On our second day in Wales we decided to head to the Irfon. The Irfon is a beautiful, intimate river in comparison to the much wider Wye. It cuts through the hills and rocks and joins the Wye somewhere around Builth. We were fishing some way upstream of here on a truly stunning section, set amongst the heavily forested hills and high cliffs. The trees were in their full autumnal transformation and the array of colours was quite spectacular.
The river was gin clear and as it cascaded over bedrock and tumbled down into the deep pools it looked quite magical. Fortunately for wading purposes there was a good mixture of gravel and bedrock and this made life a little more comfortable. Depths were average for the Irfon, often 2′ 6″ to 3′ seemed to be standard. We had plenty of smooth runs to go at and we hoped the fishing was going to be as good as the conditions looked.
I opted for a slightly smaller float or around 3bb as the depth was minimal and the flows moderate. I took a walk along the entire length of the section and eventually settled on a nice run of about 2′ 6″ which narrowed at the end of the run as it was squeezed between the bedrock. A little and often baiting approach soon paid off, with the float burying and a hard fighting grayling vying for freedom on the other end. I’m pleased to say I won the battle and a stunning grayling of 1lb 11oz was soon returned unscathed. Both Geoff and Kevin had stayed on a deep bend and although Kevin had managed a couple of reasonable fish, Geoff hadn’t had a bite. I had another couple of decent fish when Geoff arrived. He dropped in below me and proceeded to hook numerous big grayling. Sadly he was having ‘one of those days’! Virtually every fish he hooked came off. I at least learned a few new words!
I continued to catch and eventually hooked what felt like a bigger fish. Despite it’s best efforts at shedding the hook as it left the water like an exocet missile on numerous occasions during the fight, I finally managed to land the fish. Other than an old wound on the flank the colours and condition of the fish was stunning. It turned out to be my best Irfon fish to date at 2lb 4oz and I followed that up shortly after with another good fish going 2lbs exactly (honest Guv). That’s the first brace of twos I have managed on either the Wye or the Irfon and I was chuffed to bits.
Towards the end of the day the fishing died and we decided to head off lower downstream. We all managed a few grayling and some very nice dace before calling it a day. Geoff even hooked and promptly lost a couple of unseen monsters. Judging by the speed with which they accelerated, we think they were probably salmon. Throughout our stay we saw lots and lots of salmon jumping, so it made sense to come to that conclusion.
The River Angler 
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