Stormtrooper
Well-known member
- Joined
- Nov 7, 2020
- Messages
- 287
- Reaction score
- 2,635
- Points
- 93
- Location
- Herne Bay
- Favourite Fishing
- Shore
Hi all!
As is often the case with my adventures, I had no designs on venturing out last night whatsoever (20/10/21). However, after the wife and I ate our dinner and watched the final episode of ‘Luther’, she announced she was tired and was turning in for an early night.
The gears started turning straight away and despite heavy rain forecast, before long I was headed down to the beach just to fish the flood locally and maybe a smidge over.
I got to my mark for about 10pm with HW set for 1:30am. It was raining but not excessively and as I set up there was a light SE breeze.
First things first, I got my bivvy set up and out went rod no.1 bait with bluey and sent to the horizon in search of a ray. Rod no.2 shortly followed with a bluey head dropped in close for a bass. Within 5 minutes of settling in however, the wind picked up a little and switched round to almost straight west. My shelter caught the blow and virtually took off just as the rain decided to up its game a little too!!
A quick switch round and despite all my gear taking a bit of a soaking, no harm was done and I was comfortable again. A short while later, the wind died down and the rain dramatically eased so I took the opportunity to send out a third rod baited with whole squid close into the adjacent groin. The rain stopped, the wind dropped to nothing and it was really pleasant!
I fished on for a couple of hours with absolutely nothing happening. Just the tide run and a little weed was keeping me busy enough with the long range rod.
About half an hour before HW, so roughly 1am, my squid rod folded and thumped up and down violently! I leapt up and grabbed the 11ft bass rod, and an enjoyable tussle ensued on the lighter gear. Before long a nice silver bar slid up the shingle and went 46cm, 2lbs 3oz.
Things have been pretty awful locally lately so I was absolutely made up. I’ve already got a bass in the freezer so a quick snap and she was slid back into the now flat calm sea, she shot off like a lightning bolt!
I re-baited and recast, hoping to find her mum.
This is where everything went a bit awry though….
I was suddenly aware the rain had started again, although only drizzle at this point. I wasn’t too fussed as I was expecting the whole night to be blighted with wet and was pleased enough to have had a couple of hours in relaxing conditions.
What I wasn’t expecting though was what followed. In literally under a minute, it went from calm and clear to hard driving rain coupled with at least (and I’m not exaggerating!) 50-60mph NW winds!
My tripod threatened to go over but I managed to catch it in time and re-angle it but it still didn’t feel as stable as one would hope for. Meanwhile, my tent was almost buckling under the force of the wind and all I could do was cower under it, holding it down whilst my foot stood on the base of the tripod keeping that from going.
My rods flapped wildly in the now horrific surf and weed flew up the lines to the tips, I’ve never in my life known such a rapid and drastic change in conditions!!
Hoping it was just a squall, I sat fast, holding everything down that I could and watching my lines get battered but powerless to do anything about it.
I sat like this for nearly half an hour and it was apparent things were only getting worse, not better. By this time it was HW and the crashing waves had destroyed the shingle bank in front of me caused by the previous high and I was now faced with water and foam flooding into my tent and around the tripod. I suddenly felt very threatened by the conditions and knew I had to get out of there… but how?!?
I waited for a slight lull between gusts and dived for the bass rod, this was suffering the most. Not wanting to leave the tent in anyway unattended, i reeled in from a seated position and managed to get the gear in. I didn’t bother stripping the bait off at anything, I just chucked it in the seat box, took the reel off and split the rod down.
Whist up, I managed to push the tripod into the ground further and took the risk it was enough not to be taken over by the ever-increasing wind.
I then put everything away as much as I could and just about managed to collapse the shelter without it disappearing down the beach. It was a poor job of folding it down and it’s still full of shingle but it was one thing less to worry about.
I quickly moved all my gear out of the foam and crashing waves before returning to the tripod, slackening both drags and rapidly moving back from the vicious surf.
Still barely able to stand, I somehow successfully retrieved both rigs, chucked them in the bucket and wound the lines back into their reels.
I didn’t remove the reels or collapse the rods, I merely folded the tripod up and gathered all my belongings into my arms.
Although not far to the car, it was a difficult journey with all my gear in such disarray. Once back I threw it all in as neatly as possible and jumped in soaked to the bone and thoroughly exhausted.
As I said, I have never known things to get that bad that quickly, it was as though someone hit a switch labelled ‘Armageddon’!!
I’ve quite the task to sort my stuff out after that but I’m glad nothing was lost and nothing broken. I won’t lie, for a few moments there I was pretty bloody scared. I might need to buy new pants!!
As is often the case with my adventures, I had no designs on venturing out last night whatsoever (20/10/21). However, after the wife and I ate our dinner and watched the final episode of ‘Luther’, she announced she was tired and was turning in for an early night.
The gears started turning straight away and despite heavy rain forecast, before long I was headed down to the beach just to fish the flood locally and maybe a smidge over.
I got to my mark for about 10pm with HW set for 1:30am. It was raining but not excessively and as I set up there was a light SE breeze.
First things first, I got my bivvy set up and out went rod no.1 bait with bluey and sent to the horizon in search of a ray. Rod no.2 shortly followed with a bluey head dropped in close for a bass. Within 5 minutes of settling in however, the wind picked up a little and switched round to almost straight west. My shelter caught the blow and virtually took off just as the rain decided to up its game a little too!!
A quick switch round and despite all my gear taking a bit of a soaking, no harm was done and I was comfortable again. A short while later, the wind died down and the rain dramatically eased so I took the opportunity to send out a third rod baited with whole squid close into the adjacent groin. The rain stopped, the wind dropped to nothing and it was really pleasant!
I fished on for a couple of hours with absolutely nothing happening. Just the tide run and a little weed was keeping me busy enough with the long range rod.
About half an hour before HW, so roughly 1am, my squid rod folded and thumped up and down violently! I leapt up and grabbed the 11ft bass rod, and an enjoyable tussle ensued on the lighter gear. Before long a nice silver bar slid up the shingle and went 46cm, 2lbs 3oz.
Things have been pretty awful locally lately so I was absolutely made up. I’ve already got a bass in the freezer so a quick snap and she was slid back into the now flat calm sea, she shot off like a lightning bolt!
I re-baited and recast, hoping to find her mum.
This is where everything went a bit awry though….
I was suddenly aware the rain had started again, although only drizzle at this point. I wasn’t too fussed as I was expecting the whole night to be blighted with wet and was pleased enough to have had a couple of hours in relaxing conditions.
What I wasn’t expecting though was what followed. In literally under a minute, it went from calm and clear to hard driving rain coupled with at least (and I’m not exaggerating!) 50-60mph NW winds!
My tripod threatened to go over but I managed to catch it in time and re-angle it but it still didn’t feel as stable as one would hope for. Meanwhile, my tent was almost buckling under the force of the wind and all I could do was cower under it, holding it down whilst my foot stood on the base of the tripod keeping that from going.
My rods flapped wildly in the now horrific surf and weed flew up the lines to the tips, I’ve never in my life known such a rapid and drastic change in conditions!!
Hoping it was just a squall, I sat fast, holding everything down that I could and watching my lines get battered but powerless to do anything about it.
I sat like this for nearly half an hour and it was apparent things were only getting worse, not better. By this time it was HW and the crashing waves had destroyed the shingle bank in front of me caused by the previous high and I was now faced with water and foam flooding into my tent and around the tripod. I suddenly felt very threatened by the conditions and knew I had to get out of there… but how?!?
I waited for a slight lull between gusts and dived for the bass rod, this was suffering the most. Not wanting to leave the tent in anyway unattended, i reeled in from a seated position and managed to get the gear in. I didn’t bother stripping the bait off at anything, I just chucked it in the seat box, took the reel off and split the rod down.
Whist up, I managed to push the tripod into the ground further and took the risk it was enough not to be taken over by the ever-increasing wind.
I then put everything away as much as I could and just about managed to collapse the shelter without it disappearing down the beach. It was a poor job of folding it down and it’s still full of shingle but it was one thing less to worry about.
I quickly moved all my gear out of the foam and crashing waves before returning to the tripod, slackening both drags and rapidly moving back from the vicious surf.
Still barely able to stand, I somehow successfully retrieved both rigs, chucked them in the bucket and wound the lines back into their reels.
I didn’t remove the reels or collapse the rods, I merely folded the tripod up and gathered all my belongings into my arms.
Although not far to the car, it was a difficult journey with all my gear in such disarray. Once back I threw it all in as neatly as possible and jumped in soaked to the bone and thoroughly exhausted.
As I said, I have never known things to get that bad that quickly, it was as though someone hit a switch labelled ‘Armageddon’!!
I’ve quite the task to sort my stuff out after that but I’m glad nothing was lost and nothing broken. I won’t lie, for a few moments there I was pretty bloody scared. I might need to buy new pants!!
