Cheekpoint/ passage east 02/01/11

People: me and mickm
Tide: hw about 5 pm
Weather: Turned pretty cold in the early hours but stayed dry
Bait: mac,peeler,mussel,razor,black wrap,sand eel-all frozen and a lug/peeler combo bait i bought on the net to try out
Results: Nothing like we were hoping for...... 5 whiting,4 flounder and 4 or 5 codling (it was late )


Myself and mickm decided to head further afield because our usual spots on the east coast werent performing well of late.Unable to locate any fresh bait we threw caution to the wind and cleared micks cache of frozen baits into the cooler box. Waterford was decided on and after MUCH deliberation we finally decided on passage east, then cheekpoint, then passage east... Got chatting to a few lads on the harbour at P.East who were only fishing with mac and were doing ok with whiting/flounder etc so then we went to cheekpoint and finally got a bait in the water.Tide was starting to drop and the more it dropped the harder it was to retrieve the baits.Not long into the session mick pulled in a codling of about 1 and 1/2 lbs on mussel and we were sure it was the start of what we had travelled down for.I was trying out that combination bait of peeler/lug on a 2 hook flapper.....just to see.Not a tap for about 20 mins and then as I decided to get another rig baited up, the rod doubled over and rod and tripod got yanked over forward...I dived for the rod,and wound into the take....connecting with nothing .It was a very strong definite bite but...Ill never know what it was.Nothing touched that bait for the rest of the night and the fishing at that mark as good as died too.We moved to P.East at lw and fished it up to full (5am) with nothing really of note.Results are above, although I didnt land a single fish until about 2.45 am. I only had 1 flounder and 1 codling, both on black wrap. I would like to think if we had fresh crab and lug fishing would have been much more productive

Note: For anybody who is thinking of purchasing a penn "OTech" rod, I would hold off for a little while until they "do some further tests" as mick, who has only fished with this rod maybe ten times found that the butt section may be a little lacking in strength because while casting only a 5oz lead out , his beautiful 3 piece rod is now a 4 piece.SNAP!!!

man that's a real sickener with the rod man . is there any chance of taking it back to it's point of purchase for a replacement?

you might have got some fish but does not sound to enjoyable of a trip bad luck with the rod

yeah Al,ringing supplier tomorrow....thats the problem with e-bay

and yes you're right tright lines about the trip.it was a bit of a let down but at least we got out for a while and it was somewhere new for me. always a good thing !

hope you have better luck in arklow on 27th dave

Ah sure i was saving myself for it Looking forward to it now.I must check what way the tides are gonna be.Could get interesting if it turns about midway through...... seemed to make an awful difference the last day, although nightfall might have played a part also. We shall see ...............

ouch !

how much did he lose on the rod ?

we will find out tomorrow what the outcome will be.hopefully hemight get a replacement...being a new enough rod to the market I reckon they wont want any bad publicity but maybe Im just being too optomistic.Ill post up the outcome anyway

fingers crossed they'll just do a straight replacement for you man as obvously the rod had some sort of manufacturing flaw to begin with.