Last Saturday I hosted a large group of Spanish exchange students and their living host, students from Ålands Lyceum. The group came from Madrid on last Tuesday and are staying just over one week to learn english and the Åland culture an experience.
To my help I had two other guides, Thomas Strandvik and Jan Aalto and my family helped out to arrange the big lunch with 50 guest from hosts to teachers and family. All hosts brought their own food to be grilled an the barbecue or fried in the big Muurika pan.
Just before 11 a clock the first groups started to arrive and donned their warm floating suits. Well needed when the ice cover actually broke just the day before this event! As soon as the first twelve were kitted we headed out to the different fishing spot and started the steep learning curve of fishing and casting for pike.
We got off with a good start when all four girls I had in my boat almost from the beginning started the get the lures flying further and further during the first 30 minutes. Of course there is some lines getting crossed an lures lost but thats all part of the experience. We move about and with less then 30 min left of the 1,5 hrs tour we hook at 2,5kg pike in my boat. The amount of cheering going around I think was some sort of record in itself 🙂 Lets say the pike was one of the most recorded and photoed I’ve seen 🙂
Just minutes after Thomas called me to come and help him weigh a better pike. At 94cm and 6,75kg it was a real beauty! Also Jans boat came to watch and there and then they got their first pike at the same spot!
1,5 hrs pass super quick and we headed to shore for an hour lunchbreak before heading out with new groups. At my house, situated just 150m from the pier where we docked my wife and kids had prepared the smoking hot barbecue and sizzling Muurika. The lawn were already crowded with spaniards and Ålanders mingling, grilling and frying. There was all kinds of food being cooked, sausages, different types of meat, grilled cheese, vegan style food and so on…
The weather was treating us nice with 10+ and a clear sunny sky. The ones already finished with lunch set out to play some soccer and some social games like Kubb and Mölkky.
13.30 we left the pier with 12 brand new fishermen and fisherwomen to learn the “trade”. The first tour had catched 5 fish in the 3 boats. The second tour were luckier! Jans boat manage to catch 3 and Thomas boat six pikes. In my boat it was kind of a slow start with the new girls throwing the baits as far as a mighty javelin thrower in a olympic game but no pikes got hooked even though we did have some bites they just wouldn’t get stuck on the hooks.
We kept fighting and all of the sudden one of the girls shout out! I don’t know what it was becuase it was in spanish but I could se her rod was bent and there was a large spray of water where her bait an pike were having a fight :). Soon it became obvious the she had hooked a really big pike! After a minute or two drilling the fish hard we landed it safely in the net! The first fish we caught was 106cm och weight in at a slim 5,6kg beeing already post spawn. We took som beautiful pictures of the beast and then released her into her elements again!
We landed two more pikes before we needed to head back to shore and the waiting hosts. All in all we landed (and released) 17 pikes!
Donningfishing thank all the students, teachers, hosts and guides for a marvelous day! If you have nice pictures that you are ok to share please send them to hasse@donningfishing.com or tag us on instagram or facebook!
