Quite a lot of my piking time is spent fishing those places that, for one reason or another, are not readily chosen by the majority of anglers. Not fishless swims, of course, but those spots that are perhaps difficult to access, awkward or uncomfortable to fish or a long slog from the car. I’m sure I don’t need to list the reasons why.

Over the years fishing places such as these has paid real dividends for me and while not all the fish you catch from such places are going to be Drennan Cup winners they are at least often relatively unknown fish. You can of course hit the occasional jackpot pike that satisfies both the aforementioned criteria!

Don’t get me wrong, I like to ensconce myself in a spacious or manicured swim occasionally and I can see all the advantages of fishing within spitting distance of the car. If a productive swim lends itself to this approach then of course you’re quid’s in, being able to take the ‘kitchen sink’ and dip into the boot of the car at your leisure. Most of these swims, unfortunately, soon become mighty popular as word gets about and before long it can be difficult to find them unoccupied. I’m sure we’ve all turned the air inside the car blue as the inevitable ‘other car’ looms up out of the morning half-light, parked squarely in ‘My swim’.    ‘Don’t these b......s ever sleep?’ You, of course, ‘Just couldn’t sleep,’ and haven’t risen at an unholy hour and arrived in half darkness in an effort to beat everybody to the swim!

If a hot swim is easily accessible chances are that even when you use up a days holiday for a weekday visit one of those lucky beggars that gets to fish through the week will be there before you.

Time bandits
If, like myself, you don’t have access to a boat and you only get the chance to fish at the weekend (usually Sunday), or during your meagre holiday allowance, you’re always going to struggle to beat the ‘Time Bandits.’ Perhaps a better idea, as I mentioned earlier, is to seek out a productive swim or two that require a bit of effort to fish or get to. By far the best option, are the miles of rivers, drains and canals that often receive virtually no pressure at all, at least during the autumn and winter months. In a golden era that has now passed no anglers on a particular stretch of river at the weekend was a fairly safe bet that the fishing was poor. This is no longer necessarily true. The rising popularity of stillwaters and a much greater variety of affordable leisure options has seen numbers of anglers dwindle on our water-courses in recent years and many miles of banks see little or no anglers the whole season through. Especially if there is a long walk involved.

One problem the angler is going to encounter when attempting to get off, or rather, ‘ beyond’ the beaten track, especially in the case of the winter piker, is the short length of daylight hours. It may be a great swim you’ve found two miles up the river but it’s going to swallow a big chunk of your precious time to hump your tackle all that way. A forty-minute tackle laden slog back to the car, in the pitch black, particularly following a slow day, can be a daunting prospect. The thought of this gruelling trek alone can be enough to curtail the session and have you heading back early with valuable fishing light still remaining.
Cutting your tackle to an absolute minimum makes things easier and lets face it most of us faithfully carry those items that we, ‘might just need.’ The fact that you haven’t done once in five years of carting them to the bank is, naturally, irrelevant.

The ‘Jerk Jockeys’ have a big advantage; the tackle needed by the lure enthusiast is inherently less than the ‘condensed tackle shop’ a die-hard bait angler has to hump around. However, even if travelling ultra-lightly, a time-consuming trek to a distant swim can be an inhibiting factor. Added to this we have to consider the miles that will have to be covered initially in an effort to find these productive swims. With time at a premium, for many anglers the easier option may be to settle for somewhere that is known to hold fish and has a reasonably close car parking facility.

Secret weapon
Well for some of you, I think, I may have a solution. Yes, the secret weapon I’m about to unleash on the angling world is none other than the humble bicycle!
Okay so some of you are thinking “you pompous prat. I haven’t got any other way of getting there.” I apologise to you but I’ll bet there are even more ageing, overweight, car drivers like me that haven’t ridden   a   pushbike   since   the   last   time   they   crushed   their unmentionables on the crossbar outside the local youth club.
I ought to add here that I’m talking about the modern breed of all terrain bikes [Not the black monster with a basket that you did your paper round on.] and I take the bike to the venue in the back of the car.

A reasonably robust mountain bike is pretty affordable nowadays, starting at about a hundred pounds. One of these machines will allow you to cover relatively distant lengths of bank while remaining fairly economical with your precious fishing time. Okay so it might make you break out in a sweat and I wouldn’t advise it to anyone that has a coronary condition but I bet that there are a few of you out there that would secretly be glad of the exercise. There is no getting away from it cycling across grass, [if you’re lucky] especially if the winds against you, can be hard graft but it isn’t a competition and even at a plod its two or three times quicker than walking.

I ought to point out that I live in Newmarket (Suffolk.), which happens to lie on the edge of the Cambridgeshire fens. There is no doubt that the topography of the land around me is particularly conducive to two-wheeled travelling - it is flat you know! Yes we of the ‘webbed feet’ variety do have an advantage I suppose however I’ve yet to see a river/canal/drain bank that is uphill! Anyway whether you cycle or walk you will need to tailor your approach and think carefully about the tackle that you are going to take and how you are going to carry it.

For the long tricky items of tackle, my personal choice is a quiver, whether walking or cycling. As kids me and my fishing guru, Nibs ‘the Celtic bag’ Killington, used to lash our one solid glass, Woollies spinning rod directly onto the crossbar with bootlaces but I doubt your fancy carbon Kevlar numbers would stand up to much of that kind of treatment. If anybody out there has a better solution then I’m all ears.

Locating hotspots
As I said earlier the lure angler has a head start and although I’m not a fanatic myself I would have to concede that this method probably lends itself to the mobile approach better than any other. Once I’ve established some pikey-looking water I will often use the more mobile lure approach to actually locate some hotspots. You can cover lots of ground and even follow-ups may be deemed a success. With a few lure trips I can build a bank of fish holding swims on bits of river that virtually never see another angler. Once I know the swims that I feel are worth fishing, I will return to use the more refined methods of deadbaiting. (Ooh I can hear the pens rattling already!)

Whatever method you prefer its likely that you will want to take your unhooking mat, camera, scales etc. as well as a few bits and pieces of tackle. My preference is for a compact shoulder bag as this balances up the quiver nicely but the logical choice for most people will probably be a rucksack.

Recently I’ve purposely purchased one of those cheap rucksack/ stool combos to try on cycle trips. Carrying a proper adjustable chair on a bike is a definite pain and I do like a comfortable seat (When bait-fishing) for sessions that are any longer than a couple of hours. You however might be happy to sit on your unhooking mat, at least until it, hopefully, gets wet.

Lightening the load
Depending on what sacrifices you are willing to make you can lighten your load further still. For instance you can choose to fish with only one rod, lure anglers are likely to anyway. Even so, despite the fact that this obviously cuts down on the overall weight of your load, it will not reduce the actual encumbrance factor of your kit. You could also fish float based presentations only, and negate the need to carry rod rests, drop off indicators and buzzers.

It may sound obvious but you will need to make some keen observations as to where the productive areas you have previously established are positioned. If there’s an unmistakable feature you can link to the swim; an overhanging tree, cattle drink, stile, drain and so on, then you’ve got no problem. However if like myself you’re waters are mostly lacking in bankside features you will need to deploy other tactics.

Even on rivers that are fairly rich in these fishy looking features there will be barren looking stretches of bank that still have good fish holding potential. Yes it’s true, despite our natural instincts telling us that every fallen tree and bridge support has a resident pike underneath it, sometimes the stretches of uniform and featureless bank between these ‘sexy’ looking swims actually fish better. Its quite logical really when you consider that a fish is concerned with what’s under the water and not how pretty the swim looks above it. Besides which it is the insignificant areas of river that are likely not to be pressured by other anglers and therefore attractive to the individual seeking pastures new.

A cycle ride, or walk without the tackle along a prospective length of towpath or bank is highly recommended. Without the burden of tackle you will be better placed to check out every likely looking spot. I take Polaroid’s and some spare bait on these excursions. On rivers and drains in particular the old maxim of, ‘find the prey fish and you’ll find the pike,’ is a reasonable starting point.

Find the birds
Aquatic birds of varying kind can signal localised shoal fish activity. Great Crested Grebes, Terns, Herons, and -cross yourselves now- Cormorants, are never far from rich pickings, particularly in the winter when the prey fish are in more concentrated packs.
Just as varying depth on the riverbed can create a fish hotspot, so can a change in the width of the river or drain, the resulting stricture giving rise to perfect ambush points on the wings. Junctions with other rivers and drains are obvious but even the smallest land drain, pipe or culvert trickling into the river or drain can generate the start of a food chain and old Esox is usually on the end of it. The tiniest of ditches or side-streams, farm bridges, long-term weed rafts and heavily-reeded alleys are all worth a look.

Once you’ve found enough redeeming factors to entice you to fish you can return with your tackle and start nailing down some fish. Initially don’t get tunnel vision and park yourself on one convincing feature only, remember its what’s under the water that appeals to the fish. Neglecting to try the less obvious swims will undoubtedly result in you missing out on some good fish.

Marking the swims that have no surface features accurately will play a key part if you are to be consistently successful. It will also save you wasting your precious time. A permanent landmark within a couple of hundred yards of the swim means you can count paces to pinpoint the spot. Otherwise you can leave a marker of some kind. {It pays to choose a discreet method, which is unlikely to be disturbed by rambler’s etc.} Those more organised than myself might choose to record these swim positions and any relevant data in a notebook.

Another factor to favour the angler, who is prepared to put on their, ‘pioneering hat’ and seek out the distant or less popular areas, is the opportunity to prebait and be relatively assured that they aren’t doing so for someone else. In fact you will have the perfect opportunity to ‘bring on’ some swims by regular prebaiting. In effect you can virtually create your own hotspots. At the end of each session you can distribute some of your unused bait between a few chosen swims, this will also serve to lighten your load a little for the journey back.

While I wouldn’t want to give the impression that all my piking is undertaken on the cycle, or that the tactic is suitable for every day’s piking, I do think that on the right day it is well worth a go. I wouldn’t think of biking down the river, for instance, if I knew particularly wet or windy weather was forecast. I do like to maintain some degree of comfort. Nor would I bother if a towpath or bank were particularly treacherous to navigate. Give me a dry day and a mild breeze on the right venue though, and you might see me puffing and panting back along the bank in darkness. Red faced, tired and hot – but hopefully wearing a smug look.

This article was first published in Pike & Predators magazine