Into the wilds of Scotland

Will Martin navigates the Grimersta lochs in the hope of a salmon before the season’s end

2022-11-30 -

Itrudged through the hallway in my sodden socks, leaving a trail of brackish water as I went. The morning on the foreshore had been disappointingly goose-less. Nevertheless, today was a fishing day, and my luck could not get worse. Skeins had flown to the right and the left during dawn’s sporting adventure.

To many salmon fishers, Grimersta is known as the hallowed location of the most salmon caught in a single day by a single Rod. The entry reads: “28 August 1888, A P Naylor, Loch One, 54 salmon (331lbs), seven sea-trout.” To those of literary inclinations, Gimersta was the haunt of Ted Hughes. To me, Grimersta was where my grandfather taught me not only to fish but to enjoy the art of sitting in a boat with nothing but the company of a friend, a gillie and occasionally an obliging salmon.

And so at breakfast I sat, listening to the humdrum of the party excited for the day ahead, but deep in thought about my late grandfather and the times at Grimersta we shared. One of the Guns, Patrick Galbraith, dragged me back to the present as he regaled a tale — for the fourth time — of a crossing duck he had shot the night before. And we heard — again for the fourth time — how Millie, Jamie Tusting’s spaniel, retrieved said duck. Ending the reverie, the gillies arrived and we scurried to ready our boots, rods and, for those shooting, their guns.

A first salmon

Having drawn the short straw, Will May had the misfortune to be my boat partner for the day. Will, new to fishing, was desperate for his first salmon and had spent every minute available on the trip trying. Through 45mph winds on the first evening and hail at dawn the day before, Will was determined. Friends who fish in the hail and the rain are valuable friends indeed, and I was equally determined that he should get his fish.

Even unluckier still, Matt Cook was our gillie on his last-ever day on the system, having worked here for seven seasons. During my university summer holidays, I too had gillied at Grimersta, and I found I’d become the guest I once despised — a know-it-all. Fortunately, Matt knew more.

The water was perfect — just over 4ft on the Charrason gauge — and the rivers between the famous lochs were fishy. Summer boulders were now boils, and the stream moved with gusto and force. That, combined with Grimersta having had its best season since 1986, meant one was certain that each cast could yield something.

“Keep casting, just a little further,” Matt reminded me as I cast into the October wind, but no fish succumbed to the lure of the Collie Dog. We boarded another boat and headed deeper into the wilds of Grimersta.

Grimersta is a river system made up of four lochs separated by short streams, which then cascade into the mile-long Grimersta River to meet Loch Roag and the sea. Above the fourth loch and nine miles from the nearest road lies Loch Langabhat. This seven-mile-long behemoth is the headwater, and above this lies the

Langadale, a river so remote that it is almost a myth.

Between Loch Four, Loch Airigh na h-airde, and Langabhat lies the Langabhat River and its smaller sister Little Langabhat. The former fishes fantastically at anything above 4ft on the Charrason gauge, and so that was where we were heading.

As we boarded our third boat, we could see the shooting party striding out, following the setter Cuillin, his black frame standing out against the golden, sunlit moor. Then a hailstorm erupted from nowhere, soaking us, and as it cleared an eagle rose on the

“No matter how tempting the feathers and fur, the salmon were not for turning”

thermal. It was truly magical, and the journey was over far too soon. Roineval rose in front of us, and the Harris hills now seemed within touching distance. We pulled the boat up on to a small beach, unloaded rods and went further south into the moor.

We crested the small hillock, Langabhat stretching out as far as one could see to the west, and set about fishing our first pool on this great loch’s outlet. It was on Loch Four that I had hooked my first-ever salmon, fishing with my grandfather. I say hooked; he managed to unhook it with the net as he attempted to net it out the back of the boat, allowing it to turn and fade back into the blackness of the peat-stained water.

Matt was patiently going through the casting motion with Will, and so I put on a Blue Elver and started working down the outlet of

Langabhat. I had given Will a ‘casting’ lesson the day before, but Matt was clearly correcting much of what I had taught. By the time I had finished the pool, salmon continuing to prove elusive, Will was casting extremely proficiently, working the switch rod to significant effect and casting over the left and the right shoulder — a skill definitely required with the growing southerly wind.

We then worked our way down the Langabhat River, me in front with Elver and Stoat’s Tail, and Will following with the Collie to try to rise a stubborn fish. The salmon seemed to know that the end of the season was just hours away, and no matter how tempting the feathers and fur, they were not for turning. That was until we let Matt have a cast, and a mighty swirl erupted right over the top of the Collie. He returned the rod to Will, but the fish was not seen again.

The weather and light were spectacular in the afternoon, so we lunched on the island in the middle of Loch Four. Reports from the lower river indicated a familiar slow morning and news from the hill suggested that the grouse too were winning.

After lunch, we fished our way down Airigh na h-airde and the joys of sitting in a boat with friends soon meant that salmon became of little concern. However, time is an evil thing, and the possibility of having to leave Grimersta without a fish was soon a real concern. Spurred into action by the impending blank,

Will and I began concentrating like herons. From over the hill, we could now hear the shooting party heading home, and with the ring of their voices Will’s hope of a first salmon, my hope of any salmon and Matt’s hope of netting or catching the final salmon of the season were quickly fading.

Fruitful

It was Will’s turn fishing from the back of the boat, just upstream from the Skunk, a spot that had proved fruitful to Matt and Matt only during the season. Matt drifted us, using the wind, so that our flies just reached the shore. Will rose his rod to cast again and all hell broke loose. The fish erupted from the wave, smashing the Collie Dog with the force of a freight train. Will panicked and gripped the rod with both hands, leaving the line to flee through the rings.

I lunged across from my languid sitting position, grasping the escaping line as Matt rowed away with all his might to try to keep a semblance of tension. A ‘holloa’ erupted from the bank as the head gillie Jason Laing, gillie Chris Langhorne and four Guns watched the spectacle unfurl.

I hastily began stripping the line. Will, frozen on to his rod, started winding the reel. The line whipped through my fingers as the fish ran for the outlet. The rod bowed as the reel now took the strain. We had, at least, survived the first battle.

Fighting salmon in a loch is unlike any fight in the fishing world. They just tend to go. They dive and they

run and then, 50 yards away, they leap as if great falls lie before them.

Will started playing the fish as though he had played 100 of them before. Matt, bereft of a net, had rowed us into shore beneath the roaring crowd of the shooting party that had gathered around the jetty.

Glorious chaos

We glided into the jetty and glorious chaos ensued; I barked orders at

Paul Mcginley, the photographer, to jump out of the boat to get a better angle; the crowd yelled: “Keep the rod up”, “Let him go if he wants to go”, “Tighten up”, “Get out of the boat”. The fish, meanwhile, was causing a headache as it tried to tangle into the jetty then bolted for the open loch. Somehow, in the mêlée, the decision was made for Will to leave the boat, a move fraught with danger.

Minutes felt like hours as the fish would not yield. I felt for Matt under the weight of the occasion with Jason,

Chris, four Guns and me watching, but he decided enough was enough and lunged into the deep with his landing net. As first salmon go, this was one for the ages. It was not pretty — it wasn’t drawn into the net, head up, but it didn’t need to be. It was chaotic, it was bonkers, it was everything a first salmon should be.

There is a peace in fishing when a fish lies in the bottom of a net and finally it was. It is as if time stands still, your body still coursing with adrenaline but with sort of tranquillity, too. Everyone stood on the bank shared that peace. It was honestly one of the greatest sporting moments of my entire life — and I was only standing there watching.

“It was one of the greatest sporting moments of my life”