Dutch pike

 

Yesterday we were invited to fish for pike in Holland. So after meeting the members of the O.N.I. fishing association, we were ready to toss some flies at pike. And everything started fantastic.

Both Jean–Pierre and I missed a pike on one of our first casts.

 

And Koen was able to land this one on his third cast. Small but very beautiful!

 

Kristof landed a small pike on his first cast,

and a couple of minutes later he was able to land this beauty. Well done Kristof!

All this happened in the first 10 minutes we were at the water, so of course we thought we were in for a fantastic pike-day. But the Dutch fishing gods must have noticed that we were from Belgium and not worthy of fishing there and everything failed from that moment on.

 

We were invited by Johan Crooymans (that’s the gentleman on the left) who is the current Dutch Fly-fishing Champion. So it wasn’t due to the lack of talent in our group, because even this renowned fly-fisherman wasn’t able to hook a single fish.

 

And believe me, we tried! We fished on four different locations (the best pike waters they have in that region) with 10 people, but the three pike in those first 10 minutes were the only fish we saw that day.

But I’m still a happy man. We got to know a couple of great fellow fly-fishermen and fished in a some beautiful waters. But the main reason that I still have a big smile on my face, is this: yesterday, it got confirmed that I will join five other fly-fishermen to Ireland in April. Yes, an entire week of casting flies at pike from a belly-boat in some of those beautiful Irish lakes! Yiiiihaaaa!!! …