Finally a Day Fly Fishing at Brenig
The lockdown and some health issues have curtailed my Fly Fishing this year, lyn Brenig is a venue that I have been looking forward to.
I had to speak to a good friend of mine who is a top angler and also an admirer of lyn Brenig, he has been very supportive in helping me to get out fishing as have my other Fly Fishing contacts. So we had discussed the trip for a while and this week it eventually came to fruition.
I had heard good reports on the grapevine about the quality of the hard fighting fish in this water and couldn’t wait to get there.
Lyn Brenig the Fishery
Set high in the Denbyshire hills, this is a picturesque venue, high up in the hills with My Snowdon in the backdrop of breathtaking water. It is both a popular bank and boat water with a massive bank area and a road that takes you around the water.
Booking is via the website, you have to book online and pay at the centre on the day. The pay station is no longer in the ground floor office but upstairs in the visitors centre.
The cafe is well equipped to serve your needs, clean, well-staffed and gives a panoramic view of the water. A great place to have a snack, meal or breakfast.
Drive There
The drive is also worth the trip, going from Manchester, access via M56, A55, St Asaphs and then onto Denbigh. The views are stunning as most Welsh rural roads tend to be scenic and also very engaging for the driver.
I got there at around 0830hrs Friday 2 July 2021 and met up with my good friend in the lower car park. This is situated below the normal car parks of the visitors centre and next to the jetty. As I had some serious health issues and could not walk or carry my kit, I was able to park in one of the limited bays. Both me and Tony had a good long chat as it was a while since we fished together.
We talked about potential areas of fishing for the day and agreed to go out around 1000hrs and fish till 1600hrs to allow me time to recover and not overdue to burden my health further.
Tactics and location
So the areas we intended to fish were Sailing Club Bay, Brenig Arm, Coves, Quarry and finish at the dam area. We discussed tactics and decided to go with a fast glass line with two blobs as the fish were relatively high. The wind conditions were around 5-7mph and we had cloud cover as we set off.
We fished the sailing club with no offers but saw the odd fish move and the positive indication about the fishery was the number of bank anglers. Having fished the sailing club, we moved onto the Brenig arm.
The methods were gonna be dries or pulling/Twiddling a washing line with a tip line. After looking at the conditions, I thought would start with a fast glass line and a two fly set up first and later maybe go onto a three set up. The setups for the three flies are mentioned in one of my previous blogs Fly Fishing Leader Beginners Guide . Having created the leader using a 10lb Fluro, I opted for a Tequila blob on the point and a Sunburst Blob on the dropper.
So we fished past the jetty towards the sailing club, a nice row of trees along here looked very fishy. I had a tentative take and that was the extent of the action, so we moved to the sailing club area with no action. The encouraging sign was seeing bank anglers in most areas.
We decided to move to the Brenig Arm and took a wide birth past the Osprey nest/tower that had been subject to the recent mindless attack. There were several boats and few bank anglers in the Brenig Arm and we had a few long drifts, free-drifting as we covered more area. About third drift in, I had a tentative take just twiddling the flies back in the top three feet of water. I carried on on a slow retrieve and the line tightened up with a solid rainbow jumping all over. I landed this as with barbless hooks, the fly came out of the fish mouth in the net and away went a safely released trout. We spend some time here about three hours and I had 4 more fish to the net, After the third fish the takes dried up and I switched the top dropper blob for a Black Mini Lure with a Chartreause straggle body and had two more fish on this lure.
It was not prolific but the fish were quality, all above 23/4 lbs mark and one around 4.5lb.
We decided after a few tea and lunch breaks to head to the other side, an area called the coves which holds good fish. Several drifts along the shore produced no more takes or fish. As we were moving, I changed my set up to a two fly dry set up on a floating line, for information re set up also see previous blog Fly Fishing Leaders Beginners Guide.
We arrived at the quarry and the area of the old trees, this area had a massive growth of pine trees that have since been cut and new ones replanted but these are not yet grown yet. The wind had picked up a bit and was more than 12mph, I had a hopper and Bobs bits on the setup. About the third cast in near the quarry, with my dries and next thing a huge rainbow took this full-on, my dropper, the bits. The fight was on, I had to take great care as the leader was just 8lbs and this was a good fish. I landed the fish and released that too, during our drifts along here, I had several other tentative takes but missed the fish. Having not fished much, I was a bit rusty with my dries.
We moved to the dam area and drifted along here, this produced two more trout to the dries, the hopper taking one and a midas the other. All in all, it had a been great day out with good company, lovely scenery and hard fighting fish.
Having not fished much and with the health issues, I was tired but made sure I staggered my fishing with breaks of rest in between, We arrived back at the jetty by about 415pm and my boat partner helped me get my kit to the car.
I sat on the benches at the visitors centre to have a few cups of tea before setting off on the journey back. Brenig had been good to me, the setting alone is worth the trip but the fish had been awesome.
