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Visitor Testimonials
Additional testimonial articles: Steve Wozniak | Stuart, Rob and Jay
 Hi all
This is John Howe, my friend Dave Ward & myself spent a full week's fishing with John Bate in Portugal 5th October - 14th October 2004.We were collected from the Airport and based ourselves in Alentejo, an old Copper Mining village and stayed in a typical Portuguese bed and breakfast accommodation with delightful aged lady Host, the rooms were simply furnished and clean with shared toilet and shower arrangements.
Each day we awoke at 6.30am and made our way to John's trusty vehicle and were taken to 2 different dams & a river the first day was on a dam were I caught 39 carp to 11/2 lbs and 65 on the second day on the 3rd day we went to a river location and I caught 11 Barbel, 3 Carp & a terrapin. days 4, 5 &6 on a dam with lots of features (reeds) the first day I got smashed up twiceand blanked the second day Dave caught a personal best of 11 & then 161/2LbsI caught good carp but nowhere near that weight. the 6th day was 4 hour session John managed to fit in before we went back, showered and John then took us to the Airport, for our evening flight.
Throughout our stay we used a dustbin full of particle bait John had prepared, and numerous tins of sweetcorn & boilies which john had bought with him. We fished from dawn till dusk arriving back in Alentejo, very tired, having a shower and then eating in a local restaurant, which was good and inexpensive before getting back to base & falling asleep very quickly.
Oh did I mention John's Breakfasts cooked for you on the Bank, Egg, Bacon, Sausage Tomatoes, Beans, Mushrooms and Bread, a real blow-out to keep you going all day.
All in all an excellent supervised fishing trip Thank you John Bate. muchappreciated.
Kind Regards
John Howe & Dave Ward
Hi again John.
This is the second year I have gone fishing with John. Last year he suggested at the end of my visit that I should fish two consecutive days, so on arriving for my trip in 2004 this was my plan.
Day one was sunny, but the fish were not there in any quantity only one taken on a boilie and the other five taken on sweetcorn on the float rod. But as suggested by John I continued to feed during the whole day and then topped up the swim with an extra load of bait as we finally packed up for the day.
Day two, fishing the same swim, things could not have been so different, with a succession of small carp coming to the float rod and were there almost before the swim was fed for the first time that day. The fish started aout around the pound mark and as the day progressed the weights started to push to around the three to four pound mark.
The the larger carp moved in and on the float tackle it became a real tussle to land them, I had five fish over the 10lbs mark, including one that had moments earlier managed to break John’s line and had become entangled in mine, this fish must have been an expert in line tying for sure!
The Boilies did yeald 3 good fish, but the response was much slower than the particle approach using the float tackle. This was a hard days fishing where they never got tired of taking the bait, something you don’t find very often in England.
For 2005, well I think I shall be back in Portugal and take John’s last piece of advice and not just two consecutive days but stay overnight at this particular water and have a barbeque and se how the water fishes at night. If you intend coming to Portugal and want to go fishing, give John a try, he will do his utmost to put you where the fish are and serve up some wonderful bacon butties whilst he is doing it!
Regards Roy Wickenden.
England
 I hired John last October for a days fishing at large, 3000 acre dam. This is a Dam I and my party have fished quite a few times, but under John's guidance three of us caught personal bests. We met John before daybreak and he took us to one of his out of the way swims, showing us his techniques and methods. The result of this was fish ranging from 13.5 to 17lb, five in total and loads of smaller fish.
There were ample cups of coffee and with John's relaxed approach it all made for a very enjoyable day.
See you later in the year!
Graham
England
 John has been taking me and my friends fishing for 10 years.
We always have a great time and John does his best to find us new 'secret', out of the way fishing spots, we all recommend him and his services to you!
Vic
Norwich England
I have known John for 11 years, he loves to show people how to catch carp, nothing is too much trouble for him.
Thanks to John we are now catching carp in Holland, which before we had found uncatchable.
We have also been sea fishing with John, where he showed us how to catch sharks.
Kurt
Holland
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