The last time I was at Fields End was, unbelievably, in May 2012. The Pit hasn't changed, although there are apparently now more swims on the Pool. The owner, Charlie, was in the shop and was surprised to see me. He thought his wooden platforms (which I dislike because of the noise they can generate) had scared me off, but I assured him that this wasn't the case, and that my interests had expanded, with golf and French now taking a lot of my time.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the lake wasn't too busy. This was not good for Charlie, of course, but certainly more relaxing for me. Mine was the only car in the visitors' car park, although a disabled badge holder was parked on the far bank, unfortunately next to where I had planned to pitch. Rather than sit next to him, like those people who park next to you in car parks when you've left the car in a remote corner hoping to avoid door dents, I decided to fish what I call the reed corner. This was once my favourite swim but it's risky to fish, as the larger fish make a beeline for the reeds as soon as they're hooked.

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I wasn't too worried about catching big carp and hoped to get the crucians feeding. Needless to say the first fish was a carp, which at only 6lb was a handful on my match rod and 5lb line. I missed quite a few bites that were probably crucians or roach, but finally I hooked one and landed a nice 2lb 3oz crucian. They are gorgeous little fish.

A couple more crucians followed, each about 1½lb (unweighed), and then a roach of about 4oz, followed by another crucian again of around 1½lb.

It was now approaching 14:00 and unfortunately a misfire on my car had reappeared when I arrived at the lake, so I needed to make tracks home to contact roadside assistance to try to get it sorted out. I say unfortunately as I was starting to get the measure of the crucians, which can be difficult little blighters to hook. The chap on the other side of the reeds to me was pulling out roach on a pole, probably the only way to get a reasonable strike rate with these fast-biting fish, and there was another couple around the other side of the lake also using poles.

The heavy-duty carp men were conspicuous by their absence, which didn't worry me a bit.