RYHOPE REVISITED
If you’ve got a head for heights, the cod are virtually under your rod tip at this popular venue in the North East…
Where the cod are under your rod tips.
When I was a lad and living at home with my folks, my bedroom window faced directly towards the coast. When the wind battered against the glass, it always woke me up in the middle of the night, and I would huddle under the covers, instinctively knowing there was a real chance that a decent cod sea would be starting to run.
After a few days, the northerly gale would eventually subside and I’d run into the garden at the rear of the house. Amid the subdued calmness, I could clearly hear the distant roar of the waves rolling on to the beach. Excitement would immediately take over, and after a quick inspection of my dad’s bait fridge and freezer in the garage to see what was available, I simply couldn’t resist the urge to go chasing cod.
My cod fishing apprenticeship started some 40 years ago, and back then my dad was desperately keen for me to get the fishing bug. He would regularly take me to Ryhope beach, often in the early hours, to catch a 3am high tide. As a 10-year-old you really do need to have a special kind of dedication to cod fishing to drag yourself away from a cosy, warm bed and head out into the freezing cold in the dead of night.
Back then, for whatever reason, Ryhope beach was hardly ever fished by anyone. County Durham anglers had marks like Horden, Easington Flight, The Blast and the Chemical Beach to choose from. Sunderland lads, however, had unlimited access to the docks in those days too, where infamous marks such as The Lane, Back of the Tanks, The Mixer and Low Drum would always produce fantastic bags of cod.
My dad and I, though, relished the lack of anglers at Ryhope. If conditions dictated a decent swell, where two or three rollers were lazily crunching on to the shingle, we both knew the cod would never be too far away.