Big Autumn Bass

Krakov contacted me in the week saying he was thinking of an all nighter at St Osyth. Allnighter being until daybreak. Didn't fancy that much, so went about trying to persuade him to fish the floof at Frinton up to high tide, roughly 1.30 a.m.

Being the good chap that he is, he agreed to meet me at Frinton at 20.00. At this stage there was very little water, maybe only a couple of feet 80-100 yards out. After an hour or so we had a couple of whiting and started getting a few bites.

I had one rod out with a whole squid and another with a couple of small pieces of squid for the whiting. I was just about to wind the whiting rod in, as somehow the line had hooked up on the groyne, when Kracov came over for a chat. A few moments later the rod tip wrapped round with some force and I grabbed the rod, cursing that the line was snagged up on the groyne.

I handed Krakov my coat and waded out to try and free the line (luckily I had the chest waders on). No luck, it wouldn't come loose. Bloody typical, you wait ages for something decent and then this happens.

I winched the line in, knowing that when the rig reached the groyne it would snag for good and the fish would be lost. Well, that's what would happen most of time, but tonight luck was on my side. Suddenly the rig pinged free as the fish dragged the gear over the groyne and onto the next beach.

I caught sight of the fish, a big bass and carefully guided in towards the shore, before picking it out and shouting out to Krakov.

Turned out to be a real pig of a bass,  an immaculate, heavily built fish of 7lb. Well chuffed.

Krakov manned the camera and did a great job as you can see from the photo.

Couldn't decide whether to keep it or not, but eventually took pity on it and released it.

Rest of the evening was pretty slow with some good sized whiting. We fished until about 2.30 a.m, tired but happy.