Dover Prince of Wales Pier 14-Dec.1997

DSAA Christmas Competition......... Having fished the Breakwater the day before, and reasonably happy with the strategy devised, and with a few rig adjustments at 4.30am that morning, I was horrified to learn on the long drive down, that the Met. Office shipping forecast mentioned the dreaded number 7, in terms of the wind speed..... in all probability the motorboat company would not take us across, and the Comp, would be fished in the Harbor, on the Prince of Wales Pier......

More bad news greeted me when I got to Dover...... the digger for yellowtail had not shown up at Bills Bait and Tackle .... Clive was most apologetic, and so I had to settle for normal blow lug..... but he was able to give me a score of rag, which I felt had some merit for the PoW (and if I'd thought about it would have grabbed for Pollack on the Breakwater as well..) ... there was only a slight shade of jealousy in my eyes when I saw Clive's own personal container full of large pristine white rag.... one of the perks of the job I guess.....

Made my way across to the PoW after going to the DumpHead and been told by Tom, that the venue had definitely been changed. I was still unsure that I'd been entered for the Comp... very nice Chap from DSAA, Duncan Goulds, had made a number of phone calls on my behalf, as I had been unable to contact the Organizer, Frank Hern, directly..... as I understood it, the entrance fee to the Pier (which is normally 3UKP, and you pay near the barrier... small dispenser that looks like a car ticket machine), was included in the Match fee..... Walked down to the end to find people milling around, and a little confused as Frank had yet to make an appearance!!!!! mind you as it was only 8am and the Comp, wasn't due to start 'til 9.30 guess the observation maybe a little harsh..... Steve Allmark seemed to take charge, and with some Chalk provided by Tom, proceeded to mark out the Pegs..... not long after the job was done, Frank turns up, with the bag labels etc.... I picked mine up, and paid my 12UKP as arranged.. I had drawn Peg 26... right next to Tom.... looked across the Harbor to the Breakwater, with hardly a ripple on the surface, and silently wept....

With 3\4 of an hour to go, a chatted a little, set my gear up around the Peg and waited... decided to stick with the traces that I'd made up... and give the 1/0 wishbones a go.... there was a chance of a few codling about, along with whiting, and maybe pout..... but flatties, were going to be the order of the day.... along with anything from down the wall, such as Pollack...... On reflection what I should have done, is packed up, forgot about the comp, and moved over to the Ad. Pier for some Cod fishing..... or did what Rick Ryder did.... go Christmas shopping....!!!!!!!

9.30am.... Competition starts..... few small whiting are being landed by people around me...... I get a bite.... hit straight into a snag (It'll teach me to laugh about snags with Tom, 2 minutes earlier!!!!).... one set of lost tackle...... not a great start to my first match in almost 20 years!!! :-(

I then watched as the occasional whiting and small codling were retrieved by others, along with one or two Pollack down the wall.....

By 11am, I decide to fish down the wall..... bait up with various combinations of Rag or Lug, with the occasional bit of squid for good measure.....

11.40am.... bang down goes my rod tip.. a fish at last.... only trouble is that it's 13 odd inches of CoalFish rather than Pollack (taken the top hook baited with lug), and so has to go back.... and whilst It's very nice for people to come up and say things like "you don't often see those down here", it would have been nice if it had been a sizable fish... hell even a sizable pout would have been good!!!!!!

The wind picked up strength as the day wore on, to what I would guess would be between force 4 to 5..... It was very frustrating having to fish like this with the Breakwater right in view.....

After about 12.30pm people started to pick up flounders, and it seemed to me that they were steadily increasing in size as the afternoon wore on.... me, well I started getting Tip happy... you know, when the slightest twitch necessitates a response... had a few bites, and missed them..... really should have sat on my hands and let them develop, but I guess by this time my heart was not really in it, and I was lamenting my failure to pack-up earlier and fish the Ad. Pier....

3.30pm.... Time called..... Clive came past with some fine looking flounders, guess the white rag had done the trick... I had nothing to weigh-in, so I packed up slowly, and was the last to walk off..... by this time the wind had dropped to about force 2 or 3, just to compound my misery...... the Breakwater could have been fished..... but rules is rules....

Decided to go home so I don't know what the final outcome was, but I guess many were in the same happy mood that I was.. :-)

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