I would consider myself far from being a die-hard fisherman. Although, over the years I have done my fair share of fishing. Usually the day starts out promising, planning to spend a relaxing day on the lake hoping to land the big one. More often than not by lunch time I’ve had more bug bites than fish bites. Even with the lack of activity from the fish everyone usually keeps rather busy, it seems someone gets snagged up on a log or in the weeds about every five minutes. Rarely do I get completely “skunked” (no fish at all), normally its one or two keepers along with several that get thrown back in the lake. However, as the old saying goes “A bad day of fishing is better than a good day at work.”
Luckily, every dog has his day, and my day came in July 1995. I was on another great fishing trip to Canada with my father and friend Marcus. The three of us traveled about 250 miles North of Sault Saint Marie to catch a train to take us deeper into the Canadian wilderness. Most of our time was spent fishing for Northern Pike (Esox Lucieus); the rest of the time Marcus and I were donating our money to my father at the poker table.
The amount of fish we were able to catch that week was rather astounding. Throwing back 24” Northern Pike that week was a common experience since all three of us were able to catch so many, it was more a of a “catching” trip than a fishing trip. During the third day of the trip while fishing a hot weed bed, I got my redemption for 26 years of bad fishing. While trolling the edge of the weed bed it seemed that I was snagged on a log. To my astonishment it was no log but a rather large Northern Pike. After about ten minutes of fighting I was able to land the fish in the boat. The fish measured 36” which was the largest one I have ever caught, I could not have been happier. I was wrong, no more than 15 minutes after landing that whopper in almost the same spot another big Northern Pike could not refuse my lure. This time the fish that I caught was even larger, a 39” monster.
In the ten years since that luck day the biggest Northern Pike that I have been able to land was 34”. This July I will once again troll the cool waters of Northern Canada hoping to land another monster. Most likely I will never be able to beat that great day of fishing again, but one can only hope.
