In the 1996 Hooked on Scottish series, Paul Young meets Ala McGruar, a salmon fisherman on Loch Ness.
Ala tells of having caught fish right in front of Castle Urquhart, when his was “the most photographed boat in the country”.
Paul then visits the monster centre at Drumnadrochit, before moving downstream to the banks of the River Ness.
He is there at 5:45am, and hopes to intercept a fish on the way up to the loch.
He uses a floating line, with a couple of flies. “Something really special about being out on a morning like this, everything’s calm, quiet. The fish are reasonably undisturbed, they haven’t been spooked. The great thing about fishing is every day, every place you go to, it’s different. It was fascinating being out on the loch, but all the fish that go to the loch have got to come through this fairly narrow bit of water.”
A fish bites, but gets away after a short struggle, taking the fly with it.
