On the other side of the pond

Since 2008 I have been lucky enough to have a week’s carp fishing on the St Lawrence Seaway. For the past two years I have fished the American side of the river courtesy of Jerry and Marcy Laramay who run “American Carp Adventures”
(www. allamericanangler.com). The first year I stayed with Paul Hunt and his wife who run “Canadian Carpin”. If you have read my piece on that trip you will know that I had a couple of minor issues with swim suitability which I am not going to repeat, you need read it for yourself. However first I need to give you a history lesson.

Some time ago a bunch of civil engineers built some dams in a valley on the North American/Canadian boarder. This valley was flooded and the St Lawrence Seaway was born. This allowed ocean going ships to travel inland to places in the USA and Canada where they previously could not reach. Carp were introduced to control the weed. The carp thrived and “surprise” so did the weed. The runs water, of all runs waters had now been conceived. History lesson over!

The St Lawrence carp are usually easy to catch, but do not think it is always a fish a chuck. To get the big hits you generally have to work at it. Regular casting of two rods, about every twenty minutes and spodding maize at the same rate is needed to keep the fish interested. You need to adopt a match fishing style on this river. There are big fish, but do not run away with the idea that you are going to catch them, you might, but I had 83 fish last September in six 10 hour days, this was topped by my best USA fish of 30lb 4oz but I only had four or five other fish over the twenty pound mark. What you will get is some of the hardest fighting carp you can imagine and when you do hit a big one you will know all about it. I need to mention here that the USA rod licence covers two rods and the cost is $35 a week. In Canada the licence only allows you to fish with one. Before someone says something stupid there are times when the river is moody or you cannot find where your feed has landed in 35 feet of moving water at a range of 50 yards and then two rods are a definite bonus.

The Laramays run a very successful motel business on the banks of the St Lawrence at Massena. Although they cater for anglers they no longer have the need to advertise.
Full board and self catering option prices are on their website and all bookings are conducted by email or by telephone. I can only tell you about the full board option in the motel area (there is a newly built bunk house) as that is the one I have experienced.
The rooms have good cooking facilities and a large fridge freezer. All breakfast food requirements are supplied but if you want a cooked breakfast you cook it and wash up yourself. One thing you need to take into account is that the transport pick up to get you to your swims leaves at about 7 o’clock by road to the local launch slip and then a short, fast boat ride to your designated swim. A substantial cool bag packed lunch is supplied and a well cooked evening meal completes the day.

You need to purchase any alcoholic or specific soft drinks from the supermarket on day one. These are not included in the price.

Arrival dates need to be agreed in advance. Your flight will take you into a Canadian airport from where one of the Laramays team will drive you across the border into the USA and to Massena. I have flown into Montreal and Ottawa. Watch out for beer prices on your return journey. Two pints of Heineken cost me $24. The Laramays have a travel consultant in England, Kirsty Williams, she is very good and arranged some excellent deals for me. Again the Laramays will supply the details. If you have a choice I highly recommend Air Canada for both comfort and hospitality.

I first heard about American Carp Adventures at one of the Lakeside shows. Well, not so much heard as someone thrust a flier into my hand and twenty fruitless minutes followed as I tried to find out who it was. Anyway, emails and telephone calls followed and my first trip with the old bird was arranged for that August. Jerry knows some very suitable bank side spots, and all of them allow you a certain amount of freedom so that you can stretch your legs a little. All the ones I fished were fairly “lady friendly” although in one of them, on the last trip we both had very wet feet from the wash of a boat while netting a fish. Jerry had pre-baited several swims with maize prior to my visit, the river definitely responds to a constant baiting programme. Both the Dutch clients and I definitely benefited from this, and although the two of them did not catch as many fish as I did, they had the bigger ones.

Your host will supply you with a bucket of maize each day, at least one third of this he deposits into the swim for you before you leave the boat. He also has a supply of leads and clips although I strongly recommend you take a good supply of your own in the 4 to 5 oz range, especially if you want inline leads. You also need to take your own end tackle, forceps, baiting needles etc. I can only tell you what I used on the last trip, which was size 4 Atomic Claw hooks, Rigmarole’s 25lb gravel coloured hydrolink and gravel coloured lead core. Other items worth taking with you are, a good quantity of plastic corn in various colours and sizes, a selection of pineapple pop ups and two kilo of pineapple boilies. It has just struck me that 35 feet is about 10 metres which would put one atmosphere of pressure on a pop up, so does it pop up? There was a time when I could have found out. I will have to ask some of my diving friends, however, I digress!
Rods, reels, landing nets, weigh sling, un-hooking mat, spods, extendable bank sticks, alarms, scales (although I take my own) and bags are all supplied. A selection of boots and waders are also available.

I found the landing net poles very flimsy and I broke a couple. A bank stick has the same thread and this saved the day for me on more than one occasion. I have a Shimano travel net and I now take this as well. Some of the reels had also seen better days. Just check them prior to leaving the motel on your first day. This year I took my Shimano 12 foot 6 piece 3lb TC travel rods. I am very pleased with these rods, but I did not like using them with 5oz leads or in thick weed. So in future I think I will stick with the rods Jerry supplies.

Most of the swims we fished had a fairly long shallow area before it dropped into the boat channel. To try to counter the obvious cut off problem, I arranged my rods as perpendicular as possible, however this rendered the Delkims useless. Again this was not a problem as a bouncing rod with bait runner screaming is easy to spot. Also I tried to play the fish out in the channel before bringing them into the shallows. One piece of weed attached to the heavy braid or trapped in rocks would render all these precautions useless. That is my reason for using inline leads, mine are safe as possible, but you are entitled to disagree.

This is not intended to be anything other than my experience and thoughts. I am not putting forward myself as any type of expert. If this helps you I will have achieved my aim. I also hope it prevents you making some of the mistakes that I have made on my cross channel adventures. I hope you get the chance to fish the St Lawrence, either in Canada or the USA. I really enjoy fishing the river and will be planning a return trip next year and hopefully the following year and…………….