On Wednesday I put a blog post up about this kayaking based clothing I was going to start trying out for some of my fishing, so I put my money where my mouth is and I went out for a quick session on Wednesday afternoon. To be fair I had been eyeing up the slight jump in the tide combined with the swell that’s been rolling in for most of the week - I like smaller tides for a lot of my coastal based fishing around here - and although I made the wrong call on Monday evening and found far too much sea for where I clambered down to, I had an inkling that I might find the ideal conditions on Wednesday……………..

And I did, but then I would obviously say that because I ended up catching my best bass of the year so far! In all honesty though the sea was looking great. It was just me and Storm and I couldn’t stop myself almost running down the path to get a lure in the sea. I was also fascinated to see what this Palm kayaking gear felt like to actually fish in. Without wanting to sound like some sort of fashion parade, I was wearing the Blaze Pants (leggings) and the Palm Gradient boots. I am obviously not designed to be wearing tight fishing clothing, but that aside, about five minutes after the shock of my feet actually getting wet when the sea rolled over them I had forgotten all about it. I obviously need a lot of time with this kayaking gear in a bunch of different configurations to see if and how it might work for me for some of my fishing, but the initial signs are good. The Blaze leggings are very comfortable to move around in, I didn’t get remotely cold but to be fair it was a warmish afternoon, and the grip on the Palm Gradient boots seems to be bloody amazing. I didn’t put any studs in the soles and I know it’s the kiss of death to talk about good grip, but it was quite something. I need to dig out some neoprene gravel guards to try and stop grit and sand getting into the boots - I thought this might be an issue - but it’s a learning process and it’s got me very interested. Anyway, back to the fishing.

A while ago I blogged about how interesting it is to “see” the marks you might think you know pretty well in a different light, indeed I am still kinda kicking myself that I haven’t spent enough time targeting this particular area of ground in the ways that I am now. It’s your typical sort of broken ground, and when there’s a bit of sea rolling in like there was on Wednesday, it helps to create all these rip currents which swirl around so invitingly. For sure you could go banging lures out a country mile if you were so inclined, but to me it’s all about the closer-in stuff when you’re fishing a mark like this, and as a whole it just seems almost custom designed for fishing with soft plastics in their many different guises.

You don’t need to be a genius to work out that I was most likely going to clip one of my Gravity Stick lures on when I am faced with conditions and ground like that. In a couple of weeks I will be able to tell you all about why the particular Gravity Stick I clipped on was a little bit different to the stuff that’s already out there, but I picked out a Paddletail in that awesome White Holographic UV colour because I like white based lures in green water and/or brightish overhead conditions. I also tend to turn to a paddletail when I want to try and almost “hold” the lure a bit longer in rip currents and almost behind the waves as they are dumping onto the beach. Because the sea conditions were fairly heavy with that swell, I went for one of those heavier belly-weighted Berkley Fusion19 Weight Swimbait Hooks to help keep my Gravity Stick Paddletail swimming properly (blog post about the hooks here).

And it all went and worked rather well! Admittedly it was the only hit of the session, but that one hit turned out to be a bass that was easily 6lbs and maybe nudged the 7lb mark. The fish slammed my Paddletail not far behind the dumping waves - just how good does that sharp “bang” always feel when a bass hits a soft plastic? - and in no time at all I had a very plump and fine conditioned fish at my feet. You will notice that there are no photos of this bass though. There was that much surge on I had placed my waterproof rucksack (this one here, it’s still going strong) way back from the sea. In that rucksack was my Sony camera gear and iPhone, but I was fishing on my own and there were no rockpools where I could safely place the bass while I went back for the camera or even the phone.

It wasn’t even a debate. I popped the barbless hook out and released the bass. I’ve got the memories of a rather nice mid-April bass and I’d most likely have killed the fish had I selfishly gone for the camera gear to get some hero-shots. As ever I can find so many different reasons to enjoy this one single bass on a bunch of different levels. I have now got the all important confidence boost that my Gravity Stick lures also catch bass when rigged on weedless hooks with somewhat heavier belly-weights, and combined with it being mid-April has just about made my week. The fact that I caught the bass from a mark I thought I knew pretty well but keeps opening up to me on a whole different level is the icing on the cake. I would like to apologise that you have had to see a couple of photos of me fishing in this Palm kayaking gear. You all have a good Easter weekend and I hope you might find a few of whatever species of fish you end up chasing…………

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Caught my best bass of the year so far (learning more about marks that I thought I knew lots about pays off)

© Henry Gilbey 2023