Angling Lines Blog

Having just spent a week at Golden Oak Lake in the beautiful Dordogne countryside, we thought that it would be good to tell you all about it!

Fate!

It all started back in mid-2010. We have been visiting France chasing big carp for over 20 years now and as our lives have changed and so have our venue requirements. Gone are the days where my wife (Liz) & I would happily ‘drive & survive’, we now have 2 young children (William 8 & Annabelle 5) so life has certainly moved on!

After a break of a couple of years due to the young children we decided that it was time to resume our fishing holidays so a quick call to Bridget at Angling Lines took place. Although we were originally looking towards a spring 2011 trip Bridget mentioned the excellent late season deals they had on offer, so we were soon booked to go to Bletiere in late October. Bletiere offered everything we were looking for with quality accommodation plus great fishing right next to the Gite. All looked good when disaster struck early September when Liz slipped and badly broke her left leg – meaning that we had no alternative but to cancel the trip.  We were all devastated as we were really looking forward to the holiday,  however fortunately we were fully insured so managed to claim back all the costs (less excesses) – A REAL LIFE REASON FOR MAKING SURE YOU GET HOLIDAY INSURANCE IN PLACE- WITHOUT THAT WE WOULD HAVE BEEN CIRCA £900 OUT OF POCKET & NO HOLIDAY!

I made the fateful call to Bridget and she was as gutted as us – however I told her that we would look to re-book somewhere for Easter 2011 plus she mentioned that they were taking on a new venue – Golden Oak with Field Tester Paul Cooper heading over there the following week. (Important to add that Bletiere was already booked up for Easter week)

We agreed that we would wait to see how Paul got on and then make our decision.  Numerous calls and texts were exchanged between Paul & myself the following week and after hearing all about the trip including the excellent accommodation & fishing on offer we booked a week in late April 2011.

Preparation Time!

The next 6 months were spent wishing away the days, weeks & months – Liz was making excellent progress and I spent the usual fortune stocking up on gear, planning bait and constantly checking the Angling Lines website for any Golden Oak Lake updates. (Inc. winter shots and netting/stocking)

Worth mentioning a little on the gear & bait choice for the trip here – gear wise was easy given that the lake is just 5 acres. Therefore I prepared my Century NG’s in 2.75lb TC, Shimano 10000 Baitrunners, 15 lbs mainline and usual UK style end gear.  The only difference for me this time was that William was up for a bit of carping meaning extra kit would be needed. We decided to share the rods (William would fade in and out of the fishing as the week went on!) however we would need a 2 man bivvy and 2 bedchairs – this gave us a problem on car space until we saw that Golden Oak can hire kit for you – job done with 2 bedchairs and a 2 man ready & waiting for us! (more about the kit later!)

One bit of luxury I did take with me this year was a bait boat. My good friend Kieron kindly lent me his Microcat and although I knew it would take a bit of packing I was sure it would give me an extra edge when I got there.

Bait-wise again was easy as I have been a Quest Bait user for many years now plus you  can take the car space issue out of the equation again by ordering you bait from Joe & Dick at Golden Oak meaning it is waiting for you when you get there.

A few emails followed and I had ordered 10, 15 & 20mm Quest Bait Ghurkka Spice Readymades (absolutely no need for frozen bait with this stuff – its quality and just as effective as frozen – take it from me as I am one of the biggest ‘bait-snob’s around!!).

I also ordered some hemp plus some of Dick’s own pellets which he regularly feeds the fish on – makes sense given the fish are familiar with these.

All I took with me was a few tubs of pop ups, paste and a bag of my own pellets – just to add a bit of personalisation to it.

As I mentioned we exchanged numerous emails with Joe & Dick prior to the trip. Not only does this help with planning (we pre-ordered basics such as milk, bread, beer, wine…) plus it really gets you buzzing! ) I remember one tough particular day at work when I had received some horrible emails – then I received an email from Joe at the Lake telling me that  5 goslings had hatched to the resident geese – made me really smile on a tough day!!

Time to go!

The 22^nd April finally arrived and the Passat Estate struggled out of the drive complete with packed boot, roof box and KIS rod tube (7 rods safely inside). Here’s a useful tip for you when packing your car – my spare wheel is situated in the hole continue reading…

William’s 25.13 – a happy chappy!

Hi Bridget,

Just back from a cracking week at Golden Oak Lake. I have just about finished my full article but just sorting through the 400+ photos taken! I will send on over the next few days but here’s some early feedback to help promote the venue for Joe & Dick. They were amazing and really looked after us.

Weeks results from fishing just mornings & evenings (I didn’t fish nights);

• 36 Fish
• 26 x 20′s (of which 15 were 25lbs+)
• 1 x 39.03
• 2 x 40lb captures including new Venue Record Mirror of 47lb 15oz!

47.15 - Golden Oaks new record

I caught the biggie just an 50 minutes after the 39.03 – awesome brace totalling 81lb 2oz.

William also caught a new PB of 25lb 13oz plus 4 other 20′s!

All fish caught using Quest Baits Ghurkka Spice boilies & Golden Oak Pellets. Results were amazing given that it was the first time the bait had been used a this venue – proving it’s quality.

Golden Oak was netted & additional stock added in February 2011.  You can read all about it here. Here’s the video;

The Boss at 45.08

Golden Oak Lake has just been netted in what we think is the first time in it’s 40+ year history. The owners Dick and Joe knew that a lot of small fish were going to show up but the huge volume of small fish still came as a surprise.

Planning the operation

Here’s what Dick had to say; “Thank God for the guys Angling Lines. We knew that there were a number of 10lb native carp in the lake, but it wasn’t until their field tester Paul Cooper fished here that we were alerted to the potential size of the problem. From then on, it was just a case of taking advice and having the lake netted and stocked. Angling Lines arranged the whole thing for us, right down to dealing with the French speakers at Michel Bigot’s fish farm”.

Well over 100 carp in the 10 to 12lb bracket were removed, along with well over half a ton of roach, pike and perch. All the carp over 20lb were all returned to the lake.

Netting underway

The two biggest carp returned to the lake weighed 39lb 11oz and 45lb 8oz.

Then 30 new fish were stocked, all between 20 and 31lbs.

It’s estimated that the result of the whole operation has meant that the average fish size jumped immediately from teens into the twenties – great news for the anglers who will fish this brand new venue in 2011.

You can see more photos here & there’ll be a video on-line soon.

Golden Oak Lake

An article by Paul Cooper describing his session on Golden Oak in October 2010.

Golden Oak Lake is situated deep in rural France, just South of Limoges. The 5 acre lake is owned by Jo and Dick Muntimer, and it sits on their 38 acre estate. They purchased the estate around 5 years ago from a local farmer and have worked continually to present the ideal fishing holiday destination, the biggest project being the conversion of an old barn.

The gite is part of the barn conversion and has been built and furnished to a very high standard. It consists of a ground floor and first floor.

The ground floor has an open plan design, living, dining and kitchen area. The kitchen is fully equipped with an electric oven, ceramic hob, a microwave oven, all the pots, pans, dishes and cutlery that you require to prepare any meal, along with a large refrigerator.

There is a television with a satellite connection providing most of the free view English channels, 2 settees, dining table and a wood burner, making this a warm and comfortable place to relax in the evenings.

There are 3 bedrooms, one on the ground floor and the other two on the first floor, all with en-suite facilities consisting of a toilet, wash-hand basin, heated towel rail and a large shower. Two of the bedrooms have a double bed and the third has 3 single beds.

The double patio doors open out onto a patio leading to a lawn which overlooks the lake. There are a table and chairs on the patio and only a few yards away is a splash pool, for those hot balmy days.

There is a large freezer in one of the outbuildings to accommodate an ample supply of boilies for your visit.

The lake is around 5 acres in size, with wide grassed banked access around it. Some of the banks are shared with the owner’s sheep, goats, geese and horses, but none interfere with the anglers and the lake can be comfortably fished by up to 4 anglers from the nearside bank.

The banks are sectioned off by gates to keep the owners animals secure and apart. The lawn leading down to the lake is fenced off from the lake and access is gained via a gate that can be secured to keep children away from the water.

At the far end of the lake a stream enters the lake where the water is around 18inches deep. This drops after about 60 yards to around 4 feet slowly deepening down to 9 feet by the dam, making over 4 acres of the lake 4 feet or deeper. The far margins across from the Gite are bordered by click here to read the full article…