Sangachal, the trestle

Called up Rustam-79 midweek and we agreed
to head out to Sangachal again.
No sooner said than done
.
Got there by 7 in the evening.The first bite turned out to be a catfish, and for some reason
that didn't even surprise us anymore. Since last time, too, almost every other bite
was a catfish
.But luckily that was the first and last little catfish.
Then came some decent-sized roach, a small carp
got caught, and a couple of medium-sized kutum. But
the real feast for the soul only came the next morning. For the morning bite we
were expecting a good catch, but unfortunately apart from roach and one small kutum there was
nothing. Rustam, after a sleepless night, was tired and already in pack-up mode and
was suggesting we reel in, even though we still had shrimp left for a couple of casts.
I suggested changing the baits and leaving only when
they ran out. Seeing how sluggish he was, I took it on myself to check and change the baits
on his rigs too, which he was only happy about. I started with his rigs, and just as I walked up
to his third spinning rod the ratchet starts screaming. Grabbing the rod and cranking
the reel I felt SOMETHING. At first it didn't fight back and I only felt
its weight but not its strength.
But closer to the surface it jerked so hard that
it tore the spool handle out of my hand and it started spinning like crazy. Barely held
on and started reeling again.Then Rustam comes running, and somehow he's not sleepy anymore but
all perked up, eyes shining. When we got this monster to the surface it turned out
it was a kutum. Since I had no experience lifting a fish like that up that high (and
the distance from the water surface to the trestle is 6-8 meters) Rustam offered
to take over this ceremony, and I readily
agreed. The chance of a monster that
size coming off the hook is pretty high. Better let a pro do it. And if
it does come off, let it not be because of me, I'd never have forgiven myself. But
Rustam's professionalism didn't let us down. Our happiness knew no bounds. Back
then it seemed to us it weighed
no less than 2.5-2.8 kg. But as
Rustam told me after weighing it at home, it turned out to weigh just 2 kg. All the sluggishness and
tiredness we had just evaporated somewhere. But unfortunately that
was the last kutum. Soon we ran out of
shrimp and we headed back but promised to come back :)

To be continue ...