Wolfclyde And Imperfect Memories
- Details
- Published on Tuesday, 01 December 2009 17:59
- Written by Bob Graham
I know quite a few readers are familiar with the Clyde at Wolfclyde but I wonder how many can remember it before 1950. I think I can, although some of my memories are a bit hazy.
Stand on the bridge looking downstream. There was another bridge, a railway bridge and some stones still remain. I think, think, I can remember the railway bridge being there, although if I am wrong I can certainly recall that most of the bridge was still there until the middle 1960s before it was finally demolished and the stone carried away. I think, again, that I remember a level crossing just to the east of the present row of houses. These are (or were before some were sold) council houses. They replaced a previous row of council houses that had metal roofs and were demolished around 1970. I think I remember they replaced yet another row of cottages sometime in the 1950s.
The river hasn’t changed much over the years apart from some streamy water created when the railway bridge was finally removed. Further downstream from the bend onwards the river is still as it was in the late 1940s.
Now cross the road (watch for traffic) and look upstream. The river has hardly changed in over fifty years all the way up to Sandy’s Ford. But here’s the interesting bit – the big field on the right hand side used to hold a very basic camping site. When I say very basic I mean that the farmer allowed camping near the fence on the right.
I know this because I was there – in 1947. I was just a wee laddie but an experienced fisher with two years under my belt and short trousers. That year there were three ex-army bell tents. In one there was me, mum and dad and my wee brother, six years old at the time. In another was my uncle Robert, his wife Nellie and my cousin John, aged four, although his brother Dennis turned up nine months after that holiday. Finally, there was Davy Dobbie, his wife Rita and daughter Marie, aged four although, again, her sister Jeannie, arrived nine months later. Funnily my sister didn’t make an appearance until the following August. I wonder if I spoiled it for my Mum and Dad.
I can’t really remember anything else about that holiday except for the fishing. I’ve a feeling I was an objectionable little so-and so with no interest in anything else other than getting down to the river with a wee seven foot rod, netting some gadgers and spending most of my time up to my knees, over the top of my wellies, in the Clyde. And I caught fish; probably not as many and not as big as I think I remember, but I caught fish. I am sure my Grand-dad turned up once and let me have a go with his rod, all fourteen foot of it but I couldn’t really handle it – just too big for me. He took me upriver past the memorial to the stream below Sandy’s Ford (and it was a ford then) and gave me a lesson on how to catch trout with stickbait. One day I’m going to try stickbait again, just for old times sake.
One day I met my first fly fisher. An old lad, well he seemed old to me, with half a dozen flees hanging out of his mouth. This was his spare cast tied up with gut that most fly fishers in those days held in their mouths to keep the gut supple. And he could fish. I watched him fishing through about a hundred yards of water and taking a lot of fish most of which were killed and dropped into a bag that hung over his shoulder. He waded out and sat down beside me, took the cast from his mouth, filled his pipe, lighted it and asked how my luck had been. I had two. He opened his bag to reveal more trout than I had ever seen before. Even my Dad and Uncle Robert had never caught so many fish (and they were good, very good). He walked up to the tent with me and sat down to blether with the other men. When he had run out of talk he asked if I wanted to see his fly tying and fishing hut and I was actually encouraged to go with him – try that these days.
He lived in one of the cottages and had a hut in the back garden filled with tackle, waders and, it seemed to me, hundreds of dead birds. He showed me how he tied his flees (no vice, no tools apart from scissors; the hook was stuck into a piece of plywood). I could have watched him for a lifetime, this was heaven. He gave me a cast of flees that he guaranteed would fill my bag the next day but I can never remember using them until later in the year on the Tweed, catching two fish and then losing the cast to a tree. I met that old lad a few times over the years but can never remember his name.
The next time you go to Wolfclyde have a look around. Note where the railway used to run. Have a look at the memorial. And look for signs of an old camp in the far corner of the field. I was there but maybe somebody can sharpen up my memory.
Bob Graham is an occasionally lucky gentleman who claims he does not do very much these days other than try to catch trout five or six days a week. Bob is a regular at Hillend Reservoir and lives in Whitburn West Lothian.