JR Hartley has a lot to answer to

I've not been much of a fisherman in my lifetime, so I was a bit concerned when I learnt the latest stag do involved fly fishing. It's a bit of a change from the debauchery of recent celebrations and it gave me a change to swing my arm, erect my rod, put me wellies on and catch an old trout. Actually that really does sound like one of those stag do's after all.

With the more senior members, we went along to Brampton Trout Farm and were met by the loud enthusiastic owner. He informed us he'd put a lot more trout in the water and if we caught the tagged huge one, we win a prize in the kitty for £200. A little lesson in the technique and away I went. I could see the trout swimming, right next to my fly which was in the water. But guess what, not one single bite....for 4 hours. We did have one successful catch and it caught a lot of people's attention. We all gathered round the stag as we were informed it was a large trout on the end of his rod. No it wasn't. It was a large branch.

Thank god we later got to celebrate the branch catch in the pub. An interesting and very enjoyable day. Perhaps I'm at that age now...