Albert Pier 4th Aug 2006

Map Ref: 647,477
Tide: LW 7.54am (4.3m) / HW 2.00pm (7.8m):
Weather Forecast: Sunny 20^oC. Wind NW 9mph with gusts to 17mph

Another 4.30am start... but the last few days were taking their toll and so by the time I'd got my act together it was gone 6am before I collected Chris, who seemed to be in the same dishevelled state that I was....

We decided to look around the harbour areas of St Helier to see where else we could fish other than the Albert Pier, and to look into some of the suggested spots given to us by local anglers over the past couple of days... we found a couple of interesting and very mulletey areas, but this being a neap tide were not really viable as insufficient water had left to fish low water, or looked difficult with too little water at what would be high water... but all useful intelligence none the less, and places to try later in the month. Having done our initial recon before LW, we decided to have a lazy 3rd day / morning on the Albert Steps and then do some more recon in the early afternoon going towards HW so we could gauge if our judgement had been right about the various marks..

Got to the Albert Pier around 7.20am or so, and tackled-up on the steps...
We had bites almost from the off, even if we were missing them it still was nice to make-up for the lack of activity of the second half of the previous days outing…

7.45am ... My float shot under and I managed to connect with the fish.. it drove downwards, but very quickly revealed its true identity by the zigzagging path that it was pursuing.. a mackerel.. it dived this way and that, with some very powerful runs that I simply couldn't control and had to give it line, great fun, but it soon tired and up it came, and small enough to lift it out the water.. Measured 12", took a picture, and dispatched it ready for later in the week..

Chris not long after had a bite, struck with too much enthusiasm and landed up with a horrible tangled mess around the top of his rod...

Whilst he was trying to sort this out, I started to get a series of very positive bites, that I just kept failing to connect with... I made some joke about Chris having a pair of tame gobies that he'd been training up to torment me... We often see small gobies and blennies on the submerged steps scoffing down the bits of bread that come drifting their way...

8.05am - whoosh, under went my float.. struck and hit home... I gave a shout to Chris (who was still trying to sort out his birds nest!!!) that I was in - boy was I in - this fish just wanted to dive, and dive, and dive again... It seemed an age before I could get it to a depth where we could see it - looked like a nice fish of around 2lb give or take - it then turned to face us, and we both could clearly see it shaking its head from side to side trying to throw the hook, and the vibration I could feel as it did so, started to turn my blood cold, as the fear that it would do so rose, but very quickly it was off again.. and with real power and vigour for such a small fish - I battled with it for a few more minutes until at last it broke surface, which triggered another deep surging run, that stripped line form the centre-pin as it clicked furiously against my thumbnail as I tried to gently brake and control it bid for freedom... at last I managed to bring it up, and guide it to Chris and the waiting landing net.... what a scrapper, it really didn't want to give up, even when we'd landed it and had it on the landing steps... and it was then also that we realized it was a golden grey mullet...

Anyway, managed to measure it - 16.1/2 inches from nose to fork, took a couple of pix, weighed it - 2lb.02oz (a nice fish considering the record for the island is around 2lb.08oz I think..).

I'd realised what had happened the previous day with Chris and the Camera - it has a double action trigger, with the first click being a freeze focus feature which Chris had mistaken for the second harder depression of the button to take the picture, having clarified this he took a picture...

So now you know and can see for yourselves that, I'm older, fatter, and not necessarily any wiser!!!!

Took the fish back to the waters edge, and held it until it had recovered sufficiently to swim lazily off back into the depths, and leave me a happy man, having just equalled my PB for this species I think I'm right in saying...

We had only a couple of bites after this, and by 9am things had gone very dead!!!

10.30am - Chris gave out a shout, and then a deep pitiful groan - a fish had taken the bait, powered off, and at the same time he'd struck.. The result was that his hook length parted!!!!
Actually the truth was much worse for poor old Chris... He'd gotten a bit too pre-occupied by his desire to be fishing, or having missed out due to the tangled mess earlier or just a moment of being too lazy, but what ever the reason, he'd failed to change the hook length, despite seeing a couple of small knots in its length (caused I think by the flicking action of his casts), and having 80 odd pre-made hook lengths at his disposal in his tackle bag!!!! A hard lesson learnt, but one I don't think he'll do again in a hurry...

10.55am and Chris managed to pull up a tompot blenny ... and got the award of mini-species specialist for the day!!! He'd put it back before I got the chance to take a pic....

A couple more missed bites between us, and then it just died again... The tide rose and the Friday Yacht exodus began and made the water rather choppy, just to add to our woes?.

By 12 noon we'd had enough, decided on getting lunch at the Café and then walk around the marinas and harbour to look at the mullet and fishing spots, we could or couldn't possibly fish...

Landed up in the harbour throwing my remaining bread roll to the mullet there --- they seemed to really like the combination of bread, turkey slices, and Branston Pickle - I wonder if I should use the normal or the small chunk pickle as hook bait the next time we have a go for them!!! LOL

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