Good Evening.

The weather has turned considerably colder over the last 48 hours and I am writing tonight’s post in the confines of my warm bivvy. It is still light outside but in 30 minutes darkness will fall and the night-time wait begins once again. I am always hopeful of a daytime take but I have a feeling the action will only come during the hours of darkness; only time will tell I guess.

A nice crisp start to the morning.

Too cold to handle.

Fancy a lie down?

It looks like I am using string as line!

Don't get lost in the fog!

Isn't nature a wonderful thing...

Today has been a very busy day and I have not stopped. It was a crisp minus 4 start to the morning as I made my wake up coffee, so I took the opportunity to take some icy pictures. At midday I had to go and pick up my recharged batteries from the shoreline and I am now sorted for the rest of my session. I also had a visit from the Guardia today in the afternoon. I showed him my license; he gave me a look that said I was crazy for fishing in this weather, admired my fire, and duly departed.

Two receivers come in very handy as one can be placed outside and it also comes with me in the boat.

On the way to pick up my batteries I rowed over one of my spots. I noticed all my bait had been snaffled and I could see my pop up sitting upright all on its own. Whether the bait had been eaten by carp or small fish will remain a mystery, but I have a feeling it may have been both. I have re-laid my trap and scattered a few more boilies around the area and I made a change to the hook bait. I have now put a 26mm bottom bait on and tipped it with a 15mm yellow pineapple plus pop up just in case the carp now don’t like bright pink baits! I also rowed over my other areas and soon spotted my hook baits beneath the surface. I also rebaited these areas but left the hook baits and rigs as they were.

No time for sitting around...there is washing to be done!

My sock stocks have got quite low, so today was washing day! I boiled them in my large saucepan with some detergent for half an hour and then rinsed and finished them off with cold lake water. The trouble at this time of year is it takes a few days to dry wet clothes and even though the sun was shining for a few hours, they will take a while to dry properly. I may concoct some drying system over my fire later but will then have to wear smoky socks for the next few weeks!

There is Robin Red in the red fish boilies after all!

Carp Italy 2010 is looming. On the 6^th and 7^th of February I am off to represent Dynamite Baits and Trakker at the show in Gonzaga. It is Italy’s big show of the year and I am looking forward to attending my first show for my sponsors. The language barrier is obviously a slight problem but the show’s organisers normally provide a few translators to help out. I have made a few Italian friendships and I look forward to seeing you all there. My dogs unfortunately won’t be attending and they will be staying at kennel accommodation that weekend. They are slightly disappointed as they were looking forward to signing a few paw prints for their fans!

They do need their beauty sleep...it is a high pressured job!

The show means my session is already drawing to a close…well not really as I still have about seventeen days left, but that time will soon fly. I will carry on working very hard to try and catch my target fish in that time and I really do hope it happens.

That is all for tonight.

Cheers

Jake and the dogs.

Tags: boilies, carp, Dynamite Baits, jake langley-hobbs, The Italian Job!, trakker

This entry was posted on January 18, 2010 at 6:58 pm and is filed under The Italian Job!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.