ALL FOGGED OUT

Many of our fishing matches were held on the river Trent and this particular match was in late November on a very cold and foggy morning. After a trouble free pick up the bus made for Newark on Trent and on the way the fog we had around our area gradually got thicker and as we approached the River Trent to see more than ten meters was difficult.

At last we arrived at the car park at Winthorpe and started to unload our fishing tackle and after being so long on the bus we all were keen to get going. Bert was first and stumbled into the pea soup fog, after going a short distance he was lost to us.

Having now all got our tackle we proceed in the direction of voices of others making for the river that we knew was somewhere in front of us. A long single file crocodile of men all carrying fishing tackle was now moving forward to find the river.

A voice in the distant fog shouted “I’ve found the water it’s over here follow me.”
Sure enough he had found the water and we all moved on following the person in front of you looking for the peg number that each man had drawn to be his fishing place. We all walked on with different men shouting out information on what he was finding: “ No peg numbers yet but I’m still looking” came a voice “ The pegs should be somewhere around here.”
We still walked on. Suddenly I heard someone behind me and being the last man to leave the bus l turned around and was greeted by Bert, the first man to start for the river.
“ How did you get behind me Bert?” I asked him. “How do I know? he replied “ I found the river and have been following the river bank ever since.”

We stopped and suddenly it dawned on us. Bert had stumbled on the waters edge in in the thick fog, assumed it to be the river but instead he had found the bank of one of the large trout lakes by the side of the river and for the past 30 minutes we had all been in single file walking around a lake and the river was a 100 meters further on.

We did find the river but the walk around the lake proved to the the laugh of the day and for weeks to come at work the joke was on Bert.