Hit the beach

A recent trip to the Lincolnshire coast with the family during late August, so inevitably I packed suitable tackle for some sea fishing. This consisted of an old Shakespeare beachcaster and large fixed spool reel loaded with 20lb mono.  Terminal tackle consisted of bits and bobs I'd collected over the years, including a whole pulley rig and weight I'd found while jumping over waves with my daughter in Cornwall earlier this summer.

I researched the fishing in the area and found that, commercial carp puddles aside, the best option would be to try for the smoothhounds that swim these waters at this time of year.  As soon as I got chance I visited the local tackle shop and bought some more rigs, wired gripper leads, bait elastic and some frozen soft crabs for the hook, not ideal maybe but with little time free for hunting out my own peelers, it was bait at least (more on bait later).

I headed for Chapel Point first as it was one of the recommended marks in some of the articles I'd read about on this stretch of coast.
I fished for about two hours up to high tide but the session ended with nothing to report, still it gave me a feel of how to deal with the roll of the waves and the casting distances though. 
An old chap down on holiday from Scunthorpe stopped for a chat while walking his dog along the beach, as a seasoned Smoothhound angler himself he gave me a few good tips, one of them being about bait.  He recommended Morrisons as the best place to go for their fresh Mackerel, squid and even langoustines if you can get them, good peelers are still a prime bait but not absolutely necessary, noting that these are all good baits for Smoothies if they are on the feed. ( if only I'd known this a day or so earlier !)

Next day and I still hadn't been able to get to Morrisons.  I tried another area nearby at Huttoft using the soft crab again, the old boy told me of a sweeping channel to try at the end of the car park, so I headed there. 

I was at least confident of being in a good area, my bait cast about 50 yards out as suggested but after another couple of hours blanking at the top of the tide I left empty handed again.  I suppose I felt a bit like being in the banker swim when Barbel fishing and still drawing a blank, you know the rod could hoop over any minute so the anticipation level is kept up.  Fishing being the natural time warp that it is, before you know it it's time to pack up again.
I wasn't alone in my lack of sport though, I met another angler in the car park who told me that there had been no smoothies caught for a few days now, as they must have moved out to deeper water while the weather had been a bit too rough for them inshore recently.   Despite the blank I enjoyed my first real attempt at beachcasting and shall be giving it another go when I can get back here, especially as I can have the use of the in laws caravan.