This was a day on which we were reluctant to venture out - East wind, limited water clarity, 40 degrees f, and the weather forecasters all saying 100% chance of an all-day rain. They almost NEVER say 100%, so when they do, ya just KNOW they're highly confident. We convinced ourselves to go, with the logic "hey, we can always decide to bag it if we get too cold and wet". We trolled about 2.5 hours without marking much bait, and not a single big hook before all heck broke loose.

The 30 minutes prior to this fish were sheer mayhem. We were trolling a tricky stretch of river, four lines out, trying to maintain heading and speed right in the current break between the main channel and a backwater. My daughter had just landed a 28 incher (her first Musky), and we had barely re-set lines and re-entered our trolling pattern along the same route when the port planer went off (same side, same lure as the just-released dink had taken). Once again the line-clearing fire drill ensued, but we lost that fish, a pretty good one. So turn the boat around, re-set and get back in the trolling groove for a third time, and BANG - the port side planer goes off again. More line-clearing, net-grabbing, and camera-readying, and this time we land a nice fat 39 x 18. After a succesful release, it took most of an hour to get all our gear sorted out. A birdsnest (on one of the lines which had been cleared), cut hooks, tangled planer lines, misplaced diagonal cutters, knocking knees (why do they always do that with a musky?), and soaking wet everything made for a slow recovery from the third-in-a-row. Tons of fun - hope to repeat it soon.