Uhh where to start .....it was a pretty intense 5 days behind. Still buzzing really much , made so many memories thats incredible. Met with all the people who I knew in some shape or form by social media and many others who dont do social media. As a first women who entered it , by the day came closer and closer to the competition my excitement turned into "I really started s@@@t myself ...what I gonna do between all those fishermens like one tiny girl, what if they not talking to me or laugh on me"....but tell you one thing I didn't felt any different between them, perhaps everybody came over to introduce and shake hands and change story's and memories ....everybody was a super friendly gentlemen...thank you guys!
So I was like "oke this is really cool " hahaha the next big butterfly in the stomach was the following morning when we arrived to the boat checks, there was so many cool boats its incredible! You guys really pulled out the big guns.....die hard lure anglers, I was really happy to see that, I love my lures and tackle myself so much. So another scary moment went past....and if you think its easy to compete against all those super anglers, you are already wrong! But at the same time you itching to get to the start line and head off to the spots and just waiting tense to hear Mr. Molenaar say " GOOOOOO!!!!" And all the engines fired up and booooom off we go!! Super absolute loved it the start!
I thought its all gonna be secret how we getting on , but everybody asked as we float past like "how you getting on" so in the middle of the comp you have some ideas about you doing bad or not. Hahaha which was silly of me because at the end of the day you will see the score charts anyway.
My favourite moment was when we found a shoal of perch under the boat and I nailed my PB 32 cm Derg perch.....deep down in 60ft of water, I loved it like in real tournament style, first small lures send down charge up the smaller ones so if any bigger one around they will bite because they really competitive about food, so in a second after a few 25+cm I changed my 3 inch lure to a 15cm shad and send it down ...then boom my rod is doubled over, then again and again, I couldn't believe it its all happened less than 5 min, there must be some monster perch down there because lost one which i couldn't moved off from the bottom at all with a 28g lure rod, will be back after them soon!
On the pike screen we didn't do very well only jack and on the 3rd day I lost all the dozen fish I hooked.....its a really tough game where every inch is count and loosing a fish not a good omen like...but that's fishing as they say. Even lost our trout as well on the troll so really I think I was just really really unlucky and no idea why.
Fishing wise it was a slow days for everybody but they still manage catch some good fish and all the teams was so happy when fish was in the boat finally....at the end this is what it is all about and you can see it on the faces, I was over the moon with my 2x pike and 3x super perch too hahaha didn't go far with them on the ranking at the end but they made my day.
And the battle was started all over again next day, but before that of course heading to the pub and between a few pints and dinner the banter was flowing. Secretly this was my favorite part, probably because the fishing was slow and all the cool conversations totally made up for it at the end of the day. Shared and heard lots of big fish memories and lots of tackle talk, exchange some info about fishing from different parts of Ireland, I love travelling and fishing around Ireland and so many places I heard about so im really looking forward in the future to catch up with you guys and fish together for a day or two one day.
Tried to squeeze as much picture as I could at least one from each team but there are lots of pictures up so here is a few of the boats..they class like, loved the start when we all head off, next year will bring the drone down and record the start from the air will look super cool .
The prize giving presentation was one of the best thing ever really.....we had local ladys playing live Irish music from the start 7pm all away trough dinner, it was amazing like everybody together sit down to get dinner with an entertainment like that ..... perfectly represented the "Irish atmosphere" loved every second of it :D
Some fun pictures of the organizers .....massive massive thank you to Herman Molenaar to put this event together, I really really enjoyed every minute locked together with all those crazy fishermens!
I had another unforgettable holiday from the beautiful Lough Derg and Killaloe!
SEE YOU GUYS NEXT YEAR!!! :D
Tight Lines: Gina
