Euan 'soundmixer'
came up for a week to try out some of the lochs around me as a change from the Assynt trip we normally go on in early June.
There's so much water near to me that it seems daft not to get out and try some of the lochs.
I would love to say there was a plan of action - but there wasn't. We winged it.
First day was at a hill loch which we took a rather longer than intended route to. Never mind, the exercise was errr..... invigorating
Here's Euan with his first fish of the trip:
I had some similar success with some really nice brownies to about 1.5lbs.
Second day we headed to Loch Eye, a loch we had both had a hankering to fish for some time. It is, undoubtedly, one of the most interesting lochs I have fished in recent times but - I think - we were maybe too late in the season. That's right, I did say too late. Eye is very low lying and also quite eutrophic, it fishes well early in the year and on until early July (allegedly) so we were a smidgen disappointed to see the water was already really quite murky with algal bloom and pretty much a flat calm. However it is a bonnie place:
and
and the murky waters
Hopefully Euan will post some pics too, we fished hard there and we each managed fish which was more than most did that day. Mine, however, came to a tactic I've been experimenting with on lochs for a couple of seasons. More on that later or in another post
The next loch we fished was Loch Benevean. Often used as a location for Alfa GT photo shoots
it is also well known as possibly one of the midgiest places in all of Christendom, especially in a flat calm. Guess what we had
Yup, that's right..... not a zephyr of a wind. Feck all breeze and every bastarding midgie for miles around homed in us like a cluster of laser guided smart bombs. Still, the pain of getting eaten alive is made up for by the fact that it is achingly beautiful up there, it really is gorgeous. You might think that this first photo of Benevean is murky cloud etc, in fact they are midgies......
It really was pretty hopeless, no wind on lochs makes the fishing hard going. So much so we decided to have a brew in the middle of the loch and Euan deployeda jedi mind trick or 'the force' in an effort to boil a kettle:
I did say it was lovely there, right
I wasn't kidding:
Honour was satisfied by catching some trout on previously mentioned technique I have been experimenting with and we legged it, we bravely ran away. Ok, we turned into a pair of middle aged pussies and retreated rapidly for the comfort of home, a nice shower and some wine.
Our last day was at another loch on one of the many hydro systems local to me and a loch that my Dad and I had hoped to fish some thirty years ago
but back then we didn't as we couldn't get a boat. This time though, Euan and I did get a boat. Firstly though we explored the glen a wee bit, for a change we were not short of wind and this photo from the dam right at the head of the glen doesn't really reflect just how much wind there was:
I singly failed to take many photos of the loch we fished (I know Euan has some) but this was taken at the bottom of the loch (almost):
And this is one of Euan taking a photo of his Alfa, which did very well as a fishing car for the week I have to say:
It was a great week with a mix of some great sport and great frustration, but the craic was always good.
H
