I received an email from a gentleman from South Africa, (Konrad), who was coming to Wales for Christmas and wanted a day out fishing. He asked if I could take him out for a day. After all the bad weather we’d had, I wondered if I’d be able to. We agreed the 28th of December was going to be the day, fingers crossed!
The 28th came and what a lovely winters day it looked, blue sky, no wind and quite mild, about 8-9 deg. C, lovely. Konrad remarked how cold it was! (Konrad’s from South Africa !) It’s their hottest time of year at 25 - 34-deg. C, so no wonder he thought it was chilly. We met up and went off to the river, the Severn looked lovely, quite low after all the rain and running clear. We had a walk up the beat to the upper limits, looking at various dippers and other wildlife that was on the river, it was very interesting to hear the different sort of things you would see in South Africa, compared to here in Wales.
Konrad had never caught or seen a grayling and that was what he wanted to catch. We sorted the gear out and put on a trio of weighted bugs. As he hadn’t ever fished Czech nymph style before,or with three flies, I started him off with a short line nymph setup, gave him a quick demo of what he was required to do and away we went.
Fishing in the first run, was a deep pool which tailed off after about 50 metres, so he flicked the bugs upstream and let them sweep around in the currents of the swirling pool. Usually, as soon as the flies go over the lip and into the drop off of the main body of the pool, you will get a fish or a pull, but there was nothing. As he worked his way into the shallower water, I thought that he would probably pick up a fish at the tail of the pool, again nothing. I hoped it wasn’t going to be one of those days! Mind you, freestone rivers aren’t like well-stocked rivers like the Test, the fish survive on their cunning.
So we went down to the next nice looking run, very similar to the first only in reverse, starting shallow and getting very deep. As Konrad started down the run, the flies were working nicely After about a handful of casts, just as the flies lifted up of the bottom at the end of the drift, there was a solid pull. In the clear water I could see a nice grayling trying to shake the hook out and it did. It was a shame but Konrad had given him too much slack and he wasn’t too pleased about it either judging by what he said! I told him to just keep the line tight and remember that he was fishing barbless hooks. He did five more drifts before another fish picked up the bug, but with the same result... fish 2 - Konrad 0 ! As we moved another five metres down the run and the flies lifted off the bottom, there was another fish and this one stayed on, Konrad kept the line tight and had a lovely silvery grayling of about 3/4lb in the net. This was exciting for Konrad, the first ever grayling he’d seen or caught and it was very nice for me to have helped him catch it. We quickly unhooked it and slipped it back into the water. Carrying on until the water started to get a little deep another grayling was on and off, in his excitement he had given the fish too much slack. By now Konrad wasn’t just cold but freezing cold, so it was time to get out of the water and have a walk along the bank to warm up. I found it warm, sometimes I’m wading in rivers when it is -8 deg. C, but in South Africa, you don’t wear waders, just shorts, lucky devils !
Time was pressing on and Konrad’s Wife had been sitting in the car for several hours ( a very understanding lady) so Konrad decided he’d fish one more run and call it a day. This run was a more even depth, about two and a half feet deep, but covered by trees. After a couple of mis-timed casts up the trees we were into the main part of the run, then an excellent grayling took the fly. As with all the other fish it took the fly on the lift off the bottom. I watched it turn and head downstream. Konrad lifted into this fish but the fish had other ideas ! I think it was around three pounds and was off like a scalded cat, I have never heard five pound line crack so loudly as it broke. That would have been a fish of a lifetime, but it was not to be.
As Konrad was freezing cold we decided to call it a day. As we strolled back to the car he enthused about the fantastic day he’d had and how he really wished he could have had longer so he could get into the groove better. He concluded that he’d like to come back to Wales to fish with his friends in the future, and they are more than welcome.
