Fished the Lugg at Lyepole on 5 November. We came up the night before when the river was fine but heavy overnight rain left it high and very coloured. We thought about claiming a washoff day but we'd driven 130 miles to get there and going back without fishing wasn't an option!! It was probably a mistake. Very difficult wading due to the press of water and a couple of times I had to come out of the river from areas I'd normally wade without giving it a second thought. I thought we were going to blank but managed a very small grayling right at the death on a heavy nymph.

Plenty of other things happened though:-

1. I heard a shuffling behind me and looked round to find 3 deer watching me. They took off across the field and cleared the 5 foot hedge without breaking stride and disappeared into the forest.

2. I nearly witnessed a head on crash! The beat car park is at the bottom of a steep hill next to a sharp right hand bend over a hump backed bridge. White van man came tearing down the hill not seeing that a car was about to cross the bridge from the other side. Screech of brakes and a 10 yard skid before he managed to stop. This is a very narrow road and I sometimes think that this is one of the biggest dangers we face, certainly more dangerous than deep wading. I once had to reverse very quickly along this road to give a big lorry room to stop before he hit me.

3. There is a cottage near the beat car park. Heading back to the river after lunch we met the owner who had just arrived to open the cottage for the weekend. She went in then came out and said "Can you help me get rid of 2 owls that are in my living room please". The brain says have nothing to do with this, an encounter with 2 owls in a confined space doesn't see to be a really good idea. Of course the mouth is on automatic pilot and by the time the brain has finished its warning, the mouth has said "Yes, of course". These were big birds! She gave me a pair of gardening gloves "because they'll try and peck when you pick them up" !!!!!! I said that there was no chance of me picking them up! We opened up the french windows and with a bit of arm waving and gentle nudging with my wading staff we managed to get them to fly out.

......so quite a day! A couple of pictures of the valley during the sunny morning, and one of the river during the very wet afternoon.

Regards

Peter

__________________
Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans
John Lennon

http://walksandfishes.blogspot.com/

LOL - nice report Peter

It was an eventful day Marco!!

__________________
Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans
John Lennon

http://walksandfishes.blogspot.com/

Looks like nice roe deer country but they could also have been fallow.

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“There is no more lovely country than Monmouthshire in early spring. Nowhere do the larks sing quite so passionately, as if somehow inspired by the Welsh themselves. There is a blackbird on every thorn and a cock chaffinch, a twink as they call him there, on every bush...... It moved me profoundly. I had been spared to see another spring, and I thank God for it.”

Oliver Kite
“A Spring Day on the Usk”
A Fisherman’s Diary

Thanks for a nice piece - particularly appropriate given your tag line I thought

"Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans"

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it. A postscript: I sent in the catch return, "1 grayling, river very high and coloured, win some lose some". The WUF responded very quickly telling me that in view of the conditions they were quite happy for me to claim a wash-off day, a great gesture I thought and well done to them. (I might not manage to fit it in before the end of the season but that's beside the point!)

Best wishes

Peter

__________________
Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans
John Lennon

http://walksandfishes.blogspot.com/