Page #2

 As the sun was starting to move in the sky and I was baiting up, a car pulled up behind my Bivvy (Thanks to Keith Thompson for the loan !!) . I noticed two uniformed gentlemen walking towards me hands on guns. 'Shit' I thought to myself, 'Here come the cavalry .'

"Alright mate?" I uneasily asked......No response. "Step away from the tent sir." Hands twitching on guns.

"What's the problem officer" I asked relatively confidently. Hey, both Karl and I had cleared it with the lake - I had done nothing wrong.

"Do you have any alcohol in the tent sir" (Please notice the lack of usage of the question mark here -It was inferred and wasn't a question)

 "Yes" I replied stupidly "A bottle of whiskey, I'm hoping to catch my first 20 !" Grin on my face like an absolute moron (English term for fool!!).

The ranger pointed to the signpost that my spod rod was leaning against. He then proceeded to walk forward and lead me to the picture of a cocktail glass with a big red line through it.

 "Oh" I replied like a half-wit. "Sorry"

 "Step away from the Tent Sir" 

  'Sh_ t' I thought here we go.

  "Do you have any weapons in the tent sir?" 

  " No , but we do have permission to fish here" I said feeling confident that, although I had indeed broken the law with my half empty bottle of 12 year old single malt scotch that had gradually gotten to its half empty stage throughout the course of quite a hard year, they would of course see reason to my slight oversight AND we HAD gotten permission TWICE to fish and Camp here.

I was wrong.

" This is a weapon sir" said Tweedle Dum holding up my Fox boilie catapult.

 " No" I replied "that's a boilie catapult...Here look" as I showed him a packet of boilies.

 "No sir " He replied indignantly...." This IS a weapon."

 My mind raced back to the previous weeks CAG fish in. I could imagine Nigel Barrow drawing out his Machete...."NO sir THIS is a weapon" etc a la Crocodile Dundee. But alas, Nigel was not here fishing with us today so I thought it best to dispense with the humor as these guys were clearly not having any of it.

"May I search the tent sir " Tweedle Dee.

The thought did cross my mind to reply sarcastically about a search warrant but I did think better of it. "Yes of course" I said.

At this point he entered the Bivvy and knocked over my bottle of salmon and shrimp flavoring liquid, that a hooked boilie was sitting in at the entrance. The very fishy aroma wafted towards me as the expensive liquid evaporated in the sun, leaving me with nothing but a fishy memory. I said nothing.

"What's this" he asked pointing at my "Stubby Spod" and bucket of maize.

"Oh, that's a spod Rod " I replied demonstrating ,with great enthusiasm,  how the curiously looking 'marital aid' device worked and how we got 'The bait out'.

 "That's illegal" he said glaring at me. "You can only use bait that is actually on the hook"

  I stared at the hooklength not a foot away from his head dangling from one of my rods.....The hair illegally blowing in the breeze with the Maize attached to it and NOT the hook.

 'Christ ' I thought 'this could open a whole can of worms.'

   "We did get permission" I pleaded trying desperately to divert the attention.

 Silence

"You can't camp here" said Tweedle Dum

 "No you don't understand.......," I began innocently. 

 At this point I think it is wise to mention that the words " NO" and "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND" should NEVER be directed to a man in a uniform with his hand on his gun !! Realizing at this point that things could get ugly I motioned to Karl and Dave to 'come on over and help me out of this bloody mess' and proceeded to inform the officer that we had indeed gotten permission to fish all night and camp by the waterside.  Karl came over and offered the same explanation.

Apparently, although we had cleared it with the lake, they hadn't cleared it with him and HE was obviously the man to clear it with. We HADN'T gotten permission from the Top man. It was clear that the officer had encountered various miscommunication problems with the people running the lake and informed us in no uncertain terms that we couldn't "Camp" at the lakeside but as we had purchased a camping spot about half a mile away in the campground we could 'camp' there and fish all night......at the bank.

 My mind raced to the vision of my fox alarm screaming out at 3am with  blue Christmas tree lights blinking and me throwing down the binoculars and sprinting the half mile from the camp-site to hit the run.......Not very practical.

 "So we can fish all night, but we cannot 'camp' here" I said confused.

 "That is correct" Dirty Harry replied.

  "So do we have to remove the stoves and sleeping bags etc?" Karl asked.

  "Oh no, you can keep all the stoves and equipment and even cook.........but you can't camp here."

 Silence.

I exchanged a confusing glance with my fellow anglers and thought about asking why we could fish all night with all the camping equipment and umbrellas but we couldn't use a Bivvy?.  I looked again at Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee and thought that, under the circumstances, what with me having to donate half a bottle of 12 year old single malt to the lake and breaking the Law, I should stop while I was ahead. In all fairness Dirty Harry was a pretty reasonable guy.

Thanks" we said and we went back to our rods.