TomBettle

Zzippy di well with that. Amazing story! It looks like a Blue, is the size of a small male, is the colour and shape, but half a mile off Durley Rocks!!! Wow! Mind you, I did have a 50lb Wahoo off the rocks last year, about the same place.... ....according to my profile anyway! Tom

They always used to have one on a suction cup, I know, I had one! If not, take the standard transducer and mount it on a small aluminium pole, this can be clamped to the transom when you need it and set at the required depth, when not in use, it is simply removed. The even simple way, is to to the same, but with a bit of wood. The transducer is simply screwed to the bit of wood, exactly as it is with the transom. The wood is clamped to the transom as and when needed. The downside to this method is tat if you use softwood it will only last a few sessions. Not a prob as it is such an easy fix. Tom

Allan Give MES a call in Poole. Cassie will answer the phone, but one of the lads will be able to help. If after speaking to them, they needed to have the unit, you could drop it to me and they can pick it up here as they are working here almost every day. Tom

Well done Paul! Nice fish and nice pictures. I have heard Utopia mentioned a few times. Could you let me know roughly where it is and I'll do the rest on my plotter? Thanks Tom PM if you'd prefer

Well done Duncan I knew you'd do it in the end. Perseverance Paid Off! Tom

Whilst in Alderney, Mark Bessant had a supply of single person 24 hour ration packs in various versions. You get Breakfast, Dinner, Chocolate, Biscuits, Sweets, Coffee, Pate and savoury biscuits, Soft drink powder (add water). These were brilliant and each 24 hour pack was in a small box of about 20cm x 15cm x 15cm weighing around 1.5kg. The hot meals were simply warmed up by sticking in the kettle or soaking in hot water for a while (Boil in the bag for want of a better word) and the rest was straight out of the pack stuff. They have a very long 6 or 7 year shelf life as they are all sealed in aluminium foil. Now we are not talking gourmet cooking here, but by eck he made me feel hungry when he was stuffing his face with Beef Stew and Dumplings or whatever it was... These things retail in Camping Shops at around

Try Undercover Awnings in Shirley, Southampton. They do tonnes of upholstery and covers etc for us and their work is top notch. Tom

I just wanted to thank Adam for all the hard work he did organising the trip. I know he had several frustrations pulling it together, but made a superb job of it! Although not officially on the trip directly, I'd also like to thank him for allowing Quest II and Phaeton crews to join in all the fun too. Cheers mate! Tom PS: Now, after my very genuine thank you to Adam, it has all gone very quiet from both the Franklin and Burt camps on their Alderney experiences.... ...I can only assume that they are waiting to have the photo's developed of all those fish!

Mike, this was due to the fact that they were always swimming faster than you were travelling....

Kam Allan

Allan Sent you a pm earlier... Any chance of some help too? Thanks Tom

Had a cracking Garmin unit which was as good as any other B&W. It took half a dozen big batteries and lasted ages. Transducer was on a suction cup. Think it was hardly anymore than a standard unit.

Nice boat Alun! Which model?

Hi Allan Wonderful bream mate. Everyone has been reporting tiddlers of sub 2lb and you spank a stack off like that! Well done. Tom

Can't fish unfortunately as I will be on a works cruise with customers from the Hamble to Salcombe that weekend. I may "buzz" a few of you though as we will be returning by Poole Sunday afternoon so if you see a 32 foot flybridge hurtling towards you at 30 knots followed by a small flotilla of Merry Fishers don't worry (or do worry it's me driving), wave in a cordial and friendly manner or with clenched fists if I get too close and swamp you with my wash. Good luck in the comp guys. Tom

Great write up Fred, you sure do have a way with words!

Nice pic Duncan, lovely fish mate. Mine were all tiddlers so I am well jealous!

PS: I appear to have hijacked your post "Alderney Double" I didn't mean to, sorry. Kind of happened last night when I was too tired to think about starting a new thread and posted in yours... That Brill of yours was something special. Wish we had found the bigger fish too. Tom

Hi Dan Alderney is well in club waters a steady 166 degrees south of Weymouth. Wait for Duncan's report as he did quite well on the last day, but it seems the club Brill record is higher than we first thought.... Tom

Nice meeting you BB and you are welcome onboard anytime we have space. It would be good to have a decent angler onboard unlike the crew I had to put up with during the week!!!!

Great write up Paul, you fished your t1ts off and deserve everything you got on Wednesday. Nice one mate. Looking forward to some more of the stories coming through from the rest of the team. I know Duncan now has a report after a rather hard first couple of days for him. Looking forward to seeing that, which should be with us soon. Tom

Quest II had a great time in Alderney. Much harder fishing than anyone expected, but we achieved every goal with the exception of Pollock, which, unusually for us, we failed on abismally. May 2nd saw us leaving Weymouth at about 06:15 trying to get an early start to beat the SE 5 that was blowing hard on the nose. Stopped at the Bill for no more than a few minutes and feathered up about 30 plump mackerel for bait and then set a course of 166 for our one and only planned stop, some 40 odd miles South. The weather seemed nasty, but bareable for the first 25 miles with our speed gradually reducing from 14 knots to about 10.5. Then the last 1/3 was really cr@p and we were taking a lot of "green water" so down we came and ran the rest of the way at about 9.5 knots. Our chosen "Pollock" mark in 330 foot of water was hard going. We arrived at about 10:00 and the wind was up making standing quite hard work. The drift was very fast and at about 3 knots was proving very tricky to manage in that depth and so after a couple of fruitless drifts we resigned ourselves to an early run in to Braye. Chris at "The Armoury" was surprised to see us when we rolled up at about 13:00 after a couple of quick ones at the Moorings. May 3rd saw us ignoring advoce and heading West to the Casquets where we dragged lumps of mackerel around for a fruitless few hours before heading down to the Schole to join the "car park" for about 14:00. After 3/4 hour steam through very dense fog we arrived ad instantly hit into Turbot with Mark bagging our best of the day at a smidge short of 8lb. Tally for the day, a hard worked 4 flatties. Mostly small, around 4lb, but Mark fantastically beat the club record for Brill with a lovely 5.5 pounder (wait for Duncan's report). On meeting the crew on Tiger Lily we heard their stories and immediately decided to work the Shole throughout the following day. May 4th saw us steaming to the Schole and being one of the first on the bank. Beaten only by Duncan on Phaeton who belted down their at warp factor 5. We chose to do our own thing and often found ourselves well away from the pack. I was trying to suss out the changing tide and setting us up on what seemed like good drifts and it worked! Reports were coming in of a real struggle onboard the professional boats with 5 to 12 fish coming from full compliments of crew and expert skippers. Quest II banged out a very creditable 9 flatties including another plump 5.5lb Brill to just 3 anglers. May 5th and we were on the boat for 08:00, but needed fuel and couldn't get on the berth until 09:30 so we enjoyed the glorious sunshine, had a coffee and relaxed wondering how Phaeton and Tiger Lily were both doing, both of which had headed off early. Due to our late departure we decided to head straight off over half way and steemed towards Portland some 29 miles only to find a trawler neatly circleing our wreck. No problem, the next was just 5 miles on so on we carried. As we arrived we were very surprised to see a Warrior 175 on the mark. This wreck was well over 23 miles off the Bill, but the weather was stunning and the guys looked like they knew what they were doing. We had a quick chat with them to find that they were really struggling and after 2 more drifts they pushed off. A quick chat with my crew to explain tactics and that Ling were the quarry and we all dropped down short traces, 6/0 hooks and fillets of mackerel into over 200 feet of water. I snagged the wreck and lost my gear, Mark was still sussing how this wrecking malarky worked and Malcolm hooked into a very small Ling of about 5lb. Next drift saw the largest Pouting you have ever seen to my rod, but not much else so a quick check of the mark and I set the next drift a little north of my numbers. BANG, at first I thought I was into a Conger as the drift was only just over a knot, but after several minutes of grunting and groaning and a very nice 19lb Ling lay on the surface waiting for Mark to net it. Several more Ling came to the boat including a couple of doubles with Mark bagging his first at over 10lb. After getting just enough for the ice box we moved on to another wreck abut 19 miles off the Bill. This was supposed to be a dead cert Pollock mark, but nothing and after three or four drifts with virtually no tide we headed for the Bill to bag some fresh mackerel and had a few bonus Herring too. Hard, but successful fishing, great company and a very enjoyable time. Thanks to my crew, Mark and Malcolm and, the crew of Phaeton and the crew of Tiger Lily for making the trip very memorable. Tom

Hi John and welcome to PBSBAC forum. Great bunch of guys and loads of useful info. Can't stop, I'm off to Alderney!.....

Well The weather hasn't changed in the last few hours, still giving the same on all the sites with a lumpyish crossing expected, with gradually improving days over there. Quest II is full of fuel and well over 100 litres spare stacked precariously wedged in the heads (complete with my overnight bag so if I honk of diesel all week, sorry ). Ice collected from Weyfish and a few assorted odds and sods from WAC purchased. If anyone fancies joining us, we are getting breakfast at the ferry port cafe at 06:30 tomorrow morning. If not, may bump into you on the quay side, mid channel or later in Braye. .....Ooooh I am all excited now! Tom