As always the weekends go so fast and Monday morning is on us before we know it but this week wasn’t so bad because me and my mate Nicholas Steedman arranged a trip on the Rhondda mid-week.

The morning came and the rain with it! I think he must be some sort of relation to Toby aka Storm-bringer. Whenever he tells me he’s coming over the bridge for a trip the heavens open and the rivers rise. Toby& Nick , next time just come over and don’t say nothing please :).   Well as I was saying the rain was in and the wind started to pick up and this was all before we even placed a foot on the river bed. Nick picked me up at 10am and after a quick check of the gear we were off to fish the Rhondda. This was Nicks first visit so I was hoping he would like the river and I had my fingers crossed that the river would perform.

 The conditions were not ideal at first and I wasn’t very optimistic of catching because it was up about 6″ and coloured, six inches don’t sound a lot but in the Rhondda it means a hell of a lo., the flow of water is crazy for such a small river. It’s difficult wading at the best of times.  As for the conditions, the dry fly rod was left behind and the bugging rod was the answer. Nick set up the french leader and I done the same and after a quick chat about what flies we were using and depth we moved onto the first run of the day. Myself,  I had around 6ft of tipped with a dropper about 18″ from the point. The point fly was a 3m gold head hares ear and on the dropper I had a black 2.5 flash back pt.  After a few casts with no success I decided to fish the water at my feet and close to the bank. After only a few flicks I was into my first Rhondda trout of the day on the point fly. I stepped back and Nick followed with catching around four trout out of  the head of one pool, not the biggest of fish but all were in top condition and their stomachs where all fat. They were on the feed big time. It rained for a few more hours but not hard so the river started to clear up and the fishing just went wild. Nick was taking full advantage of the river, pulling trout from everywhere, the smile on his face said it all, It was a tag team. Nick was fishing the left bank and I was fishing the right bank. we slowly moved up river taking fish in the shallows and glides. I think Nick was well impressed with the river and the quality of fish.

Nicholas below

Moving up river into the long runs and deep holes we started to pick up one or to better fish. Nicholas moved on to the right hand side of the river where there was a run along side a wall, it didn’t look deep but looked a good spot for fish to lie up out of the current. It was one of them spots where there was nothing else to hide behind so he was on a winner. He caught 5 trout that I seen so he was on the ball fair play, nice going Nicholas.  As that little spot went quiet we slowly fished the ripply water leading up to a small weir. Nicholas moved in for the kill and had five cast and five fish. It was really good to watch. After dragging him out of there 😉 we moved on up into a pool where I’ve had some amazing fishing in the past in a similar condition. I had the first few casts this time and managed a few before Nicholas moved in. After taking a few out at the back edge, Nicholas pitched his nymphs into the main flow and as the leader was going through the run, the leader stopped and he lifted into the take but it just stopped dead! His rod was double to say the least and all this time the pressure was on and there was nothing he could do. The line just went across the river and so slow you could see the line going back and for, it was a big, big fish. The pressure he put on didn’t even change the fishes mind, it was like it didn’t even know it was hooked. It moved across the flow and went into a snag and that was that. I feel for you brother 😦  I’m still gutted. Would have been great for you to catch a monster on your first outing on the river. There is always next time and ‘im sure you will be back soon.

I’ll leave you on that and here’s a few photos of the great day we had.