.....anything coming from Mars.......

One of my birthday presents from the Daughter....the dinkiest little table top tripod...no more than four inches tall. The legs do extend...but only by another two inches!

Beautiful morning.....slight frost on the car...off to fishing.....full English breakfast at the cafe...and then a stroll to the lake....which was iced over!!!!!

I swore I'd never break ice again to fish....but....well....we had to.

Match started dead on 10.00...despite several mutterings that we should have had a longer prep time because of the ice. Of course all that thrashing and splashing meant that it was very quiet for about two hours before the fish regained their confidence and began to feed.

caught 5 or 6 fish and then the wind got up....all 12 of us had broken an area of roughly 5 0r 6 metres wide and 10 metres long in front of our pegs. the wind set up a ripple and the ice cracked.....leaving a huge section in the middle of the lake adrift.....guess where it drifted to?

That's right.....over to the side where Gordon, Sam and I were fishing....much to the amusement of the rest we were iced in again....and no ice breaking allowed once the match was under way....we had to sit for over an hour doing nothing until the wind and Sun got rid of the ice....by which time all the bait we'd put in to attract fish had been eaten and the fish were gone.

We managed to catch a few more in the last hour but needless to say.... not one of the three of us finished in the top three.

Ah well....these things are sent to try us!

Das vidanya moy padruga.