Kayak Hand Lining, Port Isaac, Cornwall

The English weather forecast is Pollocks!

Port Isaac, Cornwall, UK

The kayak route as seen from Port Isaac

It was coming to my attention that I was finding the fishing very difficult in Cornwall for many reasons. mainly due to the lack of info and experience I had, I had great expectations of catching new species and teasing Bass and Wrasse out of rock gully's on lures, but even the locals were saying there's been too much rain which has ruined the fishing, It had been raining for three weeks before my holiday, rained during my holiday and its still raining two weeks later. Even I have to admit that as bad as the English weather is, this was unusual. Whether the rain water had pushed the fish out to sea, or made climbing on wet slippery rocks and navigating up/down sheep tracks on cliff faces near impossible and dam right dangerous, it was getting to me. If the fish won't come to me, then I will go to the fish!

The master plan by Eddie Van Goff

A boat trip? of coarse, yes! but that got cancelled! guess why? the sea was too rough! oh and when a boat did get to go out, not enough lunatics wanted to go sea fishing on a boat in the rain, except me, so that got cancelled too. Pulling my hair out now! All was not lost though, me and Sarah had a kayak trip booked, and it hadn't been cancelled. Ok, it wasn't a fishing trip, but we had been told we could hand line with feathers for Mackerel as we toddled along with the other kayaks whilst following the coastline exploring otherwise inaccessable caves and bays. It was the best that was going to be. So with a bit of cunning, sheer determination and a lot of desperation, I devised a multipurpose hand line rig, capable of fishing multiple depths at once for three target species, Mackerel, Bass and Pollock, This took me all of one minute to think about, "the master plan" was put on paper to show Sarah. The idea was tow along a standard mackerel feather trace with a 2 oz lead attached and then attach 2 meters of 20lb fluorocarbon with a Sidewinder small 6" green sand eel shaking it's stuff behind at a lower depth and swimming down to the bottom when we stopped, I figured that the feathers would appeal to Mackerel and possibly a Pollock, and that the Sand Eel would appeal to Bass and Pollock which I must say my "Van Goff" clearly shows.

Hand line rig for kayak fishing

We managed to buy a crab hand line for a bargain of £1.89 from a souvenir/bakers shop, I modified the rig for the trip, I dismantled the crab catching devise/rig so quickly I didn't even have time to figure out how it worked with a pebble, wire boon and a little sack that resembled what you put your washing tablets in for your laundry. With 5 minutes to spare we grabbed the wet suits and made our way to meet the rest of the party and pick up the kayaks. We actually set off from Port Gaverne with Cornish Coast Adventures, with a quick tutorial for the six of us, we precariously boarded our tandem kayak and demonstrated basic turning and stopping skills, which was a little bit harder as it took some teamwork, before heading out of the bay and up and down the coast past Port Isaac on our little adventure.

I didn't put the hand line out until about halfway into our paddling tour, but when I did it was clear the 1oz lead wasn't heavy enough to sink the rig whilst we were paddling along, it just skidded across the surface, but I had anticipated this and had taken a few different weight leads, so when we landed on a inaccessible tiny beach I retied a 3oz lead which sunk the rig enough, but to be honest I think a four oz would of been better. When we left the beach, I actually managed to capsize the kayak trying to get on, sending me and Sarah head first into the water, losing the hand line as it disappeared in the surf, amazingly I spotted it wash up on the shore after two minutes of frantic searching, now it was time for the slow paddle back to port. We stopped along the way a few times to wait for other people, I took the opportunity to jig the rig with my arm trying to attracted fish. then it was the home stretch, I had been purposely not rowing to slow us down, letting Sarah do all the work, mostly to give us more time out at water, She didn't know, the benefits of being at the back! Then I felt the line tugging against my leg, was it? Yes! I have! My first ever Pollock about 1lb 6oz taken on the Sidewinder 6" green Sand Eel. The fish was hooked, landed, photographed, unhooked and released in under a 30 seconds by an over excited angler. a world record maybe?. Sarah "Didn't you want to keep it for dinner?" I forgot that part. I was just happy to have caught a fish.

My first Pollock

I have to say, although not technically a fishing trip I enjoyed the kayak trip immensely, and saw some magnificent Cornish coastline from a different view, And catching my first ever Pollock was a big bonus. It has got me thinking about trying some proper kayak fishing sometime, but if you noticed in the video, my paddle floated away as I unhooked the fish, I cant help but think I might need a bit of practice lol

Beach Casting, Widemouth Bay, Bude

Horizontal rain and pain

Widemouth Bay, Cornwall. EX23. UK

Widemouth Bay

Summers here!, and holiday it is, an old friend from school had moved to Cornwall and bought a camping and caravan park, ashamedly I've never been further west than Reading, And this was an opportunity to visit this beautiful part of the country, try a bit of surfing, and put a few lines into the water.

I had unsuccessfully tried some jigging and spinning from rocks, and as a result I decided to try a bit of familiar beach casting, but which beach? I didn't have a clue, I had asked the locals and the general consensus was - too early in the year to fish, too much rain, sea too rough, too big spring tide. so the question as to where to fish still eluded me, as we never got that far into the discussion. But I didn't have the option of returning when the conditions were favourable and the fish were about.  So with absolute stubbornness I decided to push my luck, I picked the closest beach to our campsite and with 4 hours to fish, the tides, sunset and surfers dictated that I would be fishing 2 hours down to low water and two back up.

Sand Eels, look out they're hiding under your feet!

I arrived 30minutes before dusk, the surfers had all gone, it was very windy and wet. The rain wasn't falling down but going horizontally, from left to right across the beach. I looked out towards the surf, and then it dawned on me. It was a mile away, well not that far yet!! I think at this point I realised how shallow it was, This maybe wouldn't of bothered me too much, Bass would be lurking between the breakers, but with the very strong cross wind I knew I would seriously struggle to reach over 80 meters, maybe even 60. And by my calculation that wasn't even past the first breaker. I had no waders or even wellies purely because I had never needed them before.Which would of at least allowed me to wade out at least maybe another 15 meters to cast.

leger rig with boon

Undetermined I set up in front of the water, my 11'6" Shakespere Salt Extreme Bass rods with my new Shimano Biomasters 8000 spooled with 15lb Ultimer F1 titanium mono line with crystal clear tapered leaders 15lb to 60lb. I fished with a running leger. a 5oz grip lead on a boom, with 20lb fluorocarbon 18" snoods, the idea that the fluorocarbon and a single Aberdeen size 2 hook. Bait was a small sand eel with the head and tail chopped off then threaded onto the hook and wrapped in a slither of mackerel fillet and bound with bait elastic which would give it strength to stay intact and on the hook after powerful casts . The idea was to keep the rig as simple and tangle proof as possible by using a simple 1 hook running ledger, this would also keep the bait on the sea bed, as I was hoping a ray might come along, even though I'd been told it was to early in the year for them. The fluorocarbon snood is stiffer than mono and less likely to tangle in the surf, and the extra length of the snood and boom would allow a more natural movement of the bait.

It was time to cast, and as I readied the rod, I noticed a scrap piece of mackerel stuck to the back of my hand, I shook my hand and screamed in pain as my baited hook violently flapped about on the end of my hand. the whole point and barb of the hook had embedded itself in the end of my finger, which by the way it's still hurting typing this six days later.  I was now ready to cast using my bleeding and bruised finger, but the sea by now had moved a good 30 meters away, so I packed everything into move mode, and made my way to the waters edge again, another lesson learnt, being this mobile with two rods on one tripod is very difficult. I ended up mostly fishing one rod as a result, I have to admit that the speed of the tide was a world away from the steep shingle banks in Kent that I was used to fishing. It was quite amusing looking at where I'd been walking, lots of tiny 2" sand eels had come to the surface of the wet sand, obviously the stomping on the sand had tricked them into coming out, I'd never seen this before, and spent a good hour of the night amusing myself with playing sand eel stomping, even joking at least I can say I caught a sand eel. It was a shame none were big enough to use as bait.

Now where's that sea going?

I moved forward about 15 meters every cast following the tide, I had no bites at all, I could of used the same two baits all night, except I did try a whole sand eel on its own, and strips of mackerel on its own before going back to using them together. The tide had turned and with the occasional rouge waves that I had managed to avoid up until now, all I could do was watch as the biggest breaker I'd seen all night, it gleamed across the horizon like a wall in the moon light, It came in so quick I didn't even attempt to move, I just stood there with my rod in casting position, I lowered my stance to stable myself as the water hit, it slowly and calmly rose over my boots, and stopped just short of my groin, before retreating 20 meters in front of me.I have to admit it was going to happen at one point or another, I done well to stay clear of the water for as long as I did.

Now I was bleeding, in pain, soaking wet from head to toe, and no fish to show for it. I decided it was time to call it a night, at least I'd managed my four hours. I reeled in and as a consolation found a 20" Dogfish attached to the hook. I didn't see the bite, proberly due the fact that this rod had been cast out for over an hour, since low tide and I had been making my way backwards up the beach letting the line off reel to leave the bait out at distance which by this time had enough seaweed caught around the line to feed an army.

Woof woof, a suprise dogggie

I'd like to think I am a good angler, and to be fair I probably am on the waters that I have experience on, but fishing a shallow surf beach in bad weather, facing a stormy Atlantic ocean on a big spring tide, ill prepared, under researched and against the locals advise was a big learning curve for myself. Yes I admit that swerve balls in fishing can pay dividends, and if you got a hook in the water than you've got a chance. But isn't that just what we tell ourselves to help maintain the belief that the big fish could be the next cast. In reality it will almost certainly end in failure more times than even the most hardcore fisherman would be willing to try, but that's only if you measure failure by the amount of fish you catch, which I don't. As I've said before, one fish can make the difference, I'd feel more happier catching one new species from a difficult/unknown venue than lots of fish from from a easy/dead cert venue. I had visions of putting up blogs of successful fishing trips full of big fish, but that would involve maybe two or three blogs per year if I was lucky, and yes, you could specialise in one type of fishing to increase your success rate dramatically, but where would the adventure be??? I'm not afraid of failure, but I'm constantly learning and that is one of the things about fishing that is so appealing whether you realise it or not, throw in a bit luck, some beautiful locations and the comradery and competitiveness of fellow anglers,  this is a very unique sport with absolutely no hard and set rules, some which may work one day but not the next. You'll just never ever know! unless you try.