Salmon Fishing in the Yemen
The funniest aspect of this film is that after it's release the Yemeni Tourist board was inundated with inquiries into fishing holidays in said province.
This is not going to be a review of the film. Oh no this is actually a reminiscence of my days as a reluctant fisherman in the deep valleys of mid Wales.
My Father and a colleague of his from the old Portsmouth Polytechnic had a friend who was a farmer in the deep valleys that stretch the length of that country.
Wales is a something of a paradox. It can be the most miserable wind swept, rain lashed, grim horrid place you ever had the misfortune to set foot in. And it can also be the most beautiful, fragrant and soulful country that there ever was. And it can do it all at the same time.
You have to visit to see what I mean.
Anyhoo!
This is a picture I have lifted off a blog
http://micksflyfishingdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2010/06/river-edw-hergest-beat.html
He says and I quote that "I have a bit of a soft spot for this river due to the exceptionally pretty location and the abundance of plenty of small fiesty wild trout."
I concur. I was never much of a fisherman however.
I know a good location when I see one though.
Let me take you back 35 years. To a time when I was in school and I was 11 years old. One Friday afternoon I just had to get through a visit to the dentist (a sadist and no mistake) and then there was the prospect of a weekend in Wales. I had never really experienced that part of the country. We had stayed in an old railway cottage near Llanidloes when I was younger but this was a trip to stay on a farm. The prospect didn't really entice me but I had an appointment with a torturer to distract my self from.
The dentist went well as it happened. Next stop - the welsh border.
Now my Dad's trips to mid Wales were legendary. He and his colleague would set off on a Friday night and work their way up through Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Hereford and Worcester and the old county of Radnorshire in Wales (now Powys). They had a couple of stop off points that were sacrosanct.
There was a toilet break in a pub somewhere in Gloucestershire followed by a fish and chip shop in a location not far away. Unfortunately my young mind did not retain the place names. I do remember the food being partaken in green lane in the dark with the radio on.
My Dad's partner in crime was a well known wit and raconteur and the conversation was lively.
I must have fallen asleep somewhere in Herefordshire for when I awoke I was all alone in the car. I knew not where I was. Fear not as I had been warned and well prepared for this stop over. It was in a fairly remote and rural location. So remote and rural in fact that when I stuck my head out of the car door the world was a black as coal and all I could hear was the persistent bleating of a world where sheep ruled. That was what stuck in my memory the most, the feeling of being a stranger in a strange land where everyone just said "Baa!"
I had instructions that should i need to I was "allowed" in side the bar but on the understanding I would station my self next to the entrance to the ladies. Should the village Bobby pay an an unannounced visit I would find myself bundled into the only place in the building a policeman would not dare enter! I did indeed become in need of a toilet and ventured into the den of iniquity and found my parents and my dad's colleague ensconced around a log fire with a warming brandy or seven. I had no desire to stay inside as I had a field full of new friends and was keen to re join the conversations. As I walked across the car park The village Bobby put in an appearance and I felt a wave of relief I didn't have to spend some time in the ladies convenience. An encounter that may last some hours if the Bobby decided to partake of refreshment, which of course in uniform he would never do, only if he thought no one was watching! I guess there must have been a nod and a wink signal from the bar staff to all the women in the bar of the presence of young boys in their latrines as a shriek from either would rather have given the game away
We eventually reached a hamlet of the name Hundred House. The title hundred is an old English name deriving from an administrative area allegedly measured by how much area could be encompassed by one hundred cow hides cut into a thin strip - like a boundary rope. All that was left of this seat of government was the public house and the chapel.
On driving up the farm track of our hosts there was a comment about travelling on the M1. In years gone by the track had had deep potholes the size of a tank and negotiating it was a trial for the hardest automobile suspension. However the jolly old EEC as it was then had provided money for the farmers of that region (and all others residing so many feet above sea level) to have their roads properly metaled and tarmaced.
We must have settled settled down for bed quickly. I guess the main action was on the morn when fishing would take place.
This is Hergest bridge. It was the most downstream part of the fishing ground and worked it's way up stream.
This is the view upstream from the bridge and was a view so beloved of my Father that a photo just like this still sits in his study. He and his mate would escape the human jungle that is higher education and spend a weekend being outwitted by brown trout in this very river.
I was never a fisherman but I was captivated by the setting. this river lies in a deep valley at this point and steep, bracken filled slopes towered over the river like ancient guardians just checking the river was still there.
http://micksflyfishingdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2009/05/river-edw-magic.html
This guy sums up the effect it had on my Dad.
For myself this was an apocryphal weekend. I had stepped into another world. And I liked what I found. I had left a life, if only for a weekend, that was attuned to the collection of "middle class" status symbols, cars houses, furniture, etc. Here was a way of life that had little of those entrapment's that I had considered to be so important and yet was richer in ways I had not considered possible.
It was the first time in my life that I realised there was more to life than owning things.
Wales is a something of a paradox. It can be the most miserable wind swept, rain lashed, grim horrid place you ever had the misfortune to set foot in. And it can also be the most beautiful, fragrant and soulful country that there ever was. And it can do it all at the same time.
You have to visit to see what I mean.
Anyhoo!
This is a picture I have lifted off a blog
http://micksflyfishingdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2010/06/river-edw-hergest-beat.html
He says and I quote that "I have a bit of a soft spot for this river due to the exceptionally pretty location and the abundance of plenty of small fiesty wild trout."
I concur. I was never much of a fisherman however.
I know a good location when I see one though.
Let me take you back 35 years. To a time when I was in school and I was 11 years old. One Friday afternoon I just had to get through a visit to the dentist (a sadist and no mistake) and then there was the prospect of a weekend in Wales. I had never really experienced that part of the country. We had stayed in an old railway cottage near Llanidloes when I was younger but this was a trip to stay on a farm. The prospect didn't really entice me but I had an appointment with a torturer to distract my self from.
The dentist went well as it happened. Next stop - the welsh border.
Now my Dad's trips to mid Wales were legendary. He and his colleague would set off on a Friday night and work their way up through Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Hereford and Worcester and the old county of Radnorshire in Wales (now Powys). They had a couple of stop off points that were sacrosanct.
There was a toilet break in a pub somewhere in Gloucestershire followed by a fish and chip shop in a location not far away. Unfortunately my young mind did not retain the place names. I do remember the food being partaken in green lane in the dark with the radio on.
My Dad's partner in crime was a well known wit and raconteur and the conversation was lively.
I must have fallen asleep somewhere in Herefordshire for when I awoke I was all alone in the car. I knew not where I was. Fear not as I had been warned and well prepared for this stop over. It was in a fairly remote and rural location. So remote and rural in fact that when I stuck my head out of the car door the world was a black as coal and all I could hear was the persistent bleating of a world where sheep ruled. That was what stuck in my memory the most, the feeling of being a stranger in a strange land where everyone just said "Baa!"
I had instructions that should i need to I was "allowed" in side the bar but on the understanding I would station my self next to the entrance to the ladies. Should the village Bobby pay an an unannounced visit I would find myself bundled into the only place in the building a policeman would not dare enter! I did indeed become in need of a toilet and ventured into the den of iniquity and found my parents and my dad's colleague ensconced around a log fire with a warming brandy or seven. I had no desire to stay inside as I had a field full of new friends and was keen to re join the conversations. As I walked across the car park The village Bobby put in an appearance and I felt a wave of relief I didn't have to spend some time in the ladies convenience. An encounter that may last some hours if the Bobby decided to partake of refreshment, which of course in uniform he would never do, only if he thought no one was watching! I guess there must have been a nod and a wink signal from the bar staff to all the women in the bar of the presence of young boys in their latrines as a shriek from either would rather have given the game away
We eventually reached a hamlet of the name Hundred House. The title hundred is an old English name deriving from an administrative area allegedly measured by how much area could be encompassed by one hundred cow hides cut into a thin strip - like a boundary rope. All that was left of this seat of government was the public house and the chapel.
On driving up the farm track of our hosts there was a comment about travelling on the M1. In years gone by the track had had deep potholes the size of a tank and negotiating it was a trial for the hardest automobile suspension. However the jolly old EEC as it was then had provided money for the farmers of that region (and all others residing so many feet above sea level) to have their roads properly metaled and tarmaced.
We must have settled settled down for bed quickly. I guess the main action was on the morn when fishing would take place.
This is Hergest bridge. It was the most downstream part of the fishing ground and worked it's way up stream.
This is the view upstream from the bridge and was a view so beloved of my Father that a photo just like this still sits in his study. He and his mate would escape the human jungle that is higher education and spend a weekend being outwitted by brown trout in this very river.
I was never a fisherman but I was captivated by the setting. this river lies in a deep valley at this point and steep, bracken filled slopes towered over the river like ancient guardians just checking the river was still there.
http://micksflyfishingdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2009/05/river-edw-magic.html
This guy sums up the effect it had on my Dad.
For myself this was an apocryphal weekend. I had stepped into another world. And I liked what I found. I had left a life, if only for a weekend, that was attuned to the collection of "middle class" status symbols, cars houses, furniture, etc. Here was a way of life that had little of those entrapment's that I had considered to be so important and yet was richer in ways I had not considered possible.
It was the first time in my life that I realised there was more to life than owning things.
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