The previous four sessions on the ouse were spent in bright sunshine and high temperatures, not the best conditions for carp fishing as we all know. On a river finding the carp can be hard enough but with temperatures so high and floaters being a difficult tactic (they just float down river to be picked off by the gulls) options were short. In the end you just have to keep plugging away at what you know works best so I chose an area that had depths of just a few feet and fed my bait a little lighter.
A succession of bream and tench (the main species in the river) had me a little frustrated but I kept on gently topping up the swim in the hope that a carp would eventually come along.
Three more sessions came and went in the same fashion and then the weather turned. Rain was expected and plenty of it, temperatures fell to a more comfortable low twenties degrees Celsius and I simply couldn't wait to get out.
On opening the front door at 4:00AM the next morning I was greeted by the most wonderful fresh smell in the air with heavy rain falling. By 5:00AM I was all settled in and hunkered down under my brolly watching my rod tips like a hawk. When the rod went off I wasn't in the least surprised, I was waiting for it.
It's an amazing feeling being out there in the river chest deep, the wind blowing hard up the river and the rain pounding down on you. Yet there's almost silence in your head as you concentrate hard and battle to overcome the heart stopping runs from an unseen beast. There's nothing like it and it's worth every single journey and every single blank.