Marsbar Monster

Well what a week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After a three hour drive down to Linear Fisheries, Oxford, we were well happy, when we found there were swims available on St Johns lake.

As we had squashed all our gear into one car we did not have a trolley (bad move). we had to carry all our gear to the other side of the lake!!! (Gas bottle, sacks of hemp, beer, sacks of pellets and all the rest of the gear)

As the swim was all set up we began to bait up the water, spodding out to a gravel bar at 80 yards with hemp, pellet and boilies with a few maggots thrown in.

We were now ready to catch so we settled down with a few beers and a cheeky T-bone for dinner!

Feeling confident as we had good swims and big fish had been visiting the bank from our swims, I had the first run that evening feeling rather exited on the first run i struck into it and landed a 8-9 lb tench, not what we were looking for but it was a confidence boost, fish were feeding out there!!!!!

No more runs that night and no sign of any fish near us. After a few more beers and more luxury fayre, the next night came and went, no more fish ?? On the third day we decided we would have a walk up to the shallow end of the lake, on our arrival we found fish were topping and one guy landed a nice mirror while we were there. We thought that a move was on the cards and when one of the other anglers told us that all the fish were at this end of the lake we decided it was definitely time for a move.

The only trouble being we had to carry all that bloody gear again, so off we went!!!!!!

On arrival in our new swims we got baited up and started again, feeling a lot more confident with fish topping all over the place.

After this move the rest is history, we had some great fish between us all, starting with Bumpy if i remember. I managed to catch 20lb m,13lb m,17lb m,25lb 12 m and the fish of the week, the long common at 37lb 4oz.
Paul Marsden