With all the hot weather this summer I started looking online for a tent and thought about a camping and fishing trip. First, I bought this two-person tent, and spent the night in the tent the first weekend after it was delivered, the first night I'd spent under canvas for years. After buying the tent online, I saw this vintage British-made 'Safari' canvas camp bed for sale locally and paid a fiver for it. I've seen them online for sale for between £40 and £60. These camp bed

Alas, no fishing this month; however, I have been looking at vintage tackle for sale and saw this beauty! These float tubes appear for sale online quite regularly, and I've wanted one for a while. I've procrastinated, waiting for one at the 'right price', and when this one came up for sale, I thought the 20-plus quill floats were a nice bonus. A great addition to my collection.

This month I bought another job lot of tackle. I've been looking for another tackle wallet for a while as the canvas one I had was a bit small. The tackle wallet in this lot was a good size, with plenty of room for floats and sections for shot, weights and swim feeders. There was also an EFGEECO hook wallet, which was something else I've been looking for. Other items which interested me were the wooden line winder, tin bait box and disgorger with a nice wooden handle. The two

The first cast of the year was on a wet Sunday afternoon at Stenson Bubble. I've increased my work hours recently, so I haven't had any chance to wet a line this year. Life does get in the way of fishing sometimes! Although the weather wasn't very good and I blanked, it was nice to be out again.

I haven't managed to go fishing this month, so I thought I'd share one of my favourite vintage videos, the Woodbine Challenge from 1973 on the River Guden in Denmark.

I haven't managed to get out fishing this month, so I thought I'd show you a job lot I bought from a local auction house. This handmade wooden float box had seen better days. The hinges and catch were in good order after some TLC. I cleaned and sanded the box, gave it a coat of varnish and put in some new float foam. An unnamed reel and a British-made Strike Right Aduraflo De Luxe centre-pin reel. I found out the Aduraflo De Luxe had a line-guard as standard and was made of a

I'd not been fishing since my holiday in September and after the festive indulgences of Christmas I was ready for some time on the bank. On the last day of the year I went to Willington with half a pint of maggots and a tub of worms to see what I could catch. It's a stretch that usually fishes well year-round, so I was fairly hopeful. I set up a cane rod and centre-pin reel, float-fished close in, and after no bites, I fished further out. I saw plenty of signs of fish, althou

At the beginning of September, we went to Norfolk for a week and stayed at Grove Farm Barns, near Wroxham. A lake and a large pond were nearby, and guests could fish for free. As the large pond was nearer, I decided to fish there. My first session was on a nice, quiet Sunday afternoon with just one other angler who'd been fishing since mid-morning on sweetcorn, without much luck. I set up my old 10' float rod and Allcock Delmatic reel with a small waggler float. After throwi

August was a busy month, and the only chance to wet a line was on Bank Holiday Monday. After much procrastinating, I decided to fish the canal at Stenson Bubble. My first choice of swim was upstream from the lock, just before the bridge, a good spot for Zander I'm told! After catching some decent-sized Perch on single maggots, two children threw stones in the canal, a dog jumped in to get a stick, then, surprisingly, my swim went quiet! I decided to move and went below the lo

July was busy with work and other commitments, so I only managed one session on the evening of 30 July. I went to Sprinwood Fishery, where I had the bottom lake all to myself on a very hot evening. I float-fished red maggots over loose-fed maggots, and after a few casts I caught Roach and watched the Carp topping and rolling on the surface. As the evening wore on, I caught more Roach, Bream, small Carp and then a few larger Carp up to about 4lb. The only session of the month,