Dover Breakwater 8th Feb.1998

Picked up Maddies and some Rag with a couple of score of fresh yellowtail to complement those left from the previous days fishing on the PoW.....

Arrived at the Dumphead just before 8, entered the draw, and drew lot 25, after paying my 10UKP entrance fee.

Wind SW 3-4 occasionally 5 later in the day..... High water at 8am......

Went over in the second boat..... landed in the mid-section....... allowed to choose peg based upon chronological draw...... decided to fish in the usual area, with the Knuckle already taken...... landed up with Pegs 56 to 58, right next to Clive Solley. Also managed to meet Paul Howlett, with whom I'd had a number of short chats with on the net.... always nice to put a face to that cryptic name!!!! Really should ask Paul about his Phew01 handle.....

Decided from the outset, that the chances of me outfishing the likes of Alan Yates, Steve Almark etc where not realistic, and that my only real hope was to go for number of species, rather than total weight, although there was always the chance of an individual biggy..... although I have to confess at this juncture, that I really hadn't got a clue what the categories were that we were fishing for!!!!!! ...... had to ask Clive to enlighten me as we unpacked and prepared for the start.....

The Match was 2 rods with a total combined number of 3 hooks, with either or both sides of the Wall allowed......

I decided that my game plan would be to fish a long flowing wishbone with size 2 Kamasans on the inside, and a single long flowing 1/0 on the outside...... this I would maintain until around 12.00pm... when I would swap the wishbone over to the outside, and use a single hooked boom trace down the inside wall for an hour or more, and then switch both rods to the inside for the remaining time..... this I felt would give me the best opportunity for success...... I felt some what relived by the fact that Clive seemed to be adopting a similar strategy......

9.30am: Start.......

9.45am: Failed to make contact with a bite from the outside...... all along the Wall from the off, codling were being pulled up... with a very noticeable bias towards the Knuckle...

10.20am: Almost an hour passes by before I manage to hook into anything..... Wow... a 10" dab from the inside.... uuummmm!!!!!

10.30am: 6.1/2" pout from the outside... not really the monster winning cod that I was going to need!!!!

10.40am: Mild depression... few fish being caught around me, but it was obvious that the low numbers had the day.... went and grabbed a coffee... on the way back looked at Steve Almarks bucket, already a third full...... oh well, guess it was always going to be that way......

10.50am: Double shot on the inside....... 8.1/2"dab, and an equally big pout........

11.05am: Pouting of 6.1/2" from the outside........

11.15am: lost a small codling on the inside, just as I lifted it out the water.... it was undersize anyway, so nothing really to shout about.... :-(

11.25am: 7" Pout from the outside......

11.40am: Manage to bring up a small edible crab from the inside!!!!

11.45am: This was followed by a starfish from the outside....... Clive very generously gave me a couple of frozen peeler crabs to play with...... unfortunately, I couldn't do his generosity justice... :-(

1.30pm: decided to use a one hook rig on the inside wall for Pollack, whilst using the wishbone on the outside for codling...... really should have spent the day train-spotting, or stamp collecting!!!!!!!! ;-)

2.55pm: miracle of miracles...... 6.1/2" pout from the outside.........

3.15pm: finish.........

Went to the weigh-in ........ Steve Almark won with something in the order of 18 sizeable codling, plus pouting and dabs..... he'd been able to cast to the left of the knuckle, and found the fish........

Clive had pulled in a number of species (5 in total), including a male dragonet, and I think was in the running for the greatest number of species prize.

Paul had had a miserable days fishing as well, and I decided that I'd had enough too, and caught the first boat back, and managed to bump in to Rick Ryder on the Quay..... but by that time I was shattered, and just wanted to get home, so I had to reluctantly turn down his generous offer of tea and a chat..... we'll do it soon Rick, I promise.....

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