The weather gods have smiled upon us here in Guernsey. The fishing has been a little spasmodic in the last month with a few weeks of amazing fishing and a mix of some slow days. The summer species have arrived with bass showing up on the usual marks. Mackerel now around in numbers allowing us to catch fresh bait. July and August is the time the large bass arrive and their is no better bait than a large fillet of mackerel fished hard on the bottom, or a sandeel fished live when the water is clear!. A busy few weeks with 6 trips in 7 days, really lucky to get such good weather in the two weeks I have had off work, and the fish have played too!
Week One
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| Bayeux Cathedral |
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| Jen sampling the local calvados |
It all kicked of with a trip to the D-Day beaches in Normandy. It had been blowing hard on the Saturday and I'd been out wave sailing (see last post) and did not expect the fast ferry to run on Sunday as the wind was still forecast to be gusting 40 knots with two meter seas. Sunday came and to our surprise the ferry was on time from Guernsey to St Malo. Two hour's later we were on French soil, Sat nav plugged in and ready to hit the road. Rather than go straight to the beaches from St Malo we decided that we really had to detour out a little further south west and stay just outside Mont St Michel for one night at a place called Les Touches, this Bed and Breakfast is ideally placed to explore not only the beautiful beaches of Normandy and Brittany but to visit the wonderful town of Fougeres with its medieval 12th Century castle. The famous Le Mont St Michel is 30 min's drive away with the Normandy Landing Beaches about an hour. We arrived late so didn't have time to explore that evening. Getting up early the next day it was time to get back on the road and head to Fougeres. One of the most charming things about Fougères is that the oldest part of the town has been restored to its Medieval splendor. Many of the buildings now house touristy businesses like traditional creperies, where you sit on the patio and enjoy some cider while taking in a view of the castle! By the time we had a good walk around the castle it was midday and time to head off to our second destination closer to the beaches. Hitting the motor way the Crossfire was in it's element cruising at 130 kmh, the trip North west took no time and we were soon at our second stop La Beauconniere is a charming old dairy farm set amidst the gently rolling hills of rural Lower Normandy. Once you are here, you can quite easily visit all of the usual and well-known tourist haunts of Lower Normandy. The bed and breakfast is convenient for Le Mont St. Michel, the beautiful medieval city of Bayeux with its famous Tapestry, Cathedral, British War Cemetry and shopping, and all of the D-Day Landing Beaches and Second World War sites from Pegasus Bridge to Arromanches, Le Pointe du Hoc and Sainte Mere Eglise. My cousin Vince flew in from Vancouver BC via Paris and meet us the next day to spend the next Four days visiting the sites of the second world war.
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| The guns at Longues sur mer. |
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Mulberry was the code name for the artificial harbours
at Gold beach Arromanche |
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| The American cemetary |
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| Vince and Jen checking out a bunker at Point du Hoc |
Week Two
Enjoying the doldrums...
Back on the rock after seven days in France, it was straight into action and out in Fortius for some bass fishing up at the point. Found plenty of boats Sunday afternoon so we motored towards the Southeast, We wanted to find some of our own water to work, can't handle fishing in a fleet of 50 boats. All by ourselves we find some fish and Bang!!! Swimmer goes off, all hands do their job and I'm in. I see colour and we're ready to net when POP and sandeel comes back without the fish, oh well....Been there done that!.... Set back in and within 20 minutes we're on again but this time fish gets the net. Fish marking well on the sounder for the rest of the morning but no love, until Vince gets his first Guernsey bass on the second to last drift.....
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| fish taco time |
Back out Tuesday and there's waaay less boats, bite goes off just before slack and within an hour and half we've had three fish to the boat, one for a Mexican fish taco dinner that Vince had promised to make when we get back home and two for the freezer. Again quiet the rest of the day.
Well it's been tough keeping up with these weekly reports, but here goes..
The Bass has hit the August doldrums on Fortius a bit on our last trip of the week but we still managed quite a few keeper Bass on every trip thus fa... We headed out to Sark on Thursday and tried our luck on the Goudin bank, but we were plagued with cuttlefish and red gurnard taking the hook before the flats or bass had time for a chew on the eel. The mackeral are making a run onto the banks and it never seems to amaze me that wherever you are you can always catch them. Mackerel are more than baitfish or a summer holiday pastime. Caught on the right tackle they can be real fun to catch as Vince found out. Mackerel get a lot of bad press. ‘Proper’ anglers don’t want the stigma of catching them or being associated with lines of holidaymakers banging out strings of feathers to catch a fish to feed the cat. Having said that, Vince had other plans for his string of mackerel and that was in the form of Sushi for tonights dinner along with the scallops we caught diving earlier that week
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| Nice bass |
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| Yours truly enjoying left over sushi on Fortius |
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sushi night with all island caught fish from the previous days...
It was awesome...... |
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| More mackerel |
WINDSURFING IS BACK..! Nothing makes this messed up world seem beautiful again like a warm, windy, sunny day in the middle of summer and a new board. It was so nice to wear a 3mm shorty again and to have a few extra seconds after peeling off my suit before I have to jump in the truck or risk becoming a frozen windsurfer Popsicle.
The Bass has hit the August doldrums on Fortius a bit on our last trip of the week but we still managed quite a few keeper Bass on every trip thus fa... We headed out to Sark on Thursday and tried our luck on the Goudin bank, but we were plagued with cuttlefish and red gurnard taking the hook before the flats or bass had time for a chew on the eel. The mackeral are making a run onto the banks and it never seems to amaze me that wherever you are you can always catch them. Mackerel are more than baitfish or a summer holiday pastime. Caught on the right tackle they can be real fun to catch as Vince found out. Mackerel get a lot of bad press. ‘Proper’ anglers don’t want the stigma of catching them or being associated with lines of holidaymakers banging out strings of feathers to catch a fish to feed the cat. Having said that, Vince had other plans for his string of mackerel and that was in the form of Sushi for tonights dinner along with the scallops we caught diving earlier that week
