I really wanted to dislike Swanage Pier. I didn’t like the prospect of having to pay £6 to fish it between the confines of 9-5, and even less so did I like the cost of parking a car in Swanage – at £9 for the day! Adding to that £15 the cost of fuel, food, and a bit of bait, I was quickly pot committed to a fish not much longer than the palm of my hand.

I’d been to Swanage once before, visiting with family in the summer, and knew that it would be busy with tourists and holidaying fisherman. I didn’t know then, though, that it was a Baillon’s wrasse stronghold. Weymouth had been crawling with day-trippers too, but at least in a harbour I could slink off to find some peace and quiet… You can’t really do the same on a pier. With the prospect of the cost, plus the general summer bustle, I have to admit that the pursuit of a Baillon’s felt like a chore before I even stepped on the wooden planks of the pier.

… I was just being a grumpy sod. I really shouldn’t have been, and on reflection I was incredibly lucky. I enjoyed myself a lot, and what unfolded that morning might even have been, dare I say, the most effortless piece of angling I’ve ever embarked on? The brain fog had already begun to lift as I sat opposite Swanage Angling, enjoying a cup of tea in the sunshine outside a café. I was waiting for the tackle shop to open at 08:30 and had already had a leisurely walk around the seafront, which had a double rainbow curving above it and away into the distance behind Old Harry Rocks. With a small parcel of ragworm wrapped in newspaper and my miniature fishing gear stowed in my rucksack I stepped onto the pier, and strolled right past the ticket point, exchanging a cheery hello with the lady in the office… No rods, no ticket? I kept walking.

My spirits had lifted to the point where I was practically skipping. I passed a group of blokes waiting for a charter boat, and that was the extent of the anglers I saw for the day – what a treat.

They’re funny things, piers, but I found this one to be lovely, with the teale waters of the ‘lower deck’ full of potential. It was a day of neap tides and we’d had light winds all week, and as such the water clarity was excellent – it was so excellent in fact that I had to double take when the water beneath my feet begun flashing like a strobe light, with great plumes of bubbles frothing on the surface. A pair of scuba divers surfaced nearby, chatting excitedly about the mysteries of the deep that they’d been snapping below.

The fish didn’t seem to mind the water being lit up like a Christmas tree, and my chunk of ragworm on a size 12 carp hook, tied to a scratching rig, was soon being gnawed away at. I’d tied up an array of micro rigs in 6lb fluoro; including several iterations of dropshot rigs, and cheb rigs with hot pink weights – but I needed neither! Swanage was about to deliver the ultimate slice of beginner’s luck, and with the first drop the rod tip vibrated and rattled over. I lifted a speckled fish onto the deck, expecting the first of many corkwings… But bugger me, it was a Baillon’s! I studied it closely, almost refusing to believe it – but the peachy fins, black smudges, and light blue face streaking confirmed it. Plenty of tiddlers were caught on ragworm and isome after (abundant corkies, ballan, pouting, tompots, and black bream) but there were no more Baillon’s.

By 10.30am I’d had my fill and it was mission complete. I didn’t want to spoil what had been an otherwise perfect morning so I packed up and left the sun-dappled pier behind. I decided to put the remainder of my rag to good use somewhere rockier ‘just around the corner’ – but that’s a tale for another day.