Crystal Water in France
A trip was organised by Pure Fishing to test the new Berkley bait with no expense spared. The UK carp team were given exclusive access to fish Crystal Waters in France which turned out to be one not to be missed. That said young Jed managed to miss out as he didn’t apply for his passport until the last minute which was bounced due to complications therefore meaning no passport no fishing trip. Of course we all sympathised with him and didn’t text him every time one of us caught….
Four of us made our way to Dover for the 5am crossing, it had been a while, in fact just over a year since my last trip and I had forgotten how arduous the journey is. Apart from my dancing technique for staying awake there wasn’t anything journey wise to report and we arrived at the lake for midday. Just in time it would seem as Drafty had one in the net just shy of thirty, after photos and a cuppa we were shown around the lake and given a run down of features on a swim by swim basis. The draw for swims was made, my biggest concern being I wanted to be last out as I couldn’t make up my mind which swim to choose, they all offered different features suiting different fishing styles. I pulled number two with Steve getting first choice and not helping matters by taking a swim I didn’t fancy. After much deliberation and sarcastic encouragement from the other anglers I opted to fish in swim 6. This gave me access to two island margins one on my left and one to my right along with a decent amount of open water in front to go at. I spent some time feature finding with the marker finding various bars and plateaus with depths to 14ft. I placed the right hand rod to the island margin in around 6ft of water amongst some sparse lily pads. This turned out to be the banker with at least one run per day and night. Unfortunately I only managed to catch bream and tench from the other two rods although I did lose one carp which kited into the tree roots to my left somehow leaving my rig firmly embedded and doing the off.
I managed to bank the first fish of the trip with a mirror of 18lbs, as with any trip my target is a carp and this took the pressure off and helped me to relax into my fishing. The bailiff was on hand and did a couple of shots, he also informed me that Rob who was fishing two swims down had lost 2 but other than that all was quiet. After I recast it was time to turn in for the night only to be awoken by a screaming buzzer where another carp had slipped up on the island margin spot, on the scales 34.08. At breakfast I got the low down on the nights activities from around the lake, Steve had the largest two of the night with a Common of 39lbs and a Mirror of 43lbs. Rob two swims down had 5 to 30lb and his loss tally was also at 5. Stewart also managed to catch with two mirrors to 30lb. Backdraft and Mick who were the bailiffs for the week also had activity so smiles all round with everyone landing fish. After breakfast I took Rob to the local town to try and sort his phone problems by getting a top up, how we managed it with Robs lack of French one will never know. One assumed showing a local French smoker a cigarette and some money would be the easiest way to find the local Tabac, I think he wanted to do a drug deal with us but we got the message across in the end. Back at the lake and rods back to the spots, it wasn’t long before the island rod was off again resulting in 34.12 Mirror. This one completely different to the first 34 which was shaped like a dinner plate, it fought like a demon and was certainly my best fish of the week hence the picture. I watched the fish move from one end of the lake to the other but never did they come through my open water spots. I did contemplate moving onto them but felt the activity I was getting was worthy of staying although I really should have made the most of the last morning. The only low point of the trip was the one I lost which I’m sure was a lump, typical methodical heavy lunges staying deep and then the hook pulled. I varied my methods to try and get the other spots producing, heavy baiting to singles fished as bottom baits, pop ups and even zigs but as I say the only thing that worked was the island spot. As any angler will tell you, if they’re not there you can’t catch them and unfortunately my swim wasn’t favourite for the week, maybe the last anglers catch of 40 carp to just over 50lb had something to do with it. I packed most of my gear away on the Friday night in readiness for the journey home the following morning. First light I was away again but ended up snagged in the marginal tree to my right, I packed my other rods away along with my bivvy and walked round to Mick who kindly done the honours from the boat, a great way to end the trip with a 28lb mirror. On walking round I noticed the fish were stacked up in swim 3 but felt there wasn’t time to move onto them as we had to be out the gate by 09.30, well that was what Stewart had text me the previous night and I didn’t want to be the reason for getting away late. All packed and driving round for a shower to freshen up for the journey home I find Stewart had moved into swim 3, he also informed me he had two thirties in the net and would like me to do the photos. I had to shower and get sorted first before I did anything. Whilst getting sorted one would have thought Stewart would have packed away but on returning twenty minutes later Stewart had landed another and still hadn’t packed anything away. I did the photos and we eventually got away, nearer to lunchtime than breakfast but we made the ferry. Robs shortcut the wrong way up a one way street nearly ended in disaster though…… Great trip, great venue, good company with some quality fishing made the journey worthwhile, only two more weeks and I’m back out to France again J Big thank you to Crystal Waters for use of the venue and to Berkley for the bait.
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