I spent the morning digging out a septic tank and the early afternoon in a tussle with Spanish bureaucracy and so the few hours on the river were appreciated more and usual. There were a few barbel around but they they can sometimes be pretty jittery and today they were easily spooked. In the end I had to work quite hard for the three I eventually managed to bank.
There is a nice deepish pool where some pretty hefty fish live and every now and then a solid fish will ghost out of an undercut bank or the cover of a raft of marginal weed. I had no success in trying to fool one of these fish but it was not for lack of trying! It is nice enough just to see these lovely fish sometimes and to speculate on how heavy they might have been. I suspect a couple of those barbel might have gone 5 or even 6 pounds.
It was an afternoon for seeking out some shade if you could find some.
Some good barbel were stationed just in front of this rock where the turtles were sunbathing. As soon as you make yourself too obvious the turtles drop into the river and the fish become nervous!
It´s worth persevering!
fishydreams 