Holiday Guernsey 2009

Ask Gloworm about that story It happened on his way home after the Herm night!

P.S. Thanks for the Ormer shells and Pashmina!

Evening chaps and chappets, got home a while ago after a funky crossing on the fast cat with plenty of grey faced peeps and a lot of full sea sick bags. The Dorset crew stood up to the challenge well with packs of crisps, burgers, pots of soup and lots of coffee.
Twas indeed a week to remember with superb food good wine and even better company, top marks to Mart and Sarah for all the hard work they put in with the evening meals and organising of festivities and to the Sarnians for the Demon Ice Cream and the company, Dave as ever you’re a world of knowledge and a top bloke and Derek is “The Man” and most definitely the Don of the Island, was nice to catch up the Jonny 250 family and good luck with the whole golf bit to Mrs 250.
Although the weather was again a bit of a bugger it’s not all about the fishing it’s a whole Guernsey experience that counts for me, and it don’t come much better than the lads have shown us this year.
Really Big thanks to one and all that got evolved with our visit.
As for the dodgy bloke and the female cyclist there was also a kidnapped Iran lad but I’ll let john tell the story of that one.:friday:fridayroflrofl

The Spaniard clan will be back next year and I will be able to load a 2 metre bluewater gun with 6 bands so watch out all you invisible bass!

The crayfish was great, a first for me, but the lobster was fantastic! I need an approximate recipe for your 'hot sauce' as I dreamt about it last night..:t

Our little soiree tonight with a mere 8lb bass was no comparison, but still stuffing it with guernsey butter, parsley, rosemary, garlic, ginger and lime and an hour in foil in the barbie seemed to work OK. may post pics later.

I agree Spaniard, all those sauces were amazing. I think we all need to open a restaurant - even if we were the only customers!

Pics now attached. There was enough to feed 10, and the cooking method seemed to work OK, although it may even have needed to be cooked for less time at a lower temperature. It ended up being over an hour, and the barbie temperature was mostly around 200, although I tried to keep it lower than that, and was aiming for just an hour. It was then left for about half an hour in the foil, during which it may have continued cooking. Unfortunately there were no juices left, which I was aiming to pour off and pass around to go over the fish.

Anyway it went down OK, with a beetroot salad made by a friend, a bean salad with fresh green and white beans from the show, and boiled potatoes from a friend's garden.
For starters we had Guernsey smoked mackerel, and finished off with a selection of Guernsey cheeses, including a new blue cheese. I also made a dessert with peaches from the Normandy market which came over, in sauternes and lavender.

Top marks & cooking I have been wanting to try that peaches recipe, was it as good as it sounds?

Can't remember where I saw it, but yes it was very good, makes all the difference if you can get fresh French peaches though, or at least white flesh ones.

twas on the cookery program "From What to Eat Now" with Valentine Warner - I will give it a go

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/peachesinsauternes_91630.shtml

Cheers mate - excellent. I had forgotten about the lemon rind, and substituted Guernsey cream for creme fraiche!

Stella(r) Nights!

Finally back in front of a decent PC and keyboard after an amazing week!

Starting with the expedition to the usually underwater islands to my final successful dip in the swimming pool it was all brilliant, as were the stars, of which there seemed to be twice as many than usual - wonder why?

Thanks one again to all our gracious hosts, and of course, to the visiting, highly appreciative, companions.

Things didn't start that well, when despite Mart's and Derek's pictures of the glorious weather, the vis at the Humps turned out to be pretty naff, as pretty much everywhere all year.

Nosing around in the weed though, I saw a couple of Greys, which raised expectations a bit. Nothing compared to the dangling though, as we pulled out 5 or 6 mackerel at a go. Fed the 5000 on Monday night no problem!

Is fresh mackerel fillet in the top 5 best tasting fish - I think it might be.

First dive with the guys was in average conditions, which turned to be good in the end. Seeing none of the suggested lobsters, conger, and certainly no bass, when I came across a petite but elegant mullet nibbling at some weed he had to be the one. And he was. With no one getting owt on the remaining dives I was amazed to end up the fish-in winner. Thanks guys for the neat prize and to Dave for the trophy.

Still enjoying being on the Island after the others had returned I figured I should do what I had travelled there for ( apart from eat and drink )

A study of the crashing surf ( see Dave's pics ) on the west coast revealed only one potential location - the fabled swimming pool.

Sheltered on all sides at the right tide state, the surface was only being whipped into small waves by the wind, so in I went.

Finally - some vis! Up to 5 metres in places. I was almost hypnotised by being able to see stuff beyond the end of the gun. And I did. First bass was head first into some weed. What to do? Guess where the head is? Shoot the tail end? Wait for it to emerge? Make a small disturbance and see it disappear? You guessed it.

Adrenaline cut in now though, and the 5ft depth of the pool seemed as nothing! Next bass I saw may well have been the same fellow, parked right by the side of, and parallel to, my gun as I emerged from some stringweed. No chance.

The big fellow was part hidden behind a kelp frond, and luckily he chose to emerge from it in the wrong direction - for him.

Handling the creature is dead easy when you can stand up - I
thoroughly recommend it. 5 pounds 4 ounces on Dave's scales, and my personal best. Expertly filleted in a few seconds by Dave, it now awaits consumption by our good hosts. Hope you enoy it as much as I did.

Thanks once again to all, and I hope to meet up with at least some of you again soon.

More pics when I can find the blooming interface lead.

Cheers
Birchy ( all right your lordship?)

I think another successful event. At least despite not very good diving conditions.

While Birchy was still here I went off for a few days to London to see the sites and take in the last showing of the full size anamatronics dinosaur show. Very good it was too.

Back today to rain and gales. Good news for me anyway is my ear finally seems okay after nearly 2 months.

Itching to get in again. Maybe, just maybe the weekend.

Dave.

I know that i'm pretty ignorant as to the best times of year for spearing here, but looking back over the last few years June seems to be the best month for the most reliable conditions..? 2008 had some bad vis, but even so there were bass reports through June. My impression is that July - August just get windy and can be good, but perhaps there's more luck involved in whether the weather is good...?