The thrills and spills of recon

Time spent in reconnaissance is seldom wasted — or at least that is the hope for Richard Negus and son Charlie as they take a high-speed approach to a sea bass search

But it’s essential that I teach him the importance of good reconnaissance,” I pleaded to my wife. My son, Charlie, stood next to me, eyes wide, hands cupped before him in the position of supplication. I sensed a maternal softening. “Well, you can go, but you won’t catch me on that thing. I’d be sick.” With this less than fulsome agreement given, the boy and I booked a trip on the Coastal Voyager.

His mates Georgina, Charlotte and Eleanor had cried off to go crabbing, which left only the boy and I as sole participants in an excursion we had dubbed Operation Sea Bass. The River Blyth rises at Laxfield, meanders along for 30km through wildest Suffolk, then widens into a wildfowlrich tidal estuary at Blythburgh.

The river then enters the North Sea at Southwold, passing through the Blackshore, as the harbour area of the picturesque town is known.

Out to sea, Sole Bay provides a bounty for the inshore fishermen who still ply their trade here. Sole, skate and flounder are commonly caught. But it is the elusive shoals of sea bass that can truly pay the bills.

As an aside, there are a number of anglers on social media platforms who gnash their teeth at prefixing bass with the word ‘sea’. I am of the mind that if professional Southwold fishermen call them sea bass, then sea bass it is.

Local knowledge

For those of us who venture out with rod and line to try for these bars of silver, reconnaissance and some local knowledge is the key to success.

Charlie has been wetting his line in the Blyth since he could first cast a rod. Never once has he caught a sea

bass — nor, for that matter, have I in half a decade. Therefore, I hoped that the local intelligence provided by a trip up the Blyth in the company of Marcus Gladwell, a crew member of the Southwold RNLI vessel, the Alfred Corry, and skipper of the Coastal Voyager, could give us the edge and help to address our blanking.

As we boarded the Voyager, I looked at Charlie; under his suntan, he had gone pale. The craft was admittedly a mean-looking thing — a bright-orange 9m rigid inflatable with a deep ‘V’ hull. There were 12 seats, each looking like those found on cars with tinted windows and exhaust pipes with the bore of a cannon. Behind the con, two V6 four-stroke engines quietly rumbled. Charlie turned to the skipper and asked: “How big are they?” Marcus replied: “They are 3,614cc — DOHC 24-valve powerhead with digital sequential fuel injection.” The boy and I nodded, pretending we knew what this meant.

Quizzical expression

Another youthful passenger asked the question we all wanted to know: “How fast can this go?” Maddie, the co-crew, answered while she checked we were all strapped in correctly: “We can hit around 35 knots out at sea.” I responded to Charlie’s quizzical expression by tapping a few buttons on my phone, then whispered in the boy’s ear: “That’s about 40mph.” He went paler still.

Maddie cast off and the 12 passengers aboard the craft began to look left and right as we made our way at a crawling pace along the millpondlike waters of the Blyth. Marcus gave us a running commentary of the history of the harbour, and some of the crews and boats that bobbed at anchor there. As we headed up river, we passed a squat, red trawler called Crofter on the starboard side. “That’s my dad’s cousin’s boat,” Charlie told anyone who was listening. A few necks craned round to stare at the net-strewn boat, the deck filled with fish boxes.

Squadrons of sand martins zipped over the water and a solitary heron lazily took to the air from the mudflats caused by the wherries that once turned there when this river was a hive of sail-powered trading craft. Voyager made a mid-channel turn as we arrived at Bailey Bridge, which provides a footpath connection between Southwold and the celebritybeloved village of Walberswick.

Just past the iron-lattice span, the river makes a gentle bend to the left and widens. Free of moored craft, saltings lay on the water’s edge, behind that reed beds and grazing marshes, with the skeletons of old wind pumps jutting like broken teeth. Here, on the Walberswick side of the water, a half-moon of salting squats. “This is bass country,” I told Charlie and we stared into the river as it swirled and eddied around the bridge piers.

Sure enough, under a wave crest, a flash of silver could be seen, then another. The tide tables told us we had to wait until 8.37pm for the tide to be full once more. I patted the boy on the back. “Perfect isn’t it?” My companion remained silent. The Voyager was heading seaward once more and he had the North Sea on his mind rather than sea bass. Back past the moored yachts and boatyards we chugged at four knots. I prattled away to Charlie about lures and angling plans. He remained tight-lipped.

We reached the harbour mouth, at which point a pair of speakers fixed in the bow before our front-row seats crackled into life. In a rush, the opening drumbeat of The Dandy Warhols’ Bohemian Like You began to blare, a roar of engine note came from the stern, and the boy and

I felt our stomachs punched into the back of the Recaro seats as Voyager accelerated like a marlin.

I began to laugh maniacally as we shot out into the churning maelstrom between the harbour walls. A wave broke over the rearing bow, soaking us to the skin. The boy held his mouth open in a silent scream as we crashed over a breaker and fell with a spinejarring thump into a trough.

The juxtaposition from the gentility of our initial river-borne trundle to this violent mosh pit of broiling sea was stark. For half an hour, we tore around Sole Bay, racing like a charger over the crashing North Sea. I rediscovered my point-to-point jockey’s love of speed — and Charlie his breakfast.

Silver flashes

The sun had long gone from the Blackshore. Lights twinkled like fireflies on the harbour gantry and a milky half-light caught the orange crests and swirls of the incoming tide. Charlie and I crossed over Bailey Bridge and slunk down to the saltings where the lapping waters slurped and sucked at the muddy bank.

“I rediscovered my point-to-point jockey’s love of speed — and Charlie his breakfast”

Our rods already set up, we tied jelly sand eels on to 10lb breakingstrain leaders that were, in turn, looped on to braid. We cast out into the Blyth, trying to land our lures into the breaking water where we had seen the silver flashes that morning.

Cast after cast we made, varying our retrieves, each whizz, splash, clank and click made in eternal hope. If the angling gods had been kind, this tale would end with us catching three or four plump bass. Sadly, they were heartless beasts as usual and we left the saltings as blank as maggots. On the positive side of things, we made it to the Harbour Inn for last orders.

Next month: Charlie and the gang join Richard in preparing the release pen and washing feeders.

The Coastal Voyager leaves behind the tranquil waters of the River Blyth and bursts into Sole Bay

Charlie casts out into the Blyth, trying to land his lure where the sea bass were that morning