Friday afternoon and the chance of a couple of hours pike fishing so the gear was tossed into the van and away we went. The weather was tending towards 'Fenland peculiar', windy then calm, out comes the sun, clouds roll in and it tries to rain, it stops, then it starts to get prematurely dark and much colder and so it went on for the entire session. Perhaps you are more aware of the changes because of the big Fenland skies, one thing for sure you can certainly see the weather coming towards you
The visit wasn't a great success but there were sporadic signs of fish hunting and it wasn't long before a violent take signalled a pike had taken the bait but my reflexes got the better of me and it's not often I can say that. I forgot that I was using a circle hook and struck in the normal manner. Fool. The fish was there for a minute or so before it let go and spat out the bait.
A short while later and a jack pike saved me from a blank and this time I remembered to wind down into the bite, rod pointing at the fish. For a couple of minutes this lean and hungry jack pike pike stayed deep and put a bend in the rod leading me to think it was much bigger than it was, in reality it was punching way, way above his weight you could say.
After a couple of hours it was time to go and walk the two terriers who are just a little bit more tenacious than he was but at least the session wasn't a blank and I'll be out again in a few days time filled with optimism as all fishermen are.
