My Birthday and another assault on the Alyn with yet another early start - this could become a habit! Thought I'd try my 7' 6" Fladen today with a 4 weight line and 4' furled leader. A bit longer and heavier than last time I was here to experiment with keeping more tightly in touch with a sunken nymph. The main objective really (apart from getting out of the city), was to further explore the river and practice my casting with a particular emphasis on roll-casting.

To the river then, and no sign of anything rising, although there is quite a lot of fly activity - I think I’ll try a single nymph. Initially I went with the same white bead-head 16 I’ve used with success before but as this didn’t seem to draw any activity I changed to a slightly bigger 14 nymph, resplendent with a blue-green sparkle back just as I get to one of the deeper runs just below the ‘two bridges’ section. Second run down and the leader dips slightly, tighten up and there is fish on! This is a bigger fish than I’ve felt before and it goes boring deep upstream before rushing downstream and jagging back into the deeps again. No aerial gymnastics for this creature. As soon as I can I draw him in an as he breaks surface I can see he is a beautiful Grayling. In the net and this fish is over a foot long and quite plump – must be pushing a pound in weight – what a beauty.

A quick pic and then hold it in the current, head upstream, to recover. This worried me a bit because it took some time for the fish to leave. For a period after I’d let go it seemed to just be happy to hold position and I was absolutely amazed at the effectiveness of the camouflage. It was no more than a foot (304.8mm for anyone too young to remember real measurements) from my foot (which isn’t exactly 304.8mm long) but if I didn’t know it was there I would never have seen it. After a couple of minutes, it flicked away and was gone. Wow, what a privilege.

A quieter patch now so time to practice my roll-cast. In theory, Google and YouTube had assured me, this allows a good forward projection of the fly with minimal back-cast. Ideal for me who seems to be a world-leading expert at catching trees with my back-cast. So, bring your rod backwards and upwards (forming a 'D' in the line) and then quickly 'power' the rod forward - almost liking flicking a sticky blob from the rod-tip. By golly - it actually works! The line forms a quite attractive forward-moving loop that rolls forward (hence the name I suppose) unfurling the leader above the water and projecting the fly with fairly gentle precision. Well, most of the time anyway. This should reduce my future expenditure on flies greatly. So, let's roll onward and up(stream)ward.

But the day was not done. Just upstream there is a long quickish run – and a rising fish. I’d changed my fly to a smaller iridescent bead head nymph now and rather than change to an unknown dry I cast towards a point just above the last position I’d seen. Almost immediately the leader twitched and here was another silver Lady of the Stream. Smaller but still lovely.

That was the last fish of the day but not the last adventure. Mid-day saw the appearance of a Kingfisher, shooting along, low over the water before seeing me and shooting back upstream to disappear amongst the shadows. I’d forgotten how brilliant a blue these fellow anglers really are. Jewel-like in the sunlight.

And finally, the icing on the cake. Standing mid-stream changing a fly I had been motionless for some little time. Suddenly there was a commotion in the water just to my left. Looking up expecting to see the spreading rings of a splashy fish rise I was stunned to see a wild otter exiting the river. He/she sat there looking around, no more than 3 or 4 yards from be before snaking up the bank and under a tree trunk – presumably just going home. What an incredible sight - I’ve never seen a wild British otter before.

So a genuinely brilliant birthday, 2 grayling, a kingfisher and an otter, all in the wonderful British countryside. Fishing days really don’t get much better for me - I’m truly happy as I set off home.