So where was I to catch some fish from I’d tried the canal nope I’d tried the Huddersfield highlands by jiminy and blanked on both so lets try leaving the pike alone and concentrating on the silver fish and perhaps the odd carp, but where well it is closer to Juggla and I hadn’t been for a fair while so why not yep lets try Steve and Clare’s place Oakland’s at Gowdall just outside Hensall village up the or down the A19 and then down the side of the cooling towers towards through out tother side of Hensall then a bit further nope nearly a bit more there you go the sign is on the left just before the bridge and the bend. Now according to George the pond to fish is my least favourite the small round match pond next to the horseshoe lake so I rolled into the small carpark at around 08.45am to see plenty of fish rising and moving about, I thought that the fish would be in and around the reed cover as it was a really cold morning and with the influx of rainwater over the last few days well I just thought they’d be heading for cover. Ok now for the surprise out comes my 1.25 tc Avon style rod a Birthday prezzie from a very nice fella the one with twin tips a quiver tip and a float tip, nope you are wrong I left the feeder tip in the bag and out with a waggler and a plummet, oh and a few tears as I must have packed my float tube wrong and broken both my still water blue floats so that’s something that’ll have to be replaced on the next trip to parkgate. Not only was I using a float gasp! I was also going to use a size 20 hook and pinkie maggots bronze and red and no curry seasoning and surprise, surprise it worked I actually managed to catch some nice roach from peg 13 on the carpark side I stayed there having a chat with Steve on his return from his hols, poor lad yesterday in the Cuban sunshine of 90 degrees today in the Yorkshire fog and 2.5 degrees. Whilst chatting with Steve I put my order in for breakfast when George arrived this happened at around 11 as poor juggla had to go in search of that illusive thing the cheap spare tyre isn’t it always the way you see loads of places that do tyres when you don’t need them and all in the size you have but directly you get a flat nope none in that size m8 sorry the cheapest we have is mega bucks. Right George arrives and we decide to move over to the side next to the horseshoe lake and set up either side of the lily pad which remarkably still has leaves on it and plenty of fish topping and swirling I try to carry on float fishing but instead of six to eight feet as on the carpark side I find I’ve got twelve to thirteen feet in front of me and even with the small canal Polaris float I borrow from George I’m not comfortable so I finally give up after a particularly nasty tangle I change the tip over and grab the feeder top and a really small blackcap feeder and picked out my reflection and started to get a bed of pinkies going. In the mean time juggla had set up his trusty pole the other side of the pads and was fishing pellet on the bottom neither of us were expecting a real bag up day but we were pleasantly surprised at the amount of fish we were attracting. Then from out of the Gloom it came arms limp staggering one foot in front of the other but not in a fluid human way but more like an Automaton it grunted you want food it was then we realised it was a very ,very jet lagged Claire she had been up 28 hours and was not feeling at her best but even after all this and the fact she was having to pack a load of merchandise for her e.bay shop she was still good enough to do us a cuppa and a sausage sarnie what a real star ,thanks Claire I hope you and your whole family have a brilliant Christmas. So back to the fishing all of a sudden George says right as there is so much action on the surface I’m gonna use summer tactics ,and sure enough he shortens up to about 18 inches with a bright orange controller float titter not thinking he is going to get much if anything when bump, bump whoosh away goes the controller and a very chuffed little Penfold is soon fighting a rather over excited Chub, then again another one then a roach so after proving that the fish at Oakland’s are mad taking bait on a summer method he goes back to pellet on the bottom suddenly he is into another fish he has been kidding me about catching a December Tench when suddenly I hear a gasp I turn and See him shaking his head I said surely not ,not a mid December Tench, Nope but almost as good it is a crucian. What a day we laughed we put the world to rights we listened to the countryside we had the whole fishery to ourselves and we caught fish turbo charged pristine Pastie carp of a couple of lb beautiful Rudd with the deep red fins silver darts of roach ,long lean locomotive Chub and finally some confused crucians, we fished through until it was too dark to see Georges float, all in all a very, very nice day, which has really whetted my appetite for our fish in on the 27th, so until then I hope you all have a great Christmas and Santa brings you everything you wished for best regards until next time Malc.