Hintlesham Specimen Lake 2

10th of May 2025 – Duration 24 hours

Who Went

Our first short trip of 2025 as Jason and Craig made their way to Specimen Lake 2 at Hintlesham Fisheries.  We like this as it’s a local venue for us and a great one to get started.

Out of the 4 main lakes they have there, this one isn’t Craig’s favourite (in fact it’s his 3rd choice) but it was a busy venue so we had to make do.

There are some big (around 35 lb) carp in there but they don’t come out too often.

We arrived at 7 am as we usually do and began getting set up.

The Weather

Well, being a few weeks later in the year there wasn’t much to say about it.  It was nice when the sun was out but a lot colder in the shade.

It made for nice fishing but it was a timely reminder to keep out of the sun for too long as it was starting to beat down.

Once the sun dipped at the end of the day though a wind whipped up and you certainly felt the cold.

The Fishing

We set up and got under way and the people we’d passed on the way to our swim said they had caught which was encouraging.

It wasn’t too long after this that we were all set up and underway.

We’d traveled light knowing we were not far away, there is a tackle shop onsite and good facilities.

Hintlesham is a gated fishery so it keeps most of the trouble away which is always nice.

It was just after midday when Craig landed his first carp of the day having grabbed a nice run and not had a fish on it earlier, as well as an interesting number of liners. 

It’s always nice at Hintlesham as there are no bream which is a relief.  If you get a fish it’s usually a carp.

So, around mid day Craig landed a nice common, not worth weighing so we put the chap back quickly but he sure was a fighter, even on the bank.

Jason was trying Ronnie rigs which he isn’t a fan of.  Often when casting out and bringing his line back in later there was no bait yet he was hardly hearing a bleep.  This seemed to plague him entire the trip.

Craig said he should have changed but Jason was being stubborn!  In fairness Craig has used them and had the same thing happen on occasions albeit rarely so perhaps he was unlucky or something was not going right.

Then, around midnight, Craig landed another excited young carp.

He felt if he wasn’t so tired (days of reduced sleep due to work) he would have been able to work all night but instead he had a good sleep finally landing a last minute 3rd carp when he was packing up at around 6am.

Hintlesham Carp Fisheries – The Venue

We’ve covered this in an earlier report – click to read.

In fairness it’s not changed much.  It’s still a well run, friendly and high quality fishery.

Security is good but there is a special shout out we’d like to give to someone.

One of the new Bailiffs.  

Fishing for us is supposed to be about friendship, a break from the race of life and a chance to get back to nature.

What it shouldn’t be is about bad spirited angling which sadly we encountered here.  There were a couple of lads a few swims down fishing well outside their swim.

They said they would be leaving that evening at 6.30pm and as we were setting up we watched them trundle along with their bait boat, right over Jason’s swim.  This left him with about 30 yards of water to hit so not much and it’s not on.

Craig spoke to them and they said in effect, we were told we can fish there by the bailiff (maybe they were as there is more than one bailiff).  However, it’s fairly obvious to one and all that that only stands when others are not fishing near to you.

We’d asked them to shift over about ten feet so Jason could at least fight to the main feature, the big lilly pad.  They said they had been baiting it up for some time etc… (you know the usual stuff).

Their reply was literally ‘well, it’s tough shit’…

Now, a few words were said by Craig and them but basically he can’t drown them as then he is the problem.

So, being the responsible adult we went and spoke to the Bailiff on site.

He then spoke to them in the shop, they then moved over to more acceptable water (about ten feet at most).  This was then enough for Jason to have his logical water and both parties to have features to hit.

This sort of stuff really annoys me, we didn’t cross over their lines, Jason fished short to begin with but really – these sort of people need to learn how to be more considerate.

It’s not how angling should be in our view.

So, well done to the Bailiff doing their job and doing it well – so thank you.