Simple Fishing: Getting Back to Basics and fishing for yourself

Let me tell you about the best fish I have ever caught. It was a brown trout no more than ½ lb, taken on a cheap little spoon lure from a corner shop, the sort that back then costs about £1. I must have lost ten of those lures to the trees and bushes on the bank that day before one of them finally did its job.

I was only a boy, stood on the banks of the Liddel Water at Newcastleton, up on the Scottish border. It was cold, and my dad had just walked my sister back to the cottage to warm her up. Five minutes after they left, my lure stopped dead and that trout came thumping up through the current. I did not have the faintest clue what I was doing. I had no idea how to even unhook it. And to this day, decades and a fair few gaps in my fishing later, it is still the best fish I have ever caught.

The only thing that comes close is watching my own son catch his first, on a simple multipurpose rod and a bit of bait. Nothing fancy. Nothing that cost the earth. Just a kid, a bend in the rod, and a smile from ear to ear.

I think about those two moments a lot, especially when I see the way fishing has drifted.

We Have Made a Simple Thing Complicated

Somewhere along the line, a hobby about sitting by the water became a competition about who spent the most getting there. You see it everywhere. Someone asks an honest question on a Facebook group, proud of the rod their nan bought them from a catalogue, and gets picked apart because it is a Mikado or an NGT and not a Korda or an Avid. As if the fish check the label before they bite.

Let me be plain about this. You could catch a fish with a stick, a bit of line and a hook if you had to. The gear is not the point. It never was. Chasing a bigger carp than the bloke next to you, just to one up him, is the fastest way I know to suck all the joy out of a day on the bank. There is real fun in big fish, of course there is. But when that is the only thing it is about, when it becomes a scoreboard, it stops being fishing.

Fish for the Feeling, Not the Clout

Here is my honest confession, from someone who sells tackle. I would be perfectly, quietly content catching ten tiny roach on a simple float setup, feeling every little turn the fish makes down the line, than landing a fifty pound carp on a rod and reel that cost more than my car. I know that because I have felt both (maybe not quite 50). The big fish comes with a knot in your stomach. Is the gear going to hold? Am I using the bait everyone else is catching on? The little roach comes with nothing but a smile.

More expensive does sometimes earn its keep, I will not pretend otherwise. Longer warranties, better aftercare, kit that lasts. But be honest with yourself. Are you going to have more fun, and less worry, with a fifty pound rod or a five hundred pound one? I know which one I would rather carry down to the water.

And do think twice about the pressure to keep upgrading. Nine times out of ten, the person telling you that you absolutely need the new thing is making a commission when you buy it. There are good, genuine people out there too, and I am not tarring everyone with the same brush. But the next time social media makes you feel like your kit is not good enough, ask yourself who benefits from you feeling that way. It is rarely you, and it is never the fish, the fish do not care if you use a bait boat, they dont care if your line is gold plated, they just want to eat.

Cheap From Abroad Is Often a False Economy

While we are being honest about money, let me say something about where it goes. Those bulk import apps, the Temus and AliExpresses of the world, feel like a bargain right up until you do the sums properly. A lot of it is the very same stuff you will find here, just badged differently and shipped halfway around the planet, and by the time you have replaced the bits that snapped or bent on the first fish, you have not really saved a penny. That is a false economy, plain and simple.

Here is the part worth chewing on. You can very often get the equivalent, or something a good deal better, from someone in this country for similar money. Take lures. There is a fella making genuinely lovely ones in his shed under the name Maverick Tackle. That is a real person, quietly honing a craft, who stands behind every one he sells. Spend your money there and it keeps his lights on, rather than disappearing into an overseas warehouse algorithm. I am not saying this to wave a flag, and I do not just mean spend it with us. I mean the plain, practical stuff, better quality, a human on the other end who actually cares, and someone who answers when something goes wrong. That is worth a few pence more of anyone's money.

Simple Kit, Lasting Memories

This matters most, I think, with children. A child does not want the flagship rod. A child wants to catch something, anything, and to feel that jolt of pure wonder when the float goes under. Hand them a simple little setup, a float, a bit of bait, an ultralight rod that bends on a tiddler, and you are not just teaching them to fish. You are building the exact kind of memory I have carried from that cold day on the Liddel Water my whole life. Cheap kit, priceless moment. That is the trade every time.

The Quiet Bit Nobody Talks About

There is another reason simple fishing is worth protecting, and it has nothing to do with fish. When you strip it all back, a quiet bank is one of the few places left where you can just be. No scoreboard. No notifications. No keeping up with anyone. Just the water, the birds, and the slow unclenching of a mind that has spent all week wound far too tight.

I will be honest with you, because I think that helps more than pretending. My own head does not always give me an easy ride, and there are days when getting out of the door at all is the hardest part of the whole thing. But the bank has a way of meeting me where I am. The rhythm of it, the focus narrowed down to one small float, the fresh air and the quiet, it settles something in me that very little else can reach. Fishing has genuinely helped me towards get better, and you cannot put a price on that.

And here is the part I most want you to take away. You do not need money to find that peace. A simple rod, a bit of line and a spot by the water is all it takes. If you are struggling right now, with anything at all, I would gently say give it a go. Not because it fixes everything, because it does not, but because an hour by the water is an hour you gave back to yourself, and that counts for more than you might think. If that is you, and you ever want a hand getting started or simply someone who understands, reach out. I do not say that to sell you anything. I say it because I know the struggle, I live it, and I would not wish anyone to face it feeling like they have to do it on their own.

Just Do You

So here is the whole thing, really. Fishing should never be about the gear. It should be about the feeling, the peace, and the memories you are quietly building every time you sit down by the water. It does not matter what you spend, or whether your kit is expensive, cheap, free or handed down from someone who loved it before you. It is yours. Do what you can with what you have got, do not chase a trend just to keep pace with people you will never fish beside, and never let anyone make you feel small for the rod in your hands. If they do, they were never much of a fishing mate to begin with.

Yes, we are a tackle company, and yes, we would love to sell you something one day. But we would far rather you found an hour of peace on a quiet bank than spent a fortune trying to buy it. If you want a hand getting back to basics, kitting out a young one for their first go, or you just fancy talking to someone who understands, our door is always open. We fish too, and we remember our first one just like you remember yours. Tight lines.