North Donegal, 1st December 2019

It’s hard to believe we’re into December already but here I was on the road to a north Donegal beach to meet up with MartinC who had expressed an interest in starting beachcasting. En route, I passed a spot where two other “eejits” were fishing, one of whom looked vaguely familiar…… At the beach it was a much more pleasant day than I had been bracing myself for; the northerly breeze wasn’t too strong and there was plenty of sunshine. I assembled a set of 4 rods of varying lengths kitted with fixed spools, multipliers and a variety of rigs and was just about ready when Martin arrived. We made our way down to the water’s edge to fish the last 3 hours of the ebb and early flood into darkness and four rigs baited with mackerel strip were soon splashing down at various distances into the surf. Last time I fished this spot, under similar conditions, I got small turbot and flounder from the start in daylight with a few coalies, doggies and a spiky in darkness so I felt confident we’d get something. A few hours later, the confidence was ebbing faster than the tide, not a bite between us. It was time for my usual strategy of heading back to the chuck wagon for coffee, soup and a sandwich. On the way back to the rods I commented to Martin that by now there must be a monster on one of the rods. Sure enough, he reels in a monster flounder; 40cm weighing in at 1lb 15oz. I have been at this lark for years and only got a flounder that size last year! “Beginner’s luck” he graciously acknowledges. It looked like his beginner’s luck had run out until 2.5 hrs later he reeled in a double of flounder and small turbot. This was Martin’s first ever turbot despite a lot of experience boat fishing so he was well pleased. Meanwhile, I still hadn’t had a bite, all baits returning unmolested. While I was delighted for Martin, it was starting to hurt! Perhaps the flood tide would switch the fish on but an hour and a half of flood made no difference. Martin had business to attend to and had to leave shortly after 5pm, “Next time you’re up this way give me a shout and we’ll meet up” he said and I think to myself “yeah, maybe you can show me a few more of your tricks”. He had barely left the car park when I reeled in my blank-saving small turbot. 30 mins later I had a face-saving flounder, only 24cm but as Guernica said recently,” the humble flounder will never cease to please”. Next cast saw a good determined bite with which I connected but after a few turns of the reel handle, it shed the hook. I was beginning to think that darkness had indeed brought the fish on but it was not to be; the next 90 mins gave no further excitement. The weed deposited by the previous ebbing tide was being lifted by the flood and most of it seemed to be attracted to my hooks so I finally called it a day. Not the most productive day for me but thoroughly enjoyable nonetheless, Martin certainly had a good day. Yeah, we’ll do it again.

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The obligatory extra pics...

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Fantastic flounder! nice wee turbo too.
Nice to see you out-fishing JW, Martin
great pics and report... as ever

Those other 'two eejits' look exactly that

Great report as always and a cracking Flounder!

Great read as always and what a fish, truly a monster.

Great write-up.. thoroughly enjoyed my day.. thanks to paddys tuition i nabbed my pb flounder and my first ever turbot,, small but still a new species for the list.. looking forward to my next outing now.

Class report as always JW

Havnt been out in a bit getting me interested in getting out again