Thats a nice bantam pike for sure and a great story. Sounds a whole lot like one of my most memorable experiences, also on bantam. It was my 3rd year targeting pike and had only hit the 30 inch mark. It was a very mild and sunny day, and we had already caught several fish to about 7 lbs. One of my flags goes up with huge live goldie, and the spool is slow rolling when I arrived (as the big girls tend to do). Ended up tangling with my PB at the time, a 38 inch 15+ lber. I was beyond pumped. DEP C.O. Keith Schneider happened to be in the parking lot in his vehicle at the time, and he came over the loudspeaker saying "Nice one boys!". Will never forget that fish.
Landing my PB 21 lber in VT last season was a real trip as well, but seemed like much more of a blur, probably because I was fishing solo. It was 730 AM and I was setting up my 5th trap when my first flag goes up. Same story...get to the trap and the spool is just creeping. I gave it a few more seconds and then set. The fish felt very weird, coming in easy for a little while and then becoming dead weight. No runs really, but the massive headshakes told me she was probably a good fish. It wasn't until her head was to the hole that I had any idea I was about to break 20lbs. she took one lazy assed run when she first saw the hole and then came in nice and easy. It was all over in less than 5 minutes from the time of flag up to the time of release. I was kind of stunned after I sent her back down the hole, and made my way back to the camera to see if the self timer worked. Thank god it did. Then I yelled for a minute or so.
