MIRROR POOL
BY CRAIG FENNER
After what seemed an eternity we were finally loading up the hire van with three lots of fishing tackle, ready to leave at 10pm. This was my second trip to Mirror Pool and I knew we had a long nights drive ahead of us. Myself and two friends (Rob and Phil) were down to the channel tunnel in plenty of time. After a quick trip under the sea (best way to travel as I hate boats), we were in France driving towards Paris.
As daylight broke we were only about three hours away and even though we were tired, the adrenalin kept us going. On arrival, the two blokes that had fished the week before were packing up. I was a bit disheartened to hear there had only been two fish out all week, and there had been frosts over night IN JUNE!
The three of us drew straws to see who had first pick. This went to Phil who picked a swim known as the boat house. I came out second and opted for the pylon swim on the dam wall. Rob went for the swim called the suicide aptly named due to the steps down to your rods. It seemed to take an age to set up due to lack of sleep for 36 hours, but we made it.
I fished the left hand margins on two rods and open water on the third. Tails up profish snowman style was what I was confident with due to my last trip with all my fish coming out to snowman setups.
We were all in bed early Saturday night soon pushing out the Z’s. Rob came round early hours of Sunday morning for me to take a photo for him and at 53lb I was well chuffed for him. About an hour later while I was lying in my bag thinking of his fish, I was away on my furthest margin rod. After a good scrap, I netted a 55.08 mirror. A new PB for France and I was well chuffed. After setting my traps I soon drifted off to sleep only to be woken at 7am to an absolute one toner. I stumbled to the rods and went into auto pilot, playing the fish in which was going well, until it shot down to my left under tree roots and with grating line I knew it was going to part, which is what happened.
"As I stood wondering if I could have done anything whilst cursing under my breath, Rob was in again so I reeled in the other rods and went to help. This time it was a 40 plus mirror. Phil was still to get off the mark, but after his last trip of ten fish between 38 and 52lb he was quite happy to wait.
Nothing else happened by Tuesday morning so I had moved up to the shallows swim, due to the weather turning hot and high pressure, the shallow water seemed a good bet. I could see the fish all down in the snags to my left, at the end of the lake, so they had to cross my swim first if they moved out. Still no more fish by Thursday morning so I opted to reel in and rest the swim until Thursday evening. I baited one area with a catering tin of sweetcorn and 1 kilo of pro-fish and pellet. I only fished one rod opting for less lines in the water. We all said we would turn up our alarms being our last night, as we were leaving Friday afternoon, so we could help out who ever had a take.
4am Friday morning and I had an absolute one toner. After five days without action I was on it in a flash. It was heading down to the rootey snags, so I just locked up my reel and gave it everything. Thankfully it turned and for the next 45 minutes it was an absolute animal.
Eventually it was in the net. I thought it was caught in the margin, then realised what fish it was. At 76lb it was the lake record. AWSOME is the only word I can describe it, and to top it all, Phil had a 51lb mirror, which meant we’d all had 50’s.
Brilliant place, AWSOME fish. I can’t wait until next time.
