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From what I have read on the internet, 95% of UK anglers, who go fishing in France head for the many British owned carp fisheries within an easy drive of the channel ports. I wanted to show that there are plenty of opportunities elsewhere in the country especially if you head all the way down to the Pyrenees. I set out this morning to get some videos of the dozens of lakes within ½ an hour of my home which are never fished. They are usually fenced off, not because the owners want to prevent people from fishing but to avoid potentially very expensive litigation if someone were to have an accident. I took my drone so that I would not have to get permission to access each lake and I started with the smallest which is just on the edge of my village. I was aware of the lake's presence having glimpsed reflections from its surface through the trees in winter when the leaves had fallen. Unfortunately, I got so wrapped up this morniing with this first location, the rest is on hold for the moment. It took a lot of thrashing through brambles and nettles to get anywhere near the water but eventually my dog found a way through. The third of the lakes, about 4 acres in size, proved to be an absolute gem with patches of bubbles fizzing everywhere. We are suffering from a major heatwave at the moment so fishing is not practical. Meanwhile I will visit our mayor to try and find the owner of the lakes and also do a recce to work out how to fish such an overgrown location. Mostly using footage from my phone (so apologies for the quality), I made a short Youtube clip of this morning’s visit. I hope you find it interesting.

The lightest possible that I can still cast the distance. Normally 1/2-3/4 of an ounce, maybe an ounce if the undertow and waves are quite strong.

Big Dave and I were at Alton Water today, he had the lions share of the skimmer bream while I was catching mostly roach. 30 fish between us 50/50 skimmers and roach. Best skimmer 2lb and some larger roach of about half pound. Most bream coming less than 10 feet out. Lots of good bites from the start but couldnt hook them. Changed tactics and left the bites to go until almost pull round and we were hooking skimmers, although the roach were still giving tip taps. 2 red maggots best bait fished over a vitalin mix groundbait.

Boot was on the other foot today at Lemon's Hill on Alton. Dave had 2 roach, I ended up with 12 roach, 1 skimmer and 1 ruffe which took double red maggot and a dendrobena