Hi Paul,
I read with interest your trip to the small lake at St Christophe last autumn.
Me and my mate are there in early June, could I ask you a couple of quick questions ?
I noticed on your lake map that there are a set of snags to the left hand side, what sort of snags are we talking about ?
Are they serious snags to be avoided at all costs ?
Also did you have any trouble with crays or chats during your stay ?
I have fished in France a good few times and have found on the gravel pit types of waters as this one that you can catch during the day as opposed to the siltier, older waters that seem to be predominantly night waters. Did you have any day action ?
And finally, how did you find the food at the owners place ? Could you book it for the same time every day ?
Cheers
Andy.
Paul Cooper replies;
Hi Andy,
The first thing that you need to know is that the larger St Christphe lake is around half a mile drive from the small lake.
The small lake is in its own grounds and it has its own gite that is only 30 to 40 yards away from the main double swim.
The double swim easily accommodates 2 bivies, and if you do the same as me and Pat did, we had an imaginary line dividing the lake in 2. This gave us over an acre of water each to fish. The swim itself is gravel based so make sure that your bivy pegs are deep enough. There are other locations around the lake to fish from but we found these swims not too comfortable to settle down in.
There are some serious snags just to the left of the swim. This snag consists of a large branch and some posts, that are submerged in around 12 foot of water, it is lethal and you will loose fish on this snag.
When Pat and myself fished the lake it was late October and the fish were very finicky, only picking up small baits. We did pick up some very small hybrid carp/bream because we used the small baits but fortunately only a few of them. I am sure that in June you should be fishing with the normal size baits of around 20mils and will avoid any nuisance fish.
With regards to the crayfish and Poisson Chats, we saw no evidence of these little pests, however it was October and they could well have been dormant.
There are beds of lily pads around the borders of the lake which had died back when we were there, and extend out about 15 feet from the bank. To the right of the swim there is an area of shallower water which contains a good crop of lilies, but an ideal place to find carp.
Although we did not catch loads of carp, we did catch at various times of the day and night, the best feeding times appearing to be around first light.
The accommodation is first class, with adequate cooking facilities and utensils and we solely used these and never ate at the main lake. I believe that you can book a meal at the larger lake but as I have said it is a short drive away from your lake and we did not use this facility.
If there is are any further questions don’t hesitate to drop me a line. If I can help I will.
Paul
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