Des Taylor’s Diary of a Countryman
From The Big One show to a spring carp lake – I’m one lucky old angler
AFTER last weekend’s The Big One show I felt I needed a few days in bed. I was shattered!
Then I started to think of my good mates doing hard manual jobs. They’d say ‘Man up Des!’ and rightly so – I am the luckiest man in the world, doing what I do for a living.
Here’s how my week went…
FRIDAY
Ray Cutler, his daughter Sophie and I loaded up the car and headed down to Farnborough for The Big One. I’d be looking after one of the theatres there, giving a couple of talks and in between times manning my Tackle Den stand, so to say I was going to be busy would be an understatement!
First job on arrival was to set up the stand and have a chat with the rest of the trade down there. I steered well clear of the doomand-gloom brigade and talked only to the positive folk. Life is too serious, with terrible things happening around the world for me to listen to negative thoughts.
I was on a real high by the time I took the top off my first pint of cider later that evening, and with a long hard day ahead, all three of us retired early to bed.
SATURDAY
Up early, and with a full English in our bellies we were ready for the day – and what a great day it was! On a personal note, it was lovely to get so many compliments. I am truly humbled that so many anglers are inspired by my life on the bank and off it.
It was again nice to hear lovely comments about my little mentions of the countryside in my Angling Times column.
There’s more to fishing than just catching fish, and as I get older the countryside means as much to me as the fishing. The big thing that has changed for me is the quality of young match anglers such as Callum Dicks and Lee Kerry, who are so professional in their attitude towards the sport and can hold a crowd with their professional manner on stage.
The carp world has always boasted good talkers with good stage shows – now the match world has the same, which is good for the sport. But the star of the show for me is Tom Pickering. After all these years his enthusiasm for fishing is still 110 per cent and his skills in holding a crowd are up there with the best.
My talks went well, with a mixture of tuition and laughs. I enjoyed presenting them, which is important for me, and as I looked out at the anglers listening I could feel they were enjoying it. That’s as good as it gets! Back to the hotel on the evening, I have to say Ray and I were very well behaved and in bed by 10.15pm. Some of the younger chaps were going to night clubs but I have those T-shirts from a few years ago – the bags under my eyes will prove that.
SUNDAY
Much the same as Saturday, but with more families walking around, which is usual on the Sunday of any show. My audience tends to be the over-50s and male, and lots of anglers were talking about coming on the river this year, which is great news.
Different anglers seem to put me in different boxes. Some think I am a river angler, some a pike man, some a specimen hunter and some still class me as a carp man from my old days making some of the first carp fishing films. I’m not bothered which box I’m put in as long as I am out fishing and enjoying life. By 4.30pm Ray, Sophie and I were totally shot, and I am glad it was Ray that was to make the long drive home.
It was 8.30pm when I sat down a Sunday roast and a glass of wine with my wife. Margaret told me what had been going on back in the real world and I told her a few of the things that had been going on in mine. I wanted to stay up to watch the US Masters golf but by 9.30pm I was snoring in the armchair and Margaret suggested I go to bed... which I did.
TUESDAY
With the weather so warm I had to get out for a few hours on the bank after carp. I thought they may be coming up on the top but although I saw a couple they were not yet ready to start really having it.
I still managed a couple off the bottom on my Key Cray boilies. The first fish gave me the quickest pick-up I have ever had on a boilie,
in fact I was still putting on a bobbin when it hooked itself.
I have had this lots of times on a zig or maggots but usually not on a boilie. I ended up with three carp to high doubles that fought like tigers. A couple of swallows flew over the lake. They didn’t hang around as they were on their way further north by the look of it.
A kestrel hovered a few times near to where I was fishing and the farmer in the field at the back of me was finishing off the last of the spring lambing. It’s a great time to be out there at the moment.