A good end to a terrible week

[Dontcryformejanhrdina]

I was looking forward to this week so much, I had planned to go out fishing Monday in Elephant Lake for musky and pike, then Wednesday I was going to go on a musky charter in Moira Lake with Stacy Ash from Protackle here in Belleville, then Friday after work I was going on a fishing weekend on the Trent River in Trent Hills. I was excited and confident I would get my first musky after trying all summer with no luck. Or at the very least a new personal best pike.

 

Well my father had a stroke recently and was in pretty rough shape. Last weekend though he was walking around, starting to eat solid foods again, it looked like he would make a recovery. But when I visited him in the hospital on Monday his health had taken a turn for the worse. He passed away Monday night. Well needless to say this week has been the toughest week of my life. It seemed to drag on forever and I had no quiet time to be alone with all the family around and things to do. I cancelled all of my plans to go fishing of course, just had no desire to anymore. The funeral was on Thursday, and seeing all of my extended family helped cheer things up a lot. But on Friday I decided I needed an outlet of some sort and quiet time to think. I was going to just spend the weekend with my family but the noise got to be too much with all the kids around. I love my nieces and nephews but I'm not used to having kids around 24/7. They are exhausting! So I decided to go on the fishing trip, try to enjoy myself after this week.

 

Well I met a buddy of mine from work and we headed to the cottages after picking up his boat Friday afternoon. The weather was gorgeous this weekend! After launching the boat, unpacking our stuff and saying hi to everybody we took the boat out for a bit of a fish. Went to the first spot very close to the docks, stopped in a weedbed near shore. My friend was casting towards shore and caught a nice bass in the 1-2lb range after only a few minutes. I started casting an orange bucktail towards open water, retrieving back to the weed bed we were sitting in. Couldn't have been more than 10 casts in when I get a big hit, right away I knew it was a nice fish, fought pretty hard and was staying down so I couldn't see it until I got it close to the boat. My buddy starts to grab the net but my other rod had a lure caught in it. So he grabs this tiny little net no deeper than 12". I'm fighting the fish at boat side and tell him "just unhook the lure it should come right out, they don't stick in that net." so after about 30 seconds more than it should have been (but seemed like a lifetime) we get the fish in the net. My first musky! I was shaking I was so excited! Since we were so close to the docks my buddy starts trolling slowly towards the docks while I'm unhooking the fish in the net (still in the water). I manage to get a picture of it with my cell while some of the guys come down to see it. I forgot my tape measure on my scale broke so I couldn't measure it and I just wanted to get it back into the water quick seeing as how hot it was. I was a little worried at first because she wasn't moving much but after about 4-5 minutes of gently rocking her side to side she started to kick her tail and off she swam. What a sight! I'll never forget that moment. Even though I never got another musky all weekend (I did get 1 more hit from a musky and 3 pike follows, including 1 pike that kept turning on a figure 8) I was certainly glad I went.

 

Thanks again to all the people here who gave me friendly advice on how to land that first musky.

 

 

Here She is: First Musky

[mercman]

Wow....don't know what to say, other than Deepest sympathy for your loss, and congrats on your first Muskie

[irishfield]

 

Great way to end a brutal week fella !

 

Condolences and congratulations.

 

You wouldn't be the first one around here that went fishing before or after a funeral!

Edited September 11, 2011 by irishfield

[camillj]

Sorry for your loss.

 

Glad you got some quality time (and fish)

[RickOnt]

Nice Fish! Good on Ya!!

 

Rick

[johnnyb]

Congrats, and condolences. Beautiful fish....hopefully the boost you needed

[bucktail]

My condolences to you and your family.

Lost my dad a few years ago and its a horrible feeling.