A Summer Featuring Lots Of Fishing

**Collaborative post**

The summer holidays have flown by far too quickly, at the end of the school year with 6 weeks looming ahead it seemed rather scary especially when I had to fit in working around the children being home, but we are now in the final week, uniform shopping has been done and everything is ready for the back to school return.

Well, almost everything – getting back into a routine of sleeping will have to resume pretty quickly – I’m sure we aren’t alone with the late nights and sleeping in, only Emmy has taken that a little too far and has turned on teenager mode: sleeping in until gone lunchtime, missing breakfast in the process and raiding the fridge in the early hours of the morning having not yet gone to sleep.

This summer we calmed things down a little, it was too hot to do too much and we really needed some downtime to relax and unwind. We have had playdates and days out and still managed to fit in 2 mini holidays, one caravan holiday with my parents and a glamping weekend visiting Paul’s family in Norfolk.

Both holidays have seen the kids fishing, a favourite pastime of theirs and a passion for both Grandad’s. My Dad sadly doesn’t fish anymore due to his deteriorating health issues. He used to fish loads when I was a child and we spent family weekends on the river fishing (Mum watching while knitting with Dad, my brother and myself fishing), we would have picnics and spend the whole day by the river. While my Dad still enjoys fishing it has been a long time since he was able to partake himself – limited to just holidays if the onsite lakes are disabled-friendly. Paul’s Dad, on the other hand, has upped the amount of time he spends fishing since moving to Norfolk – his house overlooks the river and he has his own fishing jetty opposite the house, and his own boat.

For those looking to explore more extensive fishing opportunities, particularly in a coastal setting, Santa Rosa Beach offers exceptional fishing charters. The serene waters and diverse marine life make it a perfect destination for both novice and avid anglers alike.

While holidaying with Grandad Fishing (Paul’s Dad – the kids have always called him Grandad Fishing) in Norfolk, we glamped 10 minutes away from his house, visiting to celebrate his wife’s 50th birthday. Following the party, we returned to their house the following day with plans to fish, however, the kids were distracted by his pool and we spent an afternoon swimming and then went out on his boat. While we swam, Grandad made the kids up some new rigs for their fishing whips and got our equipment ready for fishing the following day.

He has a purpose-built tackle room in his garden, as well as half of his garage decked out for his rods. The tackle room has everything he needs to prepare for his fishing trips – a dedicated fridge and freezer for bait, tables and lamps for making up rigs and preparing/repairing rods etc. He can store all his bait such as boilie base mixes, maggots, sweetcorn, etc safely away from the house, as let’s face it, fishing equipment comes with its own unique smells!

The following day the kids fished from his jetty, sadly the weather changed and the temperature dropped which meant the fish weren’t really playing ball and hid away. They did manage to get a few bites each and landed a couple of small fish and each hooked a big one but Harry’s disappeared with his hook and Emmy’s unhooked before we could get the net within reach. It never puts Emmy off fishing if she doesn’t catch anything but Harry quickly becomes bored and gives up.

As it was quiet, Grandad got out his Flyfishing rod for Emmy to have a go with. He has recently started Flyfishing and loves it, and Emmy and myself both learnt to Flyfish on a holiday recently and she loved it so much.

That fishing trip was a complete contrast to when we went on a caravan holiday with my parents staying on a site which had 2 fishing lakes. We took the children’s whips with us so they could spend some time fishing. As we only went for a long weekend we packed lightly and took only sweetcorn with us to fish with – well it turned out that was all they actually needed. We found a perfect fishing spot and they didn’t stop catching fish the whole time.

They spent 2 and a half hours fishing on Saturday and 2 hours on Sunday, catching a whopping 66 fish between the 2 of them in that time. They fished in the shallows near an area of weeds and for most of that time as soon as the bait hit the water they hooked a fish almost immediately. It was actually hilarious to watch, they pulled out fish after fish almost constantly and they couldn’t stop smiling and laughing.

As soon as Paul sat down and tried to read his book, another fish was hooked, a lot of the time we had to both help take the fish off the hooks as they both caught simultaneously. Mostly they hooked small fish as they were fishing in the swallows and in the weeds but a couple were a rather good size.

The joys of fishing with kids are they are happy with whatever size fish they catch, whereas adults strive for the biggest and catching one 20-30lber makes them happy, kids are happy with the smallest and turn it into a competition to see who can catch the most – well mine certainly do anyway.

We are planning a few more fishing trips locally soon and they can’t wait.