15th Leg Summer Accumulator
Sunday 17th August 2014 - Kelling
Following a change of venue from Bacton to Kelling due to reports of vast rafts of weed coming up on the sand a small but merry band of club stalwarts congregated on the cliffs at the Muckleburgh Collection. The weather was more reminiscent of a mid October day than mid August with a howling wind left to right straight down the beach. Even the North Norfolk ramblers were geared up with sweatshirts, fleeces and walking boots.
Plenty of white horses across the water and with the ebb going against the wind everyone was dreaming of bass as the conditions looked perfect. The draw was held and off we all made our way. All struggling to eventually get our umbrellas and bivvies up except the Inspector who decided to stand it out for the duration.
The shout went up to start and although windy the direction made it more awkward than impossible varying ranges of distances were achieved along the beach. That was it for the first 1hour and 45 minutes just casting practice and feeding the crabs as hooks came back cleaned off time and time again.
Mike Watts aka Last Cast was first to produce with a 29 cm flounder at distance quickly followed by a 25 cm dab. This put him out in front for a couple of casts until Paul ‘Sparks’ Harvey from a poor cast, big gust of wind at the wrong moment, produced a double shot of fine flounders from about 25 yards out 31 and 29 cms respectively. This seemed to be the spark and a flurry of fish up and down the beach with a fine specimen and biggest fish of the day to John ‘steady’ Carter of 34 cm (1lb in old money) and Peter ‘Inspector’ Morse joining the show with a 27cm flounder unfortunately this was to be it for a windswept inspector (would he ever get his hair back in place again). Richard ‘ex-captain’ Ellis at the far end could be seen to be struggling with something and out popped a small flounder to rapturous applause from everyone else only to see him hastily put it back as it only measured 16 cm. Much to Richard’s disgust John ‘silver fox’ Neave then nipped in but not with his normal monster flounder to card his one and only 22cm specimen.
It was Ivan Allison ‘The consultant’ who thought he cracked it with a cracking bite and a decent fish up and out of the surf only to discover it was a 41cm mackerel which sadly for him does not count in these matches.
The following hour saw no improvement with the vermin going crazy with baits in the water being stripped in five minutes.
As the tide bottomed out and the water started to make Paul ‘Take it Easy’ Tovell joined the party with a 32 cm flounder followed quickly by John Carter with a 30 cm flounder which along with his earlier effort took him into the lead but only for a short while as Last Cast produced two smaller fish to pull himself into the lead only for Sparks to get two 26 cm specimens in two casts to put him in front by two points with half hour to go.
The Consultant had accumulated 4 small specimens and with Tom ‘off duty’ Gibb now joining the party with a 26 and 28 cm versions and Take it Easy getting a 30cm effort it all looked like it was going down to the wire but Last Cast needs to change his name to Penultimate Cast as he produced a 28 cm version to take the lead. Looking up he could see Tom ‘off duty’ Gibb down by the water’s edge helping The Consultant with what appeared like a decent bass only for them to see it turn on the edge of a wave and disappear along with any chance of a podium finish so he was Nearly Last Cast. But today it was Richard ‘ex-captain’ Ellis who was last cast man with a fine 33cm flounder to finally join the party.
Despite the lack of fish everyone weighed in with the Ely contingent of Last Cast and Sparks taking the 1-2 followed by John ‘steady’ Carter with the final podium spot.
Club Top 5
1st Mike Watts 2lb 7 1/3oz (5 fish)
2nd Paul Harvey 2lb 0oz (4 fish)
3rd John Carter 1lb 12oz (2 fish)
4th Paul Tovell 1lb 8oz (2 fish)
5th Ivan Allison 1lb 3oz (4 fish)
