Great Ouse on Sunday, Grand Union Canal on Monday

I had two really contrasting sessions this weekend with the river Ouse being a big deep sluggish river and the Grand Union Canal being quite narrow and shallow.
Great Ouse:
Sunday saw me back on the Ouse on the same peg as I had feeder fished the week before but as I had caught Roach on the drop on the feeder I fancied a go on the float this week.
On arriving at the peg I was pleased to see plenty of Roach topping so I fancied my chances with them coming up in the water and hurriedly set up a 15ft float rod and a bodied waggler at about 13ft as a starting point. I know the river in this area is a good 18ft deep but thought that I would be ok without fishing at full depth, I had chosen to fish 1/3 of the way across as this was the area most of the fish were topping in.

The Great Ouse towards Danby Drove

Mixed fortunes on Ten Mile Bank

Well having spent the last few weeks fishing the river Welland I fancied getting back on the Great Ouse at Ten Mile Bank and fishing for Roach on the pole. We arrived at the river and decided to fish the stretch by the chapel as it was a lot more sheltered than most other sections of the river as there was a strong wind blowing. I put on a 3gr rig on my top 5 and had  plumb around the swim, I settled on a line at 11.5m as if I had gone out any further I would have been off the top kit because it was 16 ft deep and still sloping away. I had a plan to start of with a couple of balls of groundbait and then to loose feed casters and hemp over the top and get the Roach up in the water and then switch to a lighter rig.

River Thurne - Norfolk

I have just returned from a few days break near Great Yarmouth and I managed to get a couple of short session in on the River Thurne. I had spoken to an angling friend who has fished this river many times and got as much information as I could about the venue and soon found out it was about 8 - 9 feet deep and tidal. I also discovered that there are many miles of bank that are quite inaccessible without very long walks and so the info on access points was invaluable as I wouldn't have time for any long hikes as time was limited.

I planned to fish at a place called Cold Harbour which is a couple of miles below Potter Heigham as there is good parking at the bottom of a track right by the river with pegs both up and down stream of this point. My first session was early on Wednesday morning and after a half hour drive I arrived at the river at 6.30am and was set up and ready to fish by 07.00am.



Sunrise over the River Thurne