ERIC Jones wasn't too pleased with his tale of the one that got away.

"I pushed down the pole and off went my wedding ring," he said. "I seem to remember I had a silent breakfast with my wife the next day."

It's the things that happen when fishing as much the technicalities of rod and line which have appealed to the 63-year-old father.

His fascination for all things watery comes from the special privilege he was allowed as a small boy growing up in the thatched cottage on Chelford Road.

His mother was often ill so he would spend days with his grandmother - a gardener for the Cowburn family of Booths Hall. In fact, Mr Jones can recall vividly his first day with a rod cobbled together with garden canes, safety pins and a cheap reel from Hal Whitaker's shop.

"I caught quite a big roach," he said. "About three quarters of a pound. It was the first fish I had caught and I was hooked."

A vist to the Angel Hotel with his dad in 1946 to see plans to convert the Moor and Moor Pool into a Richard Harding Watt-inspired fantasy only added to the attraction.

Mr Jones doesn't know what became of the scheme - or even who planned it.

"I can remember what it looked like. There were buildings and lagoons," he said.

"If that had been developed what a fantastic tourist attraction it would be."

Boyhood days spent fishing were interrupted - but not halted - by an engineering apprenticeship in Altrincham.

And a two-year stint of national service with the RAF in 1959 took him into even stranger waters.

Spells in Bridgnorth and Weston-super-Mare prepared him for the task of radio mechanic, a sensitive job at the height of the Cold War, at western bomber command headquarters in High Wycombe.

"Then I went off to Gibraltar where I fished for mullet and other things in the sea," he said.

He had already married Enid in her native Chester after meeting her at a St Patrick's night dance at the old Knutsford Co-op ballroom, and as regulations dictated had most of his wages sent home.

It didn't stop the 22-year-old from exploring much of southern Spain and travelling to Africa.

"One of the lads had a Lambretta," he said. "We would go to all these villages or go to Tarifa point. Life was free and easy in all sorts of ways."

But it was the people who provided the best experience.

"You live quite a neutral life if you're an apprentice in anything," he said. "If you're a builder all you get to know is building and your mates."

One lad knew exactly where to sit in a cafe to get an extra piece of bread - another was a locksmith who could open jammed lockers.

"These were lessons you never had and needed to learn," he said.

Another comrade was unceremoniously hauled out square bashing one day because he was exposed as a vicar - and therefore officer material.

Hitchhiking was another fact of life for the hard-up serviceman away from home. A trip home to see Enid could be done with one lucky lift or it could be a torturous journey in 12 different cars.

Once he was refused a lift by four soldiers. Travelling in another car, he passed them a short while later - lying dead next to their blazing car.

But there were lighter moments.

The only action Mr Jones saw, so to speak, was in Weston-super-Mare. Rumours of an active IRA unit in the area had put everyone on tenterhooks.

"I was in the NAFFI," he said. "The lights went out so I tried to grab a meat pie - but the girl slammed the shutter on my hand."

On his return he couldn't afford to settle in Knutsford, so went to Timperley.

"I went through a period where everywhere I worked seemed to close down or move," he said. "So I worked at Massey Ferguson as a design engineer and my travels began again."

Visits to Italy and France ended in 1971, however, when illness forced him to find a job at ICI pharmaceuticals and he ended his career as a team leader for the engineers who design and build for the scientists at Zeneca.

Since retiring he has become a lay assistant for social services, checking on the standards for anyone who lives in local authority care.

But fishing, and the allure of water, is a passion that has remained constant. Mr Jones occasionally travels to the Lake District or Wales - but prefers to get to know his home waters.

"What fascinates me with water," he said, "and I think you find it with a lot of anglers, is that with a lot of natural lakes you don't know what you're going to catch."

It's the old golfers' adage - if you did a par every round you would probably never pick up your clubs again.

While he rarely fishes competitvely, his hobby is taken seriously. He is secretary of the Prince Albert Fishing Club and is a water resources officer for the Salmon and Trout Association, which involves monitoring and advising on any attempts to abstract water in Cheshire and Manchester.

Mr Jones is writing a book - provisionally titled Diary of a Saturday Angler - about the human stories around fishing.

Like the time, he and a pal came back from an idyllic and successful fishing in Wales as schoolboys, but had to throw their haul out of the train window because of the hum emanating from their bags.

"I've tried to recall not only my own experiences but the experiences of other people I've known," he said. "Like everything else, it's people who make the story."

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.