We’ve just spent a glorious afternoon on a mackerel fishing trip from Beer followed by mackerel, chips and a cold beer on the beach. What could be a better way of showing the kids where their food comes from than to actually get them to catch it and cook it themselves.
We had booked a spot on an afternoon trip on board Lillie-May, we were very pleased we’d previously booked as there was a huge queue of people trying to get out on the water.
After a five-minute trip out to sea we were given a quick demonstration of how to launch our lines, and the waiting began. Hattie and Grannie on one, Meg and Matt on the second and I had the third. Unfortunately, there were only seven lines between the eleven people on board but to be fair I think we would have all got a little tangled if there had been eleven hanging out the back of the boat!
After thirty minutes we hadn’t yet caught a single mackerel, Hattie and the children from the other group’s interest was starting to wane. Then Meg shouted she’d felt a pull, we weren’t totally convinced, but she excitedly pulled her line in and sure enough the biggest mackerel of the trip on the end. This followed by an excited ten minutes as between Hattie, Grannie, Meg, Matt and I we caught nine mackerel. The other group weren’t quite as lucky and only managed to bag two between them!
After an hour at sea we kindly donated some of our catch to their dinner and off we trotted with six beautiful mackerel. Whilst Matt lit the BBQ, Grannie gutted and I order a few portions of chips from the beach café.
Around 20 minutes from leaving the boat we were all sat in the evening sun with chips, freshly BBQ’d mackerel, salsa Verde and a cold beer. Meg and I topped the evening off with a lovely swim in sea, I can’t think of a more perfect way to end a gorgeous summer day on the Jurassic Coast.
The trip cost £8 per adult, £6 per child and lasts 1 hour from the slip at Beer beach. Similar trips run out of Lyme Regis.
