bite a chuck on the whip, several nice skimmers, roach, perch and a ruffe. Sniffs of a rather decent perch as well. I think an hour  or two into dusk would be interesting. No one there this morning 

A bit further towards East Ruston saw this through the trees:

It is a syndicate I think but certainly looks nice and secluded even if just off the road.