That's it, days of fishing in the Danube Delta! With and about Ioana Alexe, pike, books, movies, stories, flowers, girls or boys, songs or singers.

On Ioana Alexe I met her in the Danube Delta, at one of the pike fishing competitions in  Egreta Hidroturism. She was the only female presence in the competition, in a team with her partner, Rino (Sorin). The best crew, low profile, silent, but always with a smile and "hello" on your lips. There was something special about them, the Delta, the pike fishing, the way they behaved, both in the arrangement of tools and lures before the competition, and in the positive energy they emanated in the end. Even if they didn't count in the final standings.

How passionate is Ioana about pike fishing?

Very passionate. I realized one evening when, on the terrace in Egreta, in 2017, he asked me where he could find the new Strike Pro Pig Shad JR 15cm. At that time, I was the only one in Romania who had this model in the test, only a few pieces in four or five colors, and I had barely made any posts on Facebook and KidnappersMania In this regard. They weren't going to go on sale until next year, and I was impressed that he knew about them. So I took my kit and let her choose two pigs.

The first one took my orange one, at that time being the best color for pike in the Danube Delta. She knew, I knew, I tried hard to hide a grimace of suffering. After losing the orange, the second color didn't matter. I only met such joy in my eyes as Ioana's when she receives one of those ghosts that she is not allowed to touch. That they're mine and I'm dealing with them. As I had the following year, when I regained possession of the orange. But that's different story.

The years have passed

We met again in the following years, temporarily, in the Danube Delta, at most of the pike fishing competitions organized either by Egreta or by LRS. I like people in whose eyes you can read that happiness that only the Danube Delta can impress on you, above fish and fishing. Even though I didn't talk much together, every time I saw or interacted with them, Ioana and Rino gave me a good "vibe". If you've come this far with reading, you're probably wondering what's with this long introduction. In fact, it's just a short preamble to what you're about to read.

If it weren't for it, it wouldn't be told

Shortly after I launched the blog you are reading now, Ioana sent me a message on Instagram:

• I'm glad you're writing again. And I've always watched your videos on YouTube for editing and music!
• Hey, hey, thanks, I did a reset with this Covid. I still have a lot to write, by the way, I would like you to tell me about you, about the Delta, about the pike. What do you say?
• Maybe if you want to start a humorous column or about lazy fishermen without a sense of ridicule. Like coming to the temple of pride and saying that you actually get caught, not caught, it's important to have fun and run away from the city.
• No, you have a passion, rare nowadays, among thousands of tools, influencers, etc., especially for the fair sex. After all, that's what it's about, catch, don't catch, you call yourself a fisherman. In other words, I would like an article written by you. I also give you the title "I did it my way!" or the “architecture of pike fishing” feminist speaking… ”
• That's a challenge, and you know I can't help it. I'm writing! But it may not entertain or interest too many people. The only condition is that if it's stupid, don't publish it.
• It will be good, I feel it, I have exchanged some energies with you over time.
• All the fishermen will be angry with you: at least half of them run away from home to fish precisely because the girls don't come there. "Mosquitoes, tuna, let go of that little fish, etc." Hahaha

Blog by blog is made heaven

And Ioana wrote, as she promised. It was one of the few articles I've read head and tail, without interruption, lately. He walked me through my childhood, Delta, books, movies, music, photography, fishing beginnings. An amalgam of emotions overwhelmed me from her and my stories, remembered, relived while reading, listening, watching. I'm sorry that there are no more magazines, this article deserves, without a doubt, the rustling of paper between your fingers when you turn the page, the fresh smell of cellulose and printing ink. On the other hand, the prince could not have expressed as well the acoustic and visual electronic completions of this truly special material. An article I hope you find yourself in, as I did. In the end, after rereading the article once again, I asked Ioana to write to us or she had to make a blog. I am also waiting for your encouragement in the comments, until then, dear fishermen, Ioana Alexe. Enjoy!

"I can't think of the Delta as one place, not even at one point in time. Delta is more of a feeling of being under the sky, surrounded by a universe trembling with flights, winds and smells, in an endless sway of reeds and water. Nowhere do I feel like I'm part of nature. "

beginning

I was first in the Delta in 1988, on a vacation with my family. We are 8 years old and I remember well the road that started somewhere early in Bucharest, the fog on the road, through which I passed like a gate to another world… As a child, I had been read and read only adventure books on stormy seas, with shipwrecks, islands, huge fish, treasures and pirates. After this trip I imagined the Land of Fire, from "All the sails up", the island of Robinson, Cherries and Jules Verne with canals and reeds as I had seen in Sulina. The road with the "Passenger", the old lighthouse, the ships and barges that passed us, the villages on the edge, all unfold even in my mind with a precision of detail that I have not kept other memories from an early age. . It was the wildest, most storytelling place I had ever been.

Sulina, my love

I later found it in Radu Anton Roman, in the book „Fishing days”, The lively description of the people on the“ Passenger ”, speaking another language, of the Delta, tourists mixed with locals, people with harsh behavior, with sunburned faces, aged maybe too early. I did not forget the cemetery with the graves of some English sailors, the pieces of red marble scattered on the beach in Sulina, the skulls scattered on the field next to the road leading to the sea, the sparks that could be seen at night from the shipyard, streets 4, 5 , 6, with flowers and fruit trees as I had not seen in the Bucharest of the '80s. I was allowed to leave the hotel and walk around alone and I really enjoyed these lonely walks. In one of them I found a lie in the grass and I tried to catch fish with it, and because I was not successful, I tried to catch the mosquito clouds.

The architecture of a lost dream

I didn't come to the Delta for a while, but I went to Tulcea and Niculițel, where my father had a college colleague and where he was looking to buy a vineyard. Unfortunately, he didn't do it, but for many years he bought Niculițel grapes and made a very good white wine. So, although I haven't been to the Delta for a while, she was somehow present. Especially in the poverty of the '80s, my father came from these trips with catfish, pike and mackerel.

In the 2000s I was a student of Architecture and passionate about photography. Although the era of digital cameras had begun and I even had one, I loved taking pictures on film. I liked that I couldn't see the result immediately, I was looking through a finder, not at a screen, and I liked to use black and white films for the surprises I had in development, when I found that the emulsion was always differently impressed by the light. We walked a lot, without a specific theme, looking for places and people, especially people. At the same time, I saw at the European Film Festival, at MȚR, the film "That's it”, By Thomas Ciulei. I really liked it and I remembered my Sulina from the '80s.

We in the year 2000, when we will no longer be children

I returned to the Delta, this time, like explorers: I did the acclimatization a few days ago in Tulcea, at the father of a friend. The man worked at the Danube Delta National Research and Development Institute, listened to rock and was obsessed with the film "Arizona Dream”, In which he lived. He drank like any Danube man and woke up in the morning with a few beers. He led us with the tent on a grind full of mosquitoes and snakes to harden us. It had a metal boat made of Nautilus scraps, which was terribly hot, and an engine full of moods (how else?) That left us several times a day. Fortunately, he also had a kind of good assistant and a bonhomie, a guy more like that, who felt responsible for such a bunch of artists not to suffer anything.

He kept us in a Spartan regime for a few days in the Caraorman area, where we roamed some cochleas, through the village frozen under a relentless sun. I remember that in Caraorman I saw for the first time the ruins of abandoned blocks of flats where horses, donkeys and cows lived. I then saw them again all over the country, in Anina, in Oradea and in other places, a testimony of a demented era too easily forgotten and forgiven.

After our skin was tanned enough, sunburned, already immune to mosquitoes and tuna, we landed at Sulina, which we had not seen for more than 10 years. I felt like in "Youth without old age and life without death" when the emperor's son returns home and nothing is as he remembers: the hotel was not long ago, the shipyard was closed and in ruins, its place it had lost its wild charm and the key was invaded by plastic chairs and bad music.

Periprava, a black and white film

We went to see Periprava, which I had learned from the "Pain Memorial," but the place was a swamp. We went to look for the people in Ciulei's film, but we couldn't find Aunt Varvara, and Pal was dead. We found some new places that kept the wilderness we were looking for: at Cardon and Sfiștofca, where we thought we were doing a kind of archeology and a kind of archiving. I still have undeveloped movies from then on and I don't know if I'll ever want to see what's on them. It seems to me that I have some cans in time. And because I like the technique, I want to mention in passing, although I could write many pages, that in terms of photography I used some extremes: a fixed Nikon lens of 180mm f 2.8, with a focal length that allowed me to completely cut the subject from the landscape and a Voigtlander Bessa R2 on which I had 12mm, 35mm and 50mm focal lengths, with which I captured in the image almost everything around me without the subject noticing and feeling targeted.

Save the Danube Delta

At the age of 25, I was much more interested in people and very little in nature. I could not see birds and reeds, I could see a way of life that was dying before my eyes. Another acqua that swallowed gardens with figs, tall roses, wild horses, morons and fine sandy streets, but especially people. I had already seen too many boats with big engines, insulated windows and air pensions in the Prahova Valley to not realize that we are witnessing the sunset of a world. Then came the militant years, saving the Delta, documentaries, articles about how fragile it is, but I didn't think it was possible. For a while I stayed away from the Delta and made only small forays into the Anonymous Festival, when I experienced a small miracle: 10 years after I was looking for Varvara and Tony (characters from the movie "That's It"), I came across them in the yard by chance.

Fishing treaty, Rino

In 2014, Rino was alone on a fishing expedition in the Delta, which wanted a tour of as many lakes and canals as possible; the first stop was Uzlina, where he was supposed to stay one night. He stayed there for 10 days and saw nothing else. He fished on the Cormorant enclosure and naturally the first pike in his life. He was there with some rods to catch perch on the raft and he had a Shimano Nexave BX Spinning 2.70m 3-15g that I had taken for his birthday to lure him to go trout fishing (actually, I wanted to take him in the mountains as often as possible). He had no yarn or string, nor did he know what they were. He caught Isaac in the wind, on the train with an avat oscillator, some very lively pike. It was enough to make him a fantastic passion for the place, for boats and for pike fishing.

The first pike, the first competition in the Danube Delta

Also that fall, Rino entered us both at the contest on the premises of Cormoran, which he had found out by seeing the pictures in the hotel reception. It was about the 10th edition, which was a disaster for everyone, and that after the previous editions had been festivals! I had never caught a pike in my life and I was going to compete with Kala, Onelian, Narcis, Condratov and the rest. We had a few weeks to study what I knew on the net and to equip ourselves for the contest. I didn't know how to use a reel, and I couldn't remember them all the names of the types of lures which we unknowingly bought, so we invented code names to ask each other for the lures and tools we used.

In the competition we managed to catch one of the 5 pike we needed, but we were extraordinarily excited that we had been on the boat for so many hours, that we had been in the rain and not dead, we had started to shoot better and we even managed to put a throw on the lip. reed. I caught the first pike at a Lake Fork that I thought was my secret weapon, and I revealed to Rino another secret weapon I had learned from some old men on an American site: the Blue Fox Vibrax no. 5 gold, in which he also caught the first pike in the competition.

Three in a boat

Many competitions followed in the Cormorant Delta and New Egret. We liked it a lot and we started to make friends with our colleagues and be accepted. It is a very competitive world and we were surrounded by the best fishermen in the country, who had decades of fishing behind them. Since we are not very intuitive, we were completely inexperienced, but enthusiastic and probably this stupid serenity attracted the sympathy of our colleagues.

Narcissus

That way, I will always be grateful to him Narcis Vana who adopted us and who began to teach us methodically how to deal with pike. He gave us his ghosts, took us to his places, showed us how to do it.

Simion

After trying a few times to please him, Simion he suddenly tamed himself and took us fishing with love and joy, made us fig figs from the trees in his garden, caught us in the hall and made us his famous malasolca. His house, the last in Murighiol, which we pass at speed, with its blue porch and thatched roof, is for me the place where the vacation begins.

Stefanie

Then I met Ștefan Stoica, we became friends and started an intense training. I was interested in all the techniques and excited about everything: the unpredictable pike, the unmistakable feature and the discovery of where it stands, sonar, ghosts, reels, how the tip of the feeder shook shaken by sea bream and carrion, the summer nights of " stay at the carp ”, at the tent, by the raft shaken by the lively objects, by the coolness of a mountain river when you walk as slowly as you can, boiled in the neoprene suit, at a trout game.

I like to learn new things, to understand how logical it is in nature and Stefan helped me enormously with his methodical way, with the certainty with which he explained all this to me. I often went fishing with him and he was very severe, he controlled me, scolded me, he got angry, but he couldn't bear to see that I didn't catch him! And now, when something goes wrong, I wonder what Stefan would do. He would probably sit down to calm down, smoke a cigarette and think about trying the last lure in his luggage, change something and get caught!

I realized in these games how far from nature a child raised in a block of flats in a big city can be: what for others was a sense they had acquired in the years when they grew up free by the rivers, outside, for us it was something we had to learn from the outside and the outside, without being able to be natural to us. We started to go often to Sărulești where we fished during the day in the feeder, in the evening in the pikeperch and at night in the carp. We didn't excel in any of the techniques, but all that mattered to us was that we had a reason to sit outside, on the water or near it, and to learn new things.

Romanian Spinning League

At one point, Narcissus offered to let us in Delta Spinning and then we were a wave of Bucharestians who joined the most friendly and popular club. In Bucharest we had a very small circle, of a few friends, and the fact that we suddenly woke up with 25 people calling us, they were happy to see us and with whom we spent many evenings we really liked. We all had something to learn, maybe not fishing, but we certainly learned that we can be friends on the shore and opponents on the water.

Although the competitions are made for the elites of a sport, we have learned to fish directly in the competition. Timed fishing, with referees and rules, made us skip enough stages, come more often and want to learn more and improve. If outside of a competition there may be bad days when the fish do not eat, there is no such thing in the competition. Very late we began to realize that we need a strategy, a mentality and training as in any other sport.

For me it was a wear training to withstand any weather, standing on top of the boat, 8 hours / day, for several days, especially when we do not catch. Especially since I always fished from rented boats, without electric motors, without too much comfort. Rino was always relaxed and reconciled with the idea of the place we have in the standings, but I was always much more competitive and I competed every time with the hope that we would win. That means we always fished with confidence even though we knew how much we didn't know and what we lacked. I was still dreaming of winning an LRS stage in the Delta.

Advocacy for Catch & Release

Perhaps the most important thing was the fact that we learned to fish only catch and release and we didn't even think that it could be otherwise. That's how we both became car ambassadors in our groups of acquaintances and friends. This is also the reason why I don't have many pictures of myself holding fish in my hand: I wanted to release them as soon as possible and with as little contact as possible. We've never been able to be cerebral fishermen who understand why they don't catch. I was neither inspired nor fortunate. But we let ourselves be stolen by the beauty of the place and we always came back, without upsetting our place in the ranking. We win anyway: friends and a dream place.

Needles, razors and shears

In our boat there was always democracy, everyone did what they wanted. Stefan described the situation very politely and flatteringly: "Rino fishes beautifully, old school, and Ioana does a kind of power fishing". He meant, in fact, that Rino fishes lazily, but well and correctly, again Ioana is hysterical and jerked. That's how it is! As patient as Rino is and as slow as he can fish for a lure, I am as impatient and agitated. Thus, the waters were divided as follows: I to teaspoons, gums and wobblers more floating, Rino to rotary, spines, large lures sinking. If the pike eats, I catch well. If she is inactive and lazy then only Rino can get her out of apathy by digging on the bottom of the canal with some ghost only good for Lapland.

In the Pike Delta, I fish with…

oscillate Berti, but especially Linx;

Kuusamo Rasanen;

Golden Drunk 7 cm;

Biwaa Deus, Daiwa Tournament D'Fin.

I have been fishing for 4 years with the same two rods: Daiwa Tatula Spinning MF, rigid, responsive and aggressive especially with the small and light lures I use, a softer Shimano Aernos to curb my aggressive fishing and reels Daiwa Legalis, Revros, Exceler. I also have a favorite thread - Daiwa Tournament 8 braid evo of 0.16 and 0.18mm.

Operation Monster

I was always amazed to find that all the boys remember drills, nightmare pike, fish sizes, attacks, etc. I do not retain any of all these details. After any game, I only remember the searches, whether they are of the place, of the strategy or of the ghost. I forget during the contest how many fish I caught and with what. I think the biggest pike I brought in the boat was 93cm. I don't have too many escaped capital catches but I think the pike escaped next to the boat (how else?), At Holbina, it was that pike over 100cm. I'm glad I haven't caught it yet, it's like a promise that there is a long way to go.

Time passes, time comes

I hope that all of the above will continue to be possible in the years to come, beyond the moment we are living in now. I hope that when we can meet again without restrictions, we will have something to fish in the Delta again. I have seen disappearing before my eyes in a very short time premises like New Egreta, Cormorant, the density of pike from Holbina is no longer the highest in Europe. If some private waters have declined in such a short time, Delta has no chance. The years after the elimination of the “no kill” rule in 2018 were getting worse, culminating in the 3 pike caught in the LRS stage in the spring of 2020. I think we are no longer seasonal tourists in the Delta and I think we should to get more involved in protecting the place we consider ours by talking more about C&R, about abuses, about solutions to protect this place we love.

Ioana Alexe - good man, architect, fisherman, photographer and a future writer of your choice

Let's encourage her, I say.