Matthew and Gillian were originally booked for 2023 but due to health issues they had to postpone it so this was a long awaited trip. The couple spend about 5 weeks in France every year, with Matthew fishing various lakes in the area and Gill just enjoying the peace and quiet. In fact Matthew has fished our friends lake Etang Vilotte for many years, before Nicki and Paul have owned it and he was aware before he came here that we were friends as he has been following our catch reports and seen that we have been involved in each others fisheries.
So after a few days at Etang Vilotte, Matthew and Gill arrived and got themselves acquainted with the chalet and Matthew quickly set himself up at the bottom of the steps and started studying the lake. He loves casting so quickly got his rods out as far as he could, mainly to the left hand bank but with one in the middle. He used a spod rod to get his bait out as well as a catapult for some single boilies.
On Sunday morning at breakfast Matthew told us that he had caught his first three fish, a 25lb mirror at 11.30pm, a 25lb common at 1am and a 23lb mirror at 1.30am. A great start, and he said that he had lost one as well. And so this was the pattern for the week.
By Monday morning Matthew had had a further five carp, a 26lb common, a 34lb common, another 25lb common, a 34lb mirror and a 30lb common but he was still hunting down those elusive big ones.
On Monday early evening when we walked round Matthew told us that he heard a huge ‘splosh’ coming from the left hand bank at about 4pm, like someone throwing a brick in the water, he said. He said it took him a while to get in and whilst he was doing so his other rod went off. As he was down by the lake on his own all he could do was put the clutch on and make sure the rod was safe and get one fish in before he tackled the other. The second fish went and sulked up by the monk valve and he landed the first – a lovely 42lb 6oz common.
After getting this in and safe he then landed the other one, a 22lb mirror.
Matthew didn’t catch any fish at all on the Tuesday but didn’t give up hope of getting some more during the week, even though he had already had 10 carp on the bank and he kept watching the lake and seeing where the fish were feeding.
On Wednesday he had a further three, a 25lb common, and mirrors at 14lb and 17lb and he was convinced the numbers were going backwards but still he persisted and by Friday morning he had landed a further four commons and two mirrors ranging from 19lb to 37lb 2oz.
With the weather changing to wet and chilly he wasn’t sure how Friday would go but was planning on fishing up to 5am on Saturday morning. At breakfast on Friday he had had another two mirrors in the early morning, weighing 21lb and 34 lb. He spent some time up at the chalet catching up on some sleep and went down again in the afternoon. At 2.30pm he caught the biggest fish of the session, a 44lb 2oz common
Whilst he had planned on fishing all night the rain did not look like stopping and thunderstorms were forecast for duing the night so in a short dry spell, Matthew got his gear packed up and called it a week. With a total of 22 fish out by one single angler he has had the best catch rate of the season, the previous being 19.
Matthew has been fishing for over 40 years and developed an ‘umbrella’ style boilie stop and he gave some to Nigel over the week for him to try. We will let you know how he gets on with these but they have since been copied by the big tackle companies like Fox and Korda.
Final catch summary zero babies, 4 at 10lb+, 10 at 20lb+, 6 at 30lb+ and 2 at 40lb+. No 50s but we hope that this lovely couple will visit our lakes again some day. Until then à bientôt…
