Opening Day Delight.

June 16th is always ringed or highlighted on my calender every year, not even birthdays get that level of note, it was and still is the day I get most excited about fishing, once again on running water and the thought of pootling around the Fens in my boat, stalking R.Thames and R.Lea carp or in this instance getting straight down to business with the 40 Rivers Challenge where I am currently on 30 completed rivers and have been settled on that figure since mid-August 2025!. There was to be no annual midnight pilgrimage though, with a job booked in for a friend in the morning I packed my rolling meat gear in the van and set eyes on opening my campaign later that afternoon and once I was done on the job I made the short journey over to the R.Bourne for a short roving session and see if I could find a Barbel, a river that has bare in mind been extraordinarily difficult for me with numerous trips in all manner of conditions undertaken without as much as a sneeze or fart from a Barbel, the…