Chantecoq Du Der, France another 40lb carp

The best place to fish was unfortunately taken. The swim was about 30m to my right, where you could get your baits close to the dam wall and supports for the bridge. These Dutch anglers were well prepared with zodiac and battery motors, they used a bicycle with a back rack to swap out their batteries each night so they had maximum charge for the baiting up and constant landing of carp caught in that area. So far their largest carp was 38lb but they had 36 fish out from that spot. The conditions were perfect with a strong south westerly warm breeze in to a solid wall. The bridge is a walkway to the island and under it is the dam. Its wall is approx 1ft below surface water. That holds the southern basin carp population from venturing into the main lake. The supports are covered in mussels and are razor sharp, they use the boat to get the carp away from the dam as quickly as possible and net rather than hauling the carp to the bank. The biggest known fish is the “Big Common” at 65lb and was caught a couple of months earlier to our arrival, from the same spot I was fishing.

After trying absolutely everything and starting to feel a bit desperate I decided to row my baits out as far as my main line braid would allow and fish the far bank beach in attempt to catch the carp which moved along the far bank to get to the dam wall known as the beach area, they were defiantly not moving in between my lines it just wasn’t possible. No line bites nothing, that must be the only way the carp were getting to the dam. On two occasions I was back to the backing on the spool and had to drag the lead and line back to the bank, not good. So I tied a leader not and spooled up another 50m of braid on the already heavily loaded real.

Darkness on day 5 had arrived and out of no where and in complete silence my alarm sang a single beep, then another one shortly later. This is what happens when you catch a carp a great distance you just get bleeps like bream no ripping off of line or screaming takes just knocks and single beeps, due to the distance of the braid that’s a good sign. With mono I doubt you would get any registration at all there was a fish on and the carp would have to be self hooked and move 50m to the side before the alarm sang a tune.

I picked up the rod and started winding the 200m missing line back on my empty spool. By the time the fish was netted both of us we very tired, it was already pitch black and now we could not see anything. Trying to take a digital in complete darkness is hard work and with the high summer temperatures I was sweating buckets to hold the fish whilst we desperately tried to get the whole fish and my head into the picture frame. We did this by placing a headlamp as light indication to centre the photo. My first Du Der carp weighed 35.2lbs and I was ecstatic to get off the blank with a good sized fish.

Carp Paradise and a family adventure another fantastic place I recommend anyone trying, what an experience and at such a low cost. Try the day fishing its well worth it.

Leigh O’Keeffe