Sea trials on the Revolution 16

OK, so it was fishing session but also the first time at sea on the Revo. Don't let the comedians tell you any different. The Clyde as we all know is not alive ,but it can be better than it was today, it's March after all. One small Pollack and a Coalie that might have scraped 1.5 pounds between them. What fish there were seemed to be tight on the bottom around four or five rocky outcrops on the shoreline. The biggest problem for me today was the reflected waves, very tricky indeed with the fish being tight to shoreline.

There were a few bigger waves rolling in during the day due to a navel exercise.

If it was as calm as it was when as I drove home I might have been able to pick up a few more with a little precision fishing. 9.5 miles today and a good few hours in the saddle of the new boat. I met a few people on the water today which was nice, lot's of yaks but no yak anglers. I had a decent chat with a guy in a boat that fishes here regularly he wasn't having much joy either. Onwards and upwards.....

It was my first soft beach retrieval today. It was so much easier than the Outback. Some of this is certainly down to not carrying two 12v SLA batteries. So far so good on the FPV battery set up , the weight saving and upgrade on power is making a difference, really pleased with this. 

Launch Day

It was about time I got back on the water , having finished rigging the Revo 16 a few weeks back I opted for Saturday to give it a shake-down. I had booked some digs for Saturday night as Lynne would join me in the afternoon and hit the road at 7am.

The first thing I noticed when I got to loading the Revo on my car was that despite the increase in length ,compared to the Outback, was how much easier it was. This was mainly down to the decrease in width but the slight drop in weight helped also. As I did the cam straps up I had a lot more spare strap to wrap, that got me thinking about stability as I drove to the loch. The first few minutes were a bit edgy, a bit like the first time I launched the Outback. Turning to get something from my crate needed a lot more thought, I could take liberties in my old boat. The turbo fins had a lot more resistance but pushed me along nicely. The Lowrance now being mounted in the centre worked just fine, it was easily reached by dropping a leg over each side, that does means I'll be making less adjustments. Not normally a bad thing but for today, not that handy at all as Perch fishing means a fair amount of sounder time. I checked inside the hull after fifteen minutes, thankfully it was dry so I was good to go.

The water level was high, the fishing was hard and the wind was gusting 15-20mph at times.I only had two small Perch by 1pm. I got a few GPS numbers from my mate Les and went for a look at them. Getting there at 5mph, was pretty cool, something that I could only do for a very short sprint in the Outback. Sadly, there wasn't anything doing. Now I'm not sure why, but when I used to fish here a lot ,the fish seem to have a 3-4pm bite. I had another couple of smallish Perch but the last fish of the day was more like it.

It's nearly that time for this fish and it's mates.

Hopping a Texas rigged Yum crayfish was the only thing I caught with on this trip. I didn't target Perch last year so it was nice to get a few at least.

Overall I was happy with the new boat. I just need to make a few minor adjustments and remember it's not an Outback...

The hound does her version of a Usain Bolt victory salute, she oddly lay like that for 5 mins.