News – Page 2 – Puyravaud Carp

James travelled to France for the first time to fish Puyravaud’s Heron Lake as part of the Plume group of 10. Fishing with his angling mate Rob, little did they know what a week was ahead.

Arriving with a mid 20’s PB, this 16 year old carp fishing nut started with a 36lb PB, Rob also breaking his previous best of 43lb with his first ever 50lb fish. James continued to catch and soon had his first 50, followed by a stunning final PB of 57.9lbs.

The duo managed 33 fish in total, over 1338lbs in weight and an average weight of 40.54lbs. Quite a first trip to France for James and one that might take a few trips to beat. Well done to Rob and James.

See you when you return in August 2023.

Finally, the British Government sees sense and takes France of the Amber+ list. Perhaps the Cabinet have had a geography lesson!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So no need to quarantine on your return if you are double jabbed. Hope to see you all soon.

Thanks

Peter & Marion

We have just heard the news that UK visitors to France must once again self isolate on their return to the UK. This after everyone was expecting normal travel starting on the 19th July. We have long given up trying to understand the actions of the UK Government who are dealing with 50,000 cases a day compared to Frances 4000 cases a day. Despite these numbers the UK feels justified in maintaining the quarantine rules for double jabbed people returning JUST from France, not the rest of Europe – JUST France. My mind says this has to be political and not health based at a time when all restrictions are being lifted in the UK with cases totally out of control – where is the common sense?

This measure will undoubtedly sound the death knell for many French travel industry businesses that rely on UK visitors.

For our part, we can no longer afford to move dates to 2022 and beyond as the impact on our business is just too great and we have precious little availability left, particularly on Heron Lake with our barn accommodation. Like many businesses in our sector, we have suffered sustained losses over the last 15-18 months and we are unable to move another block of dates at Boris Johnson’s wim!

Please ensure that you have proper travel insurance to cover Covid delays as we cannot be held responsible for yet another set of measures beyond our control.

We are sorry to finally announce this, but it is this or go into liquidation!

As a result of the UK Government announcement that from the 19th July 2021, double vaccinated people will NOT have to self isolate on their return from France, we will no longer be offering change of dates for Covid reasons.

When you book with us we will make this clear and that balances are due 16 weeks before your travel date. Once your deposit is received we are unable to accept any further change in dates. Failure to pay the balance on time will lead to a cancellation of your trip and loss of your deposit. It is the customers responsibility to seek out proper travel insurance that covers such an eventuality and Puyravaud Carp Fishing cannot be held in any way liable for any cancellations caused by reasons outside of their control.

The last 18 months have been extremely difficult for us and we are taking this step to ensure the business can continue into 2022. We have previously moved trips where possible to help our customers, but continuing issues have meant it is impossible for us to match customer expectations in every instance whilst maintaining a business that can support itself.

Rumour has it that the lesser spotted English carp fisherman has been seen in a remote part of the Charente for the first time in quite a long while!

Yes it’s true – Mark and Terry have made their way to Puyravaud as our first guests of the season. Weather has been changeable and the fishing a bit up and down for their first few days but today things came alive for Terry. Just two fish, but two record breaking fish.

First a lake record and PB grass carp of 48lbs, followed early this evening by a stunning 66lb 7oz mirror – a new overall PB for Terry by 10lbs and the largest mirror ever caught at Puyravaud. No pictures as Terry is getting on in years and did not want to get into the water for a photo. However, the fish was weighed and verified by me as the true weight before being returned to the water safely.

Instead here is one of Mark with a nice 42lb grass carp earlier in the trip. The grass carp are obviously on the feed as this is the 4th one they have caught in just a few days. Not unusual to see multiple catches of this type of fish at this time of the year, but we only have 4 in Heron and they always seem to get caught from mid June to mid July before disappearing for another year. Mark and Terry still have another 10 days of their trip, so plenty of time to try and get a few more nice fish on the bank.

After a good three day session we have completed the re-stocking of Kingfisher Lake. Those who regularly follow us will know that we put the first batch of fish back in the lake at the beginning of 2020 and the plan was always to follow that with a second stocking this year.

I am happy to say that we have added 15 lovely carp with a total weight of 618lbs and an average weight of 41lbs! This means we now have a total of 50 fish in the lake with an average weight of over 42lbs. Many thanks to Jim Paveley and Dave Thomas for their help in catching these fish.

All we need now are some customers to fish for these beautiful specimens!!!!!!!!!!!

Carl, Bella and daughter Madison arrived at Puyravaud in heavy rain with little idea of the session Carl was about to have.

Despite the weather, Carl had a brilliant start with a 61lb 13oz common, followed by a lake record grassy of 46lbs 9ozs. Two more good 40’s followed on day 1 with day 2 starting with a fantastic 62lbs 6oz lake record and PB common. A dream start that continued with fish all through week one of the trip.

Week 2 could not be anywhere near as good could it. Certainly it could! After bagging 32 fish, Carl managed another 33 in week 2 for a total weight of 2828lbs!!!!!!!! The largest weight ever caught at Puyravaud by a single angler. Average weight across the two weeks – a staggering 43.5lbs! Carl ended up with 5 x 60’s, 9 x 50’s and 27 x 40’s during his stay. Only 4 of his fish were under 30lb. Carl even caught our lake record common twice during his stay!!!! Top angling!

Simply a never to be repeated session that happened after over 20 years of fishing in France.

The Amery family are on their second trip to Puyravaud and straight away Carl was into some of our biggest fish.

First out was a 61.13lb mirror, followed quickly by a 46.9lb lake record grass carp. Two more big 40’s followed on day one before first fish out on day two was a 62.6lb lake record common. A further 6 fish between 34 and 47lb have been caught by the end of day 3 to ensure a fantastic start to the trip. The good news is there is still a week and a half left of the trip! Great angling Carl and two Heron Lake records in 24 hours!

Mark and Terry are frequent visitors to Puyravaud and their two week 2020 trip started well with some nice 50’s and a lot of good 40’s. Terry enjoyed a very nice PB with his first ever grass carp weighing in at over 42lbs. As usual with this type of carp, it was difficult to land but played nicely on the mat to allow a rare photo of these beautiful fish.

Well done Terry!

Mike and his family braved the latest quarantine rules and visited Puyravaud for the first time. Mike fished mornings and evenings only, spending the rest of the time around the pool with the rest of the Bebb clan.

Mike soon found himself into the fish and undoubtedly benefited from cooler temperatures. Sticking to a number of spots and baiting regularly certainly did the trick as Mike went looking to beat his PB of 52lbs.

In total Mike managed 31 fish, over a thousand pounds in weight, a new PB of 54lbs and a grassy PB of 42lbs 4ozs. That’s a pretty good week’s fishing by anyone’s standards, especially when you consider the average weight was over 36lbs.

The family enjoyed using the pool everyday and the youngsters even got into the act, fishing our little stream.