Dutch Trip - you can't book the weather!

I'd been looking forward to this fishing trip to the Netherlands for some time. Though like any trip booked in advance you're always at the mercy of the weather. I've been bitten once or twice before and poor weather unfortunately featured rather heavily during the few days I was abroad. When a kayak fisherman talks about poor weather, it's almost guaranteed that they're referring to excessive wind. Cold, rain, snow and heat doesn't bother me at all, but fishing in strong winds removes the enjoyment factor for me. After all, we fish for the enjoyment right?

The target species for the week were the usual predators, Pike, Zander and Perch with a potential later in the week for some Trout fishing.

The first day was reasonable weather wise and I covered a large area on the drift, spinning as I went. Casting from deeper to shallow water, covering as much ground as possible before repositioning and repeating the action. It felt as though it was going to be a slow day, though I hooked into a fish quite early on which is always provides a good boost to morale. It was an exceptionally light bite that resulted into me hooking into a Zander. It was an average size, though it provided a very pleasing start to the day.

Was did prove most frustrating early on was finding that the internal battery on my HDS7 had discharged causing all my custom settings to be lost. I only had myself to blame, I'd not fished for way too long. That said, it's highlighted a good point that these modern units that permit such huge customisation do require operating ever month or two to ensure that the internal battery remains charged. Failing to do so will require the user to spend quite some time getting their unit back to their preferred settings, lesson learned!

Despite the promising start, that turned out to be my only confirmed hookup for the day, though I missed a couple of hits during the session.

That evening saw the weather deteriorate considerably to a point that I didn't really fancy fishing. To fish in highly exposed waters in a steady 20mph+ wind, gusting to 35mph really doesn't excite me. Regardless of the fact that I'd driven several hours to fish this area in the Netherlands, there are days that are best spent relaxing, enjoying a beer and watching the world go by. The next couple of days were in my mind 'pub days'. Fortunately the family were only an hour away so I enjoyed some quality time with them whilst awaiting the bad weather to blow over.

The next trip was to fish a Perch venue, an early start saw me fishing before 0630. The water clarity was very good, with the bottom being easily visible over two metres. Though that does perhaps make fishing rather more difficult. The beauty of these trips is that many of these venues are new to me. I get as much pleasure out of enjoying the surroundings and wildlife as I do fishing. It's just a very pleasant experience.

I didn't have to wait long before my lure was hit hard in shallow water by an angry Perch. They're fun on light gear and I tend to lose more Perch than any other species, so it's always pleasing to watch them slip into the net!.

It was a nice sized fish, somewhere in the mid-40 centimetre range. It had engulfed the lure!. It was quickly unhooked and photographed before swimming away strongly. There's something about these striped fish that always makes me smile.

Despite a few rattles, the remainder of the morning was quite quiet. I lost what I guess was a nice sized Pike whilst trolling, losing it just a few seconds after hooking up. Such is fishing.

At times I just like to place the rods to one side and just drift, taking in my surroundings. There were many species of geese migrating, divers working the water with many noisy Coots scooting around in the margins. I occasionally see a flock of geese passing overhead in the UK in their classic 'V' formation, though at times you can witness a couple of dozen of these formations flying back to back and side to side, passing over these extensive areas of wetland. That's one beauty of the kayak, taking you to these place and permitting you views that most people will never get to witness.

I'm slowly upgrading my tackle this year and it began with the purchase of a pair of Shimano Symetre 2500 fixed spool reels. They're a mid-range reel and I secured a decent price by purchasing from France (http://www.pecheur.com). I cant justify spending crazy money on tackle, especially when freshwater isn't really my forte and I only freshwater fish a few times a year. That said it's a very well made reel, extremely smooth with superb line lay. I've currently go both loaded with 30lb Whiplash braid, though I'll going to re-spool one with 20lb as it'll be better suited for casting lighter lures.

I managed to hook into a small pike towards the end of the session. He may have been small, though he had no problem whatsover in taking the Rapala Deeptail Dancer lure that was running in about 4m of water. I didn't manage to hook into any of the larger Pike that the Netherlands is well known for, but still, it was another fish and that's never a bad thing.

The last day of fishing proved to be the best day. The venue was a small lake stocked with both Rainbow and Brown trout. It had apparently previously been saltwater, though had long ago been closed off, with the water was somewhat brackish. This threw up a surprise as the day progressed.

I trolled my way around this lake, roughly following the drop offs that were somewhat wild and erratic in their pattern. I don't mind trolling for an hour or so, though it can get rather boring rather quickly for me. Despite that, it did produce several fish for me, the first being a nice Brown trout taken on a crankbait running at around four feet.

One thing I do enjoy about trout is that they can get rather lively and provide some great sport. Half an hour later I found myself hooked up once again. Well at first I thought that I was perhaps catching the bottom, though a quick glance at the HDS7 showed that I was well clear with no weed in the water. But no, it was definitely a fish, though it appeared to be swimming along with the kayak?. The biggest surprise was when it came to the surface... a Flounder!. During it's saltwater days, this water held Flounder and some Herring and the Flounder had adapted easily to the change in salinity when the water was closed off to the sea. Apparently there are also still some Herring in the lake.

I took three Flounder in very quick succession, two being to a double hookup!. If I passed over the correct ground, shallow, flat, patchy weed, it was almost guaranteed that the Flounder would have a go at the lure. They were all caught on the same small crankbait lure as the Trout.

Despite the good fishing there's always the opportunity to enjoy the surroundings. The sun was up, the wind was light, it was warm!. I also found a shallow sheltered area where I tied off to a small buoy and just snoozed for 30 minutes, perfect!. Hey, I'm on holiday!

The Trout continued to come, and despite a couple of misses I caught another two Browns. I also caught a beautifully coloured Rainbow Trout that gave a great account of itself, getting airborne at times. I missed the opportunity to photograph it on my lap as it decided to depart the kayak a few seconds earlier than planned!

I managed one last Flounder before I'd decided to call it a day.

After about 7 hours I'd had enough for the day, I'd managed to catch eight fish in total. None were monsters, but it was a really enjoyable session. It was my last fishing day of the trip and it was a good note to finish on.

This weekend sees me travel to a small lake at the Cotswold Water Park. This will probably be my last freshwater trip for 2-3 months as I really must concentrate of clocking up some serious hours on the salty stuff. My boy is really keen to fish with me this year so I expect that the Adventure Island will see a lot of use. I'm going to have to make a pair (or at least one) Haka. These are a wooden bench type of seat that permits a person to sit outboard of the main kayak hull on the AI. I'll post some pictures on here once I've knocked them together.

Netherlands – a few days fishing

I’m really struggling to find time to fish this year and when I do it tends to be in blocks of several days at a time. This trip was to be no exception as I headed off to the Netherlands with Ian Harris for six days of freshwater fishing. This consisted of a few days fishing local waters before competing in the Hobie European Championships over the last two days of the trip.

So with the car loaded to bursting point with tackle, bedding, etc, etc, we headed of in the direction of Dover with a journey of a few hours ahead of us. I was using my Outback whilst Ian was using a Revolution11.

The journey went smoothly and we met up with Daniel who was to be our host for most of the week. We were going to be fishing local waters in the hunt for Pike, Zander and Perch, though expectations weren’t overly high as recent reports pointed towards somewhat patchy fishing as of late.

The mark is a rather secret!, so I wont apologise for the lack of photographs, though I have to say that the weather was quite spectacular for this time of year. I picked up a small pike very early on though pickings became quite hard after that. Though to be honest, I didn't really care as the scenery is superb. I saw several pairs of Kingfishers and watched a few flocks of geese fly overhead, brilliant stuff. At times I just relaxed in the warmth of the sun and let the current take me downstream.

Sometime later whilst trolling the lure was hit hard, though once hooked up it didn’t feel too big. A small Zander was quickly bought to the net, another species for the day.

Ian hooked into his first Zander ever, something worth recording!. I pedalled over and captured the moment, one very happy angler. The fish were there, it was just really hard work. I missed several bites, most frustrating.

We both managed a couple of Perch, no monsters.

The next day saw similar results, perhaps a few more fish. Pike, Zander and Perch made appearance again, though the big fish remained elusive!

I tied off to a pontoon and took a wander to stretch my legs. The grassed path was literally alive with tiny frogs, jumping just ahead of my feet as I walked along. Really nice to see, though rather difficult to catch on camera. Though after a little perseverance I managed to get one to pose for me.

Daniel decided to show us how it was done by catching a large Zander followed by an equally impressive Perch. Personally I find it really encouraging as it lets me know that they are down there waiting to be caught.

I took the opportunity to play with my Lowrance Elite 7 HDI, finding out which mode suited me the best for the day. I didn’t particularly require the charts so I found myself using the split screen mode displaying both broadband and down imaging sonar. I have to admit that I really do enjoy having such a large screen, I’d find it a real step back going back to a 5” display or less.

Broadband & Down Imaging in split screen mode

On a fairly featureless bottom the down imaging is not so useful so it’s best to use the broadband in full screen. Broadband can be displayed with Down Imaging Overlay which enhances the detail as it combines the broadband and DI in one display. It isn’t always ideal to display one overlaid on top of the other, though at times it can be most effective. The venue that I was fishing was featured lots of submerged structure, so the down imaging was constantly in use. The photo above clearly shows a large shoal of fish, quite probably Bream.

I hardly photographed any fish during the tree day period. Having being spoilt with some really good fish in the past it doesn’t seem worth the effort to photograph smaller specimens, spoilt I guess!.

Freshwater kayak fishing – Dutch style! (Day 2)

The plan was to hit the road at 6am, be on the water by 7:30am. We left a few minutes later as Daniel was requiring some extra beauty sleep, though we still managed to hit the water on time (I should state that no speed limits were exceeded in accomplishing that!). Breakfast was enjoyed on the water, my sugar levels most certainly enjoyed the boost!

We were joined on the water by Leo again, with another Dutch chap, Ronald, joining us later as the day progressed. Techniques were the same as before and we worked our way along the waterways once more. Yesterday has been unseasonably warm with the temperature hitting a dizzy 22°C and it was looking like it was going to be another warm day afloat. I wear my dry suit all year round and it never proves to be a real issue. Should I warm up, I just pour some water over the suit and I rapidly cool down. However, at sea I’m far more exposed, there’s always a breeze to keep me cool. Not here, the trees and dykes provide a lot of shelter and I was warming up rather nicely!

Not only was Sunday my second day chasing Piker and Zander, it was my last. The pressure was on and I really wanted to catch that elusive Zander. I’ve caught a Pike from the kayak before so the Zander was top of my wanted list.

As it happened I only had to wait a couple of hours to catch the first of my target species, not a Zander though. I trolled a small soft bait along a mooring wall for recreational boats and was rewarded  with a hard hit and a solid hook up. The result was a large Pike, though I nearly lost it next to the kayak. I was going to net it onto the kayak, though decided at the last moment to gill it on. I made the mistake of grabbing the trace as I often do when sea fishing, however the fine braid, thrashing fish and lighter terminal gear gave way. In the blink of an eye the lure flew onto the kayak, the trace was blowing in the breeze and I was holding the Pike by the gill… talk about lucky!. Lessons were learned and such things were not to be repeated.

and another photo…

Despite a deep braid cut and a little ‘Pike rash’ moral soared once more and the hunt continued into the afternoon. I did drag myself out of the water at one stage and grabbed a little rest on the bankside. A young angler came and chatted to Leo and I enjoyed watching his enthusiasm, guess I was just like that once. As the day progressed people around me were catching Pike and Zander, though the action had dried up for me. Daniel landed another cracking Pike, you could easily grow to dislike this chap!

We fished the far end of the waterway for some time and despite it looking very fishy, it failed to produce anything for me. We moved into a sheltered lake that joined the main waterway and the guys took the opportunity to grab some trophy photos. Not of trophy sized fish, but of them holding the winners trophies for the European part of the Kayak Wars 2013 competition. All three of them regularly fish and catch one big fish after another, they most certainly deserved to be the winning team. They’ve also made a great start to the 2014 competition, watch this space.

The sun was quite high by midday and the Zander, being somewhat shy of the sun, were proving to be rather elusive. I felt that my chances of catching a Zander were fading rapidly so I started fishing the few areas of shadow offered by the trees. I trolled one likely looking area once without success, so I passed through it one again and found myself hooked up!. As the fish neared the surface I quickly made out the shape of a Zander and it was netted aboard in record time!. It was no monster, though at 61cm it was respectable, though most importantly it was a Zander!. Typically there was no one around to take a photo, so i kept the fish in the net alongside the kayak and pedalled downstream until I found one of the guys.

So I’d caught a Perch, a Pike and finally the elusive Zander, all boxes had been ticked. We tried a few more areas and apart from missing one hit I had no success. Tiredness was catching up once more, things weren’t helped by my increasing temperature due to wearing a dry suit. I wasn’t HOT, but warm and tired. There was clearly only one sensible solution, pull over and sleep. (thank you Leo for catching me in a deep sleep!).

We travelled along some narrower waterways, very scenic, though the fish weren’t entertaining my efforts. I managed to snag the bottom, snag a tree, get stuck in a tree… interesting moments. I decided it was better to admit defeat and retire back to the wider main waterway.

I trolled a lure on the way along an extensive drop off and experienced a hard hit and a brief hook-up to what felt like a nice sized fish… a monster Zander perhaps?!!. That basically marked the end of that trip and we came off the water at around 5pm, yet another long day afloat. Sunday evening saw myself and Daniel enjoy some very tasty takeout, a few drinks and plenty of fishing chatter, these really are great days afloat, days to remember.

I packed my gear and headed back to Eindhoven on the Monday, and with the family safely aboard we headed back home. That concluded another very good and successful road trip, where will the next one take me?

Freshwater kayak fishing – Dutch style! (Day 1)

I’ve just returned from another road trip, though this time I left the UK and headed for the Netherlands. My previous road trip had seen myself and five others tormented by awful weather conditions in the northwest of Scotland. The question was would this trip be more successful?. The fishing was certainly going to be very different, I wasn’t going to require heavy saltwater gear to fish deep water lochs this time around. In fact I didn’t require any saltwater gear at all, this was to be another foray into the mysterious world of freshwater kayak fishing.

The target species for the weekend were  Pike and Zander (Snoek and Snoekbaar in Dutch). It’s not my first attempt at catching a Zander, I’d previously fished in the Netherlands in the summer of last year but returned home empty handed. This year would see me fishing a different venue under the guidance of my friend Daniel van der Post. The plan was simple enough, leave home on Friday evening, drive during the night, taking the ferry from Dover at midnight, arriving in Eindhoven at 6am on Saturday. With my wife and children unloaded from the kayak fishing mobile to spend a weekend with her family, I drove an extra hour or so to rendezvous with Daniel.

What were the odds that when burning up the motorway in the early hours that I see Daniel’s car appear in the rear view mirror, getting closer by the minute!. We arrived together and chatted whilst rigging the kayaks. Rigging was quick enough as far less gear was needed compared to a day of bait fishing at anchor somewhere out at sea.

I have to say that the location was stunning, a river system of sorts, freshwater, though tidal due to the effects of sea movement much further away. There was open water, large reed beds as well as large areas of fallen trees and wooded vegetation. The place just screamed fish!!. Though what really caught my eye was the amount of birdlife, geese, waders, divers, woodland birds… the list just goes on. It’s not a well known mark and I’ve been asked to keep its locations to myself, so to the end that photographs that I’ve chosen to use are only a few from the multitude that I took.

The fishing was all to be with the use of lures, and I was presented with a selection of soft baits that I was assured were a choice selection that should work well. They were all rigged onto fairly light jig heads, with some of the larger shads sporting a smaller ‘stinger’ treble towards the tail to hook those fish that may be a little more tentative towards hitting the lure. So I had rigged up two lure rods, one a vertical jigging type rod to handle the larger lures as well as a lighter rod for all other work. My reels were loaded with 30lb Daiwa Tournament braid, all lures were fitted to light wire traces.

There were to be two main methods, trolling and spinning, though the latter was used more sparingly and at somewhat specific locations. Anyway, we headed along the waterway and after a few minutes I was fishing. The first fish of the day was a a nice sized Perch and was caught after only a couple of casts, what a great start!

I honestly cannot remember when I last caught a perch, probably 30 years ago. They are a pretty fish, colourful, spikey and clearly aggressive feeders. All my fish are photographed and measured to enable them to be submitted into the Kayak Wars competition for 2014, hence the measuring board. There was some tidal movement evident on the water, though I was told that this would increase as the flood turned onto the ebb as the morning progressed. We worked our way along the waterways and I tried my hand at trolling, though I was having no success. Though to be honest, I wasn’t at all bothered. It was a new venue, a very scenic one at that, and there was plenty around me to maintain my interest.

It was a good opportunity to  play with the Lowrance Elite 7 HDI combo unit and it certainly does a great job of locating and identifying structure on the down imaging (DI). That said, when it comes to identifying fish the broadband does a better job. Fortunately, I can have the best of both worlds be either overlaying broadband and DI data, or by displaying them both side by side. I personally prefer the latter as it offers a little more clarity. I regularly came across shoals of fish which I was told were Bream. In deeper water fish returns on DI are often just dots, though due to the shallow water the fish returns on DI were far clearer, on some returns the fins almost seem visible!.

At times the Bream appeared as short vertical lines on the DI, I guess that’s due the tall, flat profile of a Bream. However, the strong ‘arch’ returns on the broadband sonar were always a clear giveaway of the presence of fish. I was a little concerned as how long my 12aH battery would last for a long session afloat with the backlight on the Elite 7 HDI turned up to a higher setting. As it happened over two days I clocked up around 18 hours of running time with 11.9 volts still being displayed (I started off with 12.8 volts). Clearly the GPS/fish finder unit is fairly frugal with its use of electricity despite having a rather large display.

A couple of hours later Daniel hooked into what was clearly a nice fish and the result was a cracking Pike!

So the fish were clearly about and on the feed, all I had to do was to persevere and hopefully I’d reap the rewards. Ten minutes later Daniel was hooked up again!. I was only metres away and within moments a large Zander was thrashing around on the surface. Ok, it was a little disappointing that it wasn’t on the end of my line, but what a great experience to witness such quality fish being caught.

These fish are most certainly as large as they look, the Pike was somewhere over 90cm ( and much bigger were yet to be caught!), the Zander somewhere very close to 90cm if memory serves me right, stunning fish. Surely it would be my turn next?. We met up with Leo, another keen Dutch kayak angler, he also located Pike and Zander… clearly the knowledge and expertise was all important.

I trolled along various areas of vegetation, drop offs, etc… no Pike or Zander. I ended up spinning at one corner of the waterway and dropped a nice sized Perch close to the kayak. Moral perked up once more and I continued spinning and founded myself hook up into a lively head shaking fish, it just had to be another Perch. Sure enough after a minute or two I netted a rather large fish and bought it aboard for photographing. It was an absolute cracker, measuring in at just over 46cm!

Sadly, despite my best efforts that was to be my last fish of the day. I’d not managed to bag one of the main target species, however, I’d not blanked and had caught a specimen sized Perch. On top of that I’d seen a huge variety of birds, most memorable being three sightings of a Kingfisher, one of those being for a good minute whilst it sat on branch close to the water.

We persevered as the sun went down, hoping that the fading light would encourage the Zander to hit the baits, though it didn’t prove fruitful for me.

We came off the water at around 6pm, that’s a long day afloat. I’d only clocked up a total of six hours sleep over the previous two night and to say that I was tired was an understatement… totally knackered would be closer to the mark!. It had in fact been a struggle from midday and I can honestly say that I’ve never made so many cock-ups during one session, probably a years worth in one day!. I have to say that Daniel was patient and clearly mildly amused despite watching one lure after another be lost to the murky depths.

That was the end of the first day of fishing, the evening was spent talking fishing over a few drinks, despite the lack of Pike and Zander coming aboard my kayak, it’s been a great day afloat.

Going Dutch (final day)

The first day had seen the European Hobie Team target Zander, on the second day this had changed to bass. I’d had a few hits to the lures on the first day and lost bass on the second day, what was the third and final day going to bring?. We decided to fish another Zander venue, was I going to finally hook into a Zander?

It was a short drive from the hotel to the launch site. Again it was brackish water, the location being a small harbour with a secluded slipway giving access to the fishing grounds. we’d been warned that the slipway owner was always eager to collect his fees, we weren’t to be disappointed!. As we parked a guy appeared from the bushes and introduced himself, with three Euros launch fees in his hand he disappeared as quickly as he’d appeared.

There was only six of us fishing, myself and David plus the French and German teams. We were soon rigged up and ready to go, again it was to be fishing with jig heads and other assorted lures.

It was a short paddle through the harbour to the open water. There was a large barge moored up with sholas of baitfish jumping clear of the water as I peddled by. On the other side was a herd of cows knee deep in the water, not something that I get to see everyday!

The advice we’d been given from Bram was to fish either left or right outside of the harbour entrance where the water shelved off from 4 metres to about 13 metres. I was soon working small shads and flukes from mid-water to the bottom. There was clearly evidence of fish being present on the fish finder, often swimming sharply from the bottom to within a metre of two of the surface. Despite the clear presence of fish I wasn’t having any luck whatsoever.

It was another exceptionally warm and bright day and I’m fairly sure that this had an adverse effect on the fishing. One of the French guys managed a small Zander towards the end of the session, yet again the French managed to pluck out a fish!. It was quite a short session as we needed to make tracks and head back to Calais in order to catch the ferry.

I cant recall ever having experienced such difficult fishing over a three day period, from a fishing standpoint it’d certainly been disappointing. That said, it’d been a good experience to try some new venues and methods. It’d been great to catch up with some Team mates that we’d last seen in Texas last year, whilst meeting some other anglers who I’d previously only chatted to via the PC. I’d like to fish the Netherlands again later this year when the temperatures have dropped and the Zander and Pike fishing is more productive.