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The big one
Oscar and I couldn’t believe our good luck. We took a picture and congratulated ourselves. We should have held off on that. Not five minutes later, near the weeds along the main shoreline, I had another strike, and this fellow had no plans for going peaceably.
The drag on my spinning reel was set pretty tight, and I was using Fireline, with a diameter equivalent to an 8 pound line, but a real breaking strength of probably 17 pounds. The drag was screaming. I had hooked the pike about 20 feet from the weeds, and after a few initial runs to the side and violent head shakes, he headed for the weeds, and there was nothing I could do about it but hold on.
Our first glimpse of him was a strange one. He was headed straight away from us, and his back broke the surface of the water twice, as he seemed to porpoise through the weeds. Then, unexpectedly, he turned and came rather easily toward the boat, and I thought I had him. He had other ideas. Catch me if you can
When he got to the boat, still too deep in the water to see him, he kept on going. The tip of my rod went into the water and back under the boat, and the drag started screaming again. I hollered for Oscar to get the motor up. He did, and that’s probably what saved us. With the tip of my rod still in the water, the pike made a powerful run towards the back of the boat and would have surely wrapped the line around the motor if Oscar hadn’t raised it out of the water.
The pike headed back towards the weeds, but I was able to turn him this time, and after another minute or two of give and take, got him close enough for Oscar to get him in the net. Even in the boat, he still wasn’t finished. He bit a hole in the net before we could get him out, and, yes, he went on the stringer. He was 38 inches long, and weighed 14 pounds.
Cindy had me bring him into the restaurant part of The Bears Den, to show the other guests. \
I think she and Brandon were as happy about this fish as I was. That’s probably because they knew they wouldn’t have to listen to my mumbling anymore about a 10 pound pike. And, true, we celebrated a bit that night, and used up most of the w'hole week’s ration of snake bite medicine.
Oscar and I fished the same lake the next day. But, while we caught fish, and continued to catch good fish in other lakes for the next three days, there are no more stories to tell. (Well, really, there sure, but this one’s too long, already.)
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