All the fun of the fair! - British Fly Fair 2007

publication date: Nov 5, 2007

This past Saturday and Sunday saw an influx of gamefishers to the Trentham Gardens Estate near Stoke-on-Trent for the 2007 British Fly Fair International. With fly-tiers, retailers, destinations and visitors from several countries attending, this truly was an international event. I counted New Zealand, Alaska, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway and several others for example.

Fish & Fly were there in force, both in front of and behind the tables. Charles Jardine worked the crowd as always grouped around his tying table and Terry Lawton was prowling the aisles seeking out new tricks to try and fool even more trout. F&F's tackle reviewer Simon Young was also around on Sunday, looking for more innovations to test and report on to you over the coming months.

Out on the casting pond, Klaus Frimor from Loop was demonstrating the new Zpey rod with its innovative off-centre handle design. Watch for a short film of this coming soon to our video section!

The lecture theatres at either end of the middle tent kept the crowds occupied and gave them somewhere to rest too. One that was particularly fun was watching the X-Flies panel from Fly Fishing & Fly Tying magazine rip into some new patterns in person - never ones to hold back, some made it through the rigorous assessment while others never made it past the starting gate! A series of expert speakers also talked on a number of topics ranging from pike to trout, including England international Simon Kidd of Snowbee shown here.

I thought the location itself was well thought out as all the amenities of Trentham Gardens were available just a short walk away, including restaurants and bathrooms. Saturdays crowds seemed a little larger to me than Sunday which made getting around the main tent by the entry quite difficult at first but once they spread out into the other two tents it was a little easier. These types of events always turn into social events of course, with fishing buddies meeting up and chatting over a hot coffee or roll by the catering vans outside or in the aisles next to their favourite stands.

We did our share too, inparticular talking to Sue Hunter and Sue Shaw of the England Ladies Flyfishing Association, but also more pointedly now running the UK arm of the breast cancer survivors charity and support group - Casting for Recovery. This brilliant organisation deserves all our support and I took the chance to interview the two Sue's for a short feature on the organisation which you will find coming soon on Fish & Fly. We will also be running a charity auction on ebay of a display set of Salmon Flies tied and donated by our very own Simon Young for them so watch out for those details too coming soon and put in a bid!