Contributed by Donald Walker (copyright)

1960s again saw my wife and I taking our holidays in the Lake District. We camped this time, using a small two-man tent. It was cosy though, mind you we were relatively newly weds. Now this took place before I became a serious fisherman and I didn't have a fishing rod with me, but the tale does have a fishy theme to it.

I have found over the years that the Lake District is a bit like Scotland, it seems to get more than its fair share of rain. I can only think that it's something to do with the mountains and hills. Don't get me wrong though, I love both these areas, and if I were given a choice of holiday between UK and abroad, I would probably choose UK. Our first day in the lakes and its raining. It was getting towards evening so we were looking for a place to pitch our tent. We had spent the day around Lake Windermere and were now bumping down a rutted track on the far side about opposite Bowness. The rain had now stopped which was a good job because the bumps had knocked the exhaust pipe off and I had to lie on the ground to fix it. We found a nice little spot right on the shore and put the tent up. This was idyllic and we settled down for the evening to a little cooking and relaxation, oh and swat a few hundred flies. At 3am next morning my wife awoke me, she said something was wrong. I felt around for the torch and discovered we were surrounded by water and our airbeds were floating. The only way out of the tent was the deep end so we struggled out to find the water in the lake had risen overnight with all the recent rain. All we could do was pack up and spend the rest of the night in the car.

Next morning the rain had moved off and it promised to be a fine warm day. A good job really, to dry us out. We moved on to a new lake, Wast Water and put the tent up to dry out. Later that afternoon we were approached by two fishermen who had been pike fishing in the lake. They offered us a pike of about 9 or lOlbs saying how nice it was cooked, so we took it and jolly nice it was too. We didn't eat it all, it was too much. Next morning we were awakened by the fishermen who had apparently been night fishing. Without actually asking us if we wanted another pike they left one on our doorstep and went. Well pike for a meal is all right but I wouldn't want it two days running. However, we packed up to move on, putting the fish in the back of the car. It was another warm day and a few hours later the fish began to smell. It got so bad we thought we would just have to get rid of it and when we stopped at a bridge over a little stream we dropped it into the water, the thinking being that something would eat it. Just then a coach pulled up to let its passengers stretch their legs, so I hung about to see if anybody noticed the fish. Sure enough, one person spotted it with a shout, and in no time flat the whole coach load of them were milling round speculating on the presence of that fish.

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