The social pike

I hadn't been fishing for weeks and weeks. You know how it goes....stuff comes up from all angles and it just doesn't happen. The date had been in the diary for weeks. It was never going to move as it is one of the most eagerly awaited trips of the fishing season - The Christmas Pike Social.

I fish with my pal Jim regularly, but this trip involves another good friend who I sadly only seem to see on this festive social trip and we enjoy the day from the minute we start planning where, what food, what libations and then it stumbles to tactics and weather until the day finally arrives and we greet each other like excited schoolboys.

The Dorset Stour is always our venue of choice and we were lucky after some recent lumpy weather that the river was just fishable for our day. Colour had only just dropped out and the level was down by quite a few feet. We exchange small gifts before we start and then the most social of days begins.

It's not just about the pike. I am pretty sure we three have fishing as an excuse for actually just being there in the landscape, in nature, breathing it, smelling it and seeing it. Each year this trip provides us with pleasure for what we see - otters, egrets, lapwing, water rail, kingfishers galore, sparrow hawk and an amazing rook display at dusk. 

Even though an otter had obviously taken a liking to my pike at some stage during its life I still do get a feeling of complete excitement when I see one on my fishing trips. 

The wind was biting. One of those squally windy days which Simon said "send kids and cats loopy" - it was cold too. They generally are from the east. We would be fine though as the social provides - Kelly Kettle tea, pork pie, mince pies, stollen, whisky and pickled onions.

The fishing was hard as it can be on such days, but the river did grant us a wish to see a fish or two and bring some Christmas cheer. We three, kings of the river for a day reflected on what had been a special day as we trudged across the fields to the twinkling festive lights of the village and home to warm fires and liquid cheer....