jarrowviking
Well-known member
If you've ever shared a car with pals Mick, Dave and Col from Sunderland, you'll know for certain there's never a dull moment to be had, they're absolutely bonkers!. A nutty five hour car ride it most certainly was for me on the way up to Loch Etive in the Highlands of bonny Scotland. Kasabian's Vlad the Impalor at full blast and the two daft lads in the back ripping the proverbial out of each other, the peace and tranquility of the mountains and glens was well and truly shattered once again. YouTube - Kasabian - Vlad the Impaler
A trip to Etive has become an annual event now for the four of us, there's just something mysterious and magnificent about the place and the sea fishing ain't too bad either! On each trip we unlock a few more of Etive's secrets and we always have a great time and a few laughs regardless of how good or bad the fishing is.
On a bad day Etive can chew you up, spit you out and leave you running with your tail between your legs, on this occassion I'm glad to say the loch was good to us. We had great weather for the time of year which Col had again booked for us, decent fishing and the odd nice fishy surprise to.
The Connel bridge at the head of the loch was to be our base for the weekend, staying at a nice set of digs that overlooked the Isle of Mull.
Connel bridge
We took a drive along the north shore of the loch to check out one or two marks during daylight and decided to have a couple of casts at an old slipway near Bonawe that looked quite fishy but unfortunately just as we suspected may happen, nothing was caught during daylight, a fantastic location that on another day may produce.
The slipway
The school mark
We moved as darkness approached to a mark that's near the school at Bonawe, we've had results from this spot in the past and again it wasn't to let us down.
Thornies and codling appeared for us at this mark which has about 60 ft of water within casting range.
Mick and a typical thorny around the 3lb mark.
Dave in on the action to.
Fishing during darkness seems to be the key to success on Etive and the loch is surprisingly quite a good place to catch codling to, with a number of fish around 2lb for us.
So the first night was fairly succesful with us all managing to catch something and we hoped the fishing from then on was to be onwards and upwards.
The Quarry at Bonawe
The next day as late afternoon approached we took a good 20 minute yomp through the quarry and along the forest road to a deep mark that has over 200ft of water easily within casting range, here we hoped to pick up our first spurdogs of the trip. It's a bizarre and spooky place to fish with noises in the forest and I half expected a half ton haggis with William Wallace's sword in tow to come charging out of the gloom.
Col and Dave were first in with the humble lesser spotted doggy making an appearance, quite a few were caught.
Col pulled out a new species of bong eyed codling
And another hungry doggy!!!!!
Then what we were after a few spurdogs began to show, not in massive numbers or size but welcome all the same.
Goldenballs (Dave) with the first, Col was not amused, but we were.
One for me and Mick
Then Col pulled in a surprise Ling, think he was surprised to!!!
The biggest fish of the night came to me Mr Jammy Dodgers, in the shape of a 5lb 10 ounce, cod, an arm acher through 250 ft of water. This was to be the biggest fish of our trip and the £5 a man on the heaviest fish was to be mine, all mine. Ho!, Ho!, Ho!.
It takes well over a minute for a bait to hit bottom here.
Next day we decided to have a look at some open sea marks on the Isle of Seil and one I'd been to before when many moons younger. To be honest I thought it was a piece of cake then but now at the age of 43 a yomp up and over jagged rocks wasn't what the doctor ordered.
We set up and were more or less straight into spurdogs and Col finally managed a size one for our species race competition, doggys came out to and I think this spot has great potential for all sorts of species during the summer, maybe we'll try again then.
Col earned his spurs this time!
More stuff
The spurs in the open sea are different to the ones in the loch, the loch ones are jet black and the open sea fish a light grey, some people think they could be slightly different species.
So a couple of hours here and it was time for the off, homeward bound for more of Kasabian's finest and five hours of Mick and Col's jibber jabber.
We had spurdog, lesser spotted dogfish, cod, ling, pouting, thornback and whiting with around fifty fish between us during the weekend. I really enjoyed the trip lads, many thanks again. Tightlines, Dave.
A trip to Etive has become an annual event now for the four of us, there's just something mysterious and magnificent about the place and the sea fishing ain't too bad either! On each trip we unlock a few more of Etive's secrets and we always have a great time and a few laughs regardless of how good or bad the fishing is.
On a bad day Etive can chew you up, spit you out and leave you running with your tail between your legs, on this occassion I'm glad to say the loch was good to us. We had great weather for the time of year which Col had again booked for us, decent fishing and the odd nice fishy surprise to.
The Connel bridge at the head of the loch was to be our base for the weekend, staying at a nice set of digs that overlooked the Isle of Mull.
Connel bridge
We took a drive along the north shore of the loch to check out one or two marks during daylight and decided to have a couple of casts at an old slipway near Bonawe that looked quite fishy but unfortunately just as we suspected may happen, nothing was caught during daylight, a fantastic location that on another day may produce.
The slipway
The school mark
We moved as darkness approached to a mark that's near the school at Bonawe, we've had results from this spot in the past and again it wasn't to let us down.
Thornies and codling appeared for us at this mark which has about 60 ft of water within casting range.
Mick and a typical thorny around the 3lb mark.
Dave in on the action to.
Fishing during darkness seems to be the key to success on Etive and the loch is surprisingly quite a good place to catch codling to, with a number of fish around 2lb for us.
So the first night was fairly succesful with us all managing to catch something and we hoped the fishing from then on was to be onwards and upwards.
The Quarry at Bonawe
The next day as late afternoon approached we took a good 20 minute yomp through the quarry and along the forest road to a deep mark that has over 200ft of water easily within casting range, here we hoped to pick up our first spurdogs of the trip. It's a bizarre and spooky place to fish with noises in the forest and I half expected a half ton haggis with William Wallace's sword in tow to come charging out of the gloom.
Col and Dave were first in with the humble lesser spotted doggy making an appearance, quite a few were caught.
Col pulled out a new species of bong eyed codling
And another hungry doggy!!!!!
Then what we were after a few spurdogs began to show, not in massive numbers or size but welcome all the same.
Goldenballs (Dave) with the first, Col was not amused, but we were.
One for me and Mick
Then Col pulled in a surprise Ling, think he was surprised to!!!
The biggest fish of the night came to me Mr Jammy Dodgers, in the shape of a 5lb 10 ounce, cod, an arm acher through 250 ft of water. This was to be the biggest fish of our trip and the £5 a man on the heaviest fish was to be mine, all mine. Ho!, Ho!, Ho!.
It takes well over a minute for a bait to hit bottom here.
Next day we decided to have a look at some open sea marks on the Isle of Seil and one I'd been to before when many moons younger. To be honest I thought it was a piece of cake then but now at the age of 43 a yomp up and over jagged rocks wasn't what the doctor ordered.
We set up and were more or less straight into spurdogs and Col finally managed a size one for our species race competition, doggys came out to and I think this spot has great potential for all sorts of species during the summer, maybe we'll try again then.
Col earned his spurs this time!
More stuff
The spurs in the open sea are different to the ones in the loch, the loch ones are jet black and the open sea fish a light grey, some people think they could be slightly different species.
So a couple of hours here and it was time for the off, homeward bound for more of Kasabian's finest and five hours of Mick and Col's jibber jabber.
We had spurdog, lesser spotted dogfish, cod, ling, pouting, thornback and whiting with around fifty fish between us during the weekend. I really enjoyed the trip lads, many thanks again. Tightlines, Dave.
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thats one h--- of a report and pics jv
