I was lucky enough to be invited to Rainbow in June this year by George Csonka,
a Rainbow Warrior of the highest order; and naturally jumped at the chance!
George has fished Rainbow for 13 years and has had loads of 50s and over 20 60s
and 2 fish over 70, topped off with 2 80s, the Perfect Common at 84.08 and the
Ken Dodd fish at 81.04 ! He has so much knowledge of each swim it is daunting!
George had very kindly offered to drive my gear down and collect me from the
airport for 5 days fishing, so who could ask for more?!
The time to the trip flew by, and I was under strict instructions to make up 40
rigs and 10 60lb leaders, so I was ready to fish when I arrived.
This took me a bit of time as each rig and leader had to be perfectly built and
identical. By the time I finished the kitchen was looking like a scane from a
Clive Barker blood fest with fistfuls of size 2 rigs flying around the kettle as
I steamed the line aligners! Rigs were made using 80lb Fireline braid, as
Rainbow is just littered with 50 years worth of snags from collapsed trees and
stumps from carbon excavation in the past, so beefed up gear was essential,
including 25 ft, 100lb snag leaders and 50lb Whiplash mainline.
A rig inspection was pending on my arrival, and I needed to pass!
I didn’t finish with the ruler and trig instruments until 8pm on Saturday night,
and I was flying at 6 on Sunday morning!
3am came around too soon, and I drove down to the airport feeling weary but full
of anticipation.
A short hop and I was being collected by George bang on time, and whisked to
the lake in his Transit carp traveller benga bus.
George had done 2 days and the fishing was slow still, with no one really
catching, with most fish in the woodwork, and not feeding, with practically
nothing seen crashing out.
What greeted me when we arrived was beyond belief, as although I had looked at
the map, and seen the network of islands and finger bays that dominate the lake,
their sheer number has to be seen to be believed. They are everywhere, and
full of snag trees; and we you can’t see the snags, they are still there, below
the water, sometimes in 15-20ft!
My work would be cut out here. No wonder they say if you are going to fish
Rainbow properly, you never get to sleep, unless your rods are out of the water!
You have to fish locked up in most areas and be on the rod and into the boat
within seconds to keep the fish out of the snags.
We had a quick look in one of the bays I would be fishing, and spotted a few
smaller carp in the edges just mooching around in the morning sun.
That’ll do I thought – time to head round to our swims and make a start, as it
would take at least 5 hours to get my 4 rods out.
Tight ones!
Stew
