My Experience of 'Canadian Carpin' by Graham

This story begins in February in Gran Canaria and finishes in August at Iroquois, on the banks of The St Lawrence River. These are my views on a very special angling experience and to point out to you some of the things I may have missed in the 'small print'.

I was sitting on the balcony of our hotel room in Puerto Rico, catching up with the reading of my carp comics, when I came across an article by Steve Briggs entitled, I think, 'Canadian Carpin'. The picture with the feature was of a pod containing carp rods pointing skywards like some sort of strange anti aircraft battery. That however was not all, in the background of the photograph was a massive ocean going oil tanker. I cannot remember much about the article but on completion I knew that I had to go. Most of all I wanted a picture of me with that set up and the oil tanker. The 'Canadian Carpin' trip is run by husband and wife team, Paul and Lisa Hunt. Paul is the guide and Lisa does the domestic side. Hot, plentiful evening meals are served at about 8pm every night. You can night fish, the carp we were told feed well during the hours of darkness but no one chose to. Other groups had 'bagged up' and caught some better fish by fishing at night. Remember though you are there all night (read on). Everyone is supplied with a cool box and food for lunch but breakfast is up to you to organise in the visitor's kitchen. I have rushed on here so let's go back to the start.

I think Paul takes a maximum of 12 guests per week. The accommodation is his manor house on the banks of the river. The rooms are comfortable and clean but I thought they were small and not en suite. There is an upstairs bathroom which was reserved for the ladies and two showers and toilets downstairs for the men to use. Every guest travels from Gatwick on the same Thomas Cook flight and Paul picks you up in Ottawa. The transfer takes about an hour. Paul supplies rods, reels (loaded with 80lb braid), and a tackle bag. The bag contains some 4 ounce in line leads, unhooking mats, baiting needles, weigh sling, scales, a bite alarm and a few other assorted bits. Hooks you can either buy or bring. Paul can sell you 6 claw hooks, 40lb braid hook links, large flavoured maize and boilies. If I was to go again I would take 30lb Stonze Snag for hook links. One thing that I liked about the claw hooks was that they could be 'tickled' with a stone when blunt.

Now here is the first catch; the Canadian rod license only allows you to fish with one rod. The on the spot fine is about 75 dollars for using more. The second catch - and you definitely need to be aware of this - is that all the swims are double swims and if you go solo or your group consists of an odd number you may have to buddy up with another member of the group. There is of course the chance you will not get on with this person so let me explain more. Three of the swims are roughly 2 metre square wooden platforms located along the side of the river bank, parallel to the boat channel which is behind the bank and adjacent to the Iroquois dam. The land is private; you can stand in the water but not on the land. Each day Paul boats you to your swim and you are there for about 12 hours. You do have a walkie talkie so you can communicate with the house. These swims are not therefore particularly lady friendly. I took 'the old bird' with me as a non angler which meant that for 3 and a half days she could not be with me. I asked Paul to bring her up to my platform one afternoon and we sat through a thunderstorm together. I wound the rods in and held the brolly in place. As I had paid for two spaces I was entitled to a double swim to myself. I think this caused a bit of jealousy as I received a strange remark from one member of the group. I ignore it and just decided to catch more and bigger fish than the rest, and I did so without fishing the last day.

Basically, these platforms are tight for two anglers. One rod each or three between you would be ideal and rod share (play alternative takes). For this reason alone I suggest you go with someone that you get on well with. Each swim is supplied with a large bucket of fermented maize per day and a spod rod. For hook bait I used two or three pieces of giant flavoured maize topped with giant plastic corn. Others used boilies as well as maize. I was catching too well on my bait so decided 'if it's not broke why fix it'. May and October are the times for big fish, but I was told October can be very cold but the fish still feed. The St Lawrence freezes over in the winter. In May, Paul will sort out the spawning areas for you to attack. Swims are rotated daily, with the plan being as far as possible to let the strugglers have the best spots. As far as I am aware none of our group struggles too much. I think I caught more than the rest because I listened to Pauls advice early on and match fished the river, spodding regularly and casting every 20 minutes or so. The bites were savage and the fights were the strongest I have known.

The USA is probably half a mile across the river and every fish tried to get there. You hook a fish at 20 metres and started gaining line at 100. On my best day I landed 20 common carp to 28lb and that was the day of the storm when I stopped fishing for 2 hours. The worst was when we fished an untried downstream swim so that 'old bird' could come. I think I had 8 to mid doubles. The biggest of the week went 33lb 5 ounces and was an absolute stunner. I landed 76 carp in all, 19 of which were over the 20lb mark with three of the fish clearing 28lb and that was in 6 twelve hour days. According to Paul, on a bad week you are still likely to get 25 fish. Swims being baited prior to fishing helps but there had been no guests the week before we arrived and I had to wait two hours for my first fish. The rigs were running in line leads with no leaders or tube. After catching a couple of fish with red sides I made up some lead core leaders and cured this problem. I had brought my own tube, lead core and weigh scales.

With the rapidly changing weather that you can encounter, clothing wise you need to be able to deal with anything from the very cold to the pleasantly warm and from the very dry to the very wet. Other essentials include mosquito repellent and anti histamine paste. Allergy tablets are very good for stopping the itching from bites. Mosquitoes for us were mainly a problem early morning and late in the day.

The other activity close by is a fairly flat but interesting 18 hole course, which is pay as you go and I am told has a fairly relaxed dress code. Lisa will take any interested ladies to a shopping mall one day and they took 'the old bird' to an old type Canadian village that had all the traditional crafts, again very good I am told.

For further information I suggest you go to www.canadiancarpin.com. Also look for late deal. One of the lads paid £200 less than I did. There you have it, I thoroughly enjoyed the trip. Paul and Lisa certainly delivered! Incidentally, both have had high 40's from the river although they rarely fish now. Paul told us that he would not be able to single out the big fish and the only way of catching them was to catch whatever came along. Face it, if you were catching 200 carp a week you would certainly get sick of it at some stage! Would I do it again? Yes. Will I do it again? I don't know. It is not cheap but that is not what is holding me back. Being partnered with someone who is not prepared to work as a team would. Did I get the pictures I wanted? You bet I did!