A Bad Days Fishing.......

..........is better than a good day in the office. I agree with the tacky signs that can be found in equally tacky shops but today I almost disproved it. 

It has been a long time since I have fished due to two weddings in the space of four days, and one of them in Switzerland. I found a couple of spots over there but...

River Vispa, Switzerland

Mountain lake in the shadow of the Matterhorn.

both these waters are pure snow melt, nothing piscatorial can live in either. There may have been a couple of objections if I had gone fishing anyway.

The anticipation for todays trip was therefore quite high. I set off early and managed to get three miles down the road when the Landie started to make a sound like a helicopter was behind me, a blow out on the rear off side. I managed to pull in to a petrol station forecourt and surveyed the damage.

Thats not gonna inflate back up I thought (plus other unprintable comments). The spare is on the back door and the jack is under the front seats so at least I did not have to unload the fishing gear to change the wheel. I put the jack together and went for the wheel nuts. The alloys might look good but they are not made for removal by a standard nut remover. I realised the job was beyond my tools so I had to ring our local garage for assistance. This was beginning to hurt and not the start to the day I needed. 

The bloke from the garage arrived, got the nuts off, went to jack it up to the right height and the whole thing rocked back and fell off the jack. The standard supplied jack is as crap as the nut remover. In one way it was good that it took garage monkey over an hour to change the tyre, It meant I did not look as much as a girl as you are probably thinking. I finally got to the river at about 10.30am.

My plan was to head for the Barbel banker swim, nail a couple and then move on in search of a big Dace. I did get a Barbel but not as quick as I had hoped, but it was a great battle in the fast water and weighed 7lb 5oz. Rolling meat had done the trick again. 

Half a mile downstream there is a swim that is fairly fast flowing and never fished due to its distance from the car park but this means it is very overgrown. I scrambled my way down the bank through the thick nettles and took a step too far, it was so over grown I stepped too far and into two foot of water, lost my footing and got a soaking. I scrambled out of the river, calmed myself down and checked my stuff. My phone and camera were dry and it appeared that I had not lost anything. At least that went my way.
I was soaked through from the waist downwards but it was warm enough so I found the peg and carried on fishing. When I was rolling meat I had noticed a bit of weed coming down stream but did not realise quite how much there was. Within a minute of casting out the feeder was dragged out of position and I was reeling in masses of the stuff.

I managed to keep the chop worm feeder in long enough for two Perch, one not a bad size at over half a pound but the wet feet and the weed started to really get me down and I headed off mid-afternoon.
I got back to the van and squeezed out my socks, 

emptied my wellies,

and went home. Not the happiest day fishing I have ever had!