fishydreams

The third day of our filming allowed us to fish the Guadalhorce for the first time. The river had cleared overnight and things began to look good when I saw a nice carp feeding in the shallows on my way to meeting the boys for breakfast at Cártama Estación. There it was in the shallows beneath the iron bridge lowering its head and working though the mud leaving clouds of silt to work their way downstream. As far I was concerned that carp was a good omen. The river was clear. The fish were there for the taking.

I was keen that John should know some of the good sections of river since he would continue to fish the following day when I was back at work and so the plan we hatched over a coffee in the morning, was to look at a few sections which are worth a visit so that the crew could find them the next day during my absence.

We had a lot of fun on the third day and caught a few fish. One stuck out in my mind in particular. I had been walking a stretch of river which was running crystal clear. My friend Harry Abbott will recognise this part of the river. He caught a fine barbel here one time on a dry ant and it has become to me, Harry´s Pool. It was the hottest and brightest part of the day. The only chance I had was to stay well away from the water and below the skyline and see if I could spot barbel in the near bank. These fish spook very easily. Thankfully a couple of fish appeared and, unaware that anything was amiss, one of them took the nymph I offered it without hesitation.

There was the potential for disaster right from the offset. There were trees on the opposite bank providing snags which any self respecting fish would have charged towards.  But thankfully my fish remained on the near bank and, through a series or runs, dissipated its energy, without presenting undue cause for concern.

Before I knew it, Raúl was in the river filming the fish with an underwater camera attached to a pole. The fish performed magnificently. Not only did it keep out of trouble during the fight, but it swam obligingly up and down only inches from the camera as it was being filmed. And later, after being unhooked and released, it swam directly towards Paco,who had since waded into the river with another camera, and passed him unhurriedly before swimming away. I have seen Oscar winners with less talent than that fish. What an instinct for the camera!

There were a couple of other noteworthy events which occurred on the third day of filming. I saw the biggest gipsy barbel I have ever seen in the river at the foot of a weir, and saw other fish, much more modest in size, attempt to leap the weir which was about six feet high, just as salmon do.

Shortly before I caught the fish that played up for the camera we all had our picture taken. John put his camera on a tripod, set the automatic timer, and rushed back to join myself and the film people. I have an A3 copy of the photograph he took and this has become, for me, a lovely reminder of what an adventure the whole filming business turned out to be. I have framed this picture and as soon as I get round to finding my drill, I am going to put it up on the wall.

What a bunch of pros! From left to right: Guillermo (producer) , Moi (fisherman), Gustavo (driver), Fernando (driver), Raúl (director), Paco (cameraman), Juan (cameraman), John (fisherman par excellence)