Where do I begin?

How about with a huge, “Praise the Lord!” He answered our prayers the other day on Mille Lacs in a BIG way.

I was over there “guiding” Al Lindner (I say this only because we were fishing out of my boat. His “spots” though) and we were being filmed for an upcoming television episode of “‘We Love It’ Outdoors presented by Mills Fleet Farm.” We pulled into the first spot and within a minute or two (at the most) I got bite and landed a smallmouth bass (our target for the day). I re-baited and dropped down again and not long after it hit the bottom I was bit again. The camera was rolling and I mentioned to Mike Hehner (camera man) that the line was starting to rise and for him to look for the fish to be jumping It did and Mike got the jump!

What happened next was pretty close to a miracle.

The bass took off behind the boat and all of the sudden my rod got extremely heavy, I thought my sinker got caught in the rocks. Al took a glance and about the time he mentioned the word muskie, the drag on my reel really started to make some music. Power and a lot of weight is all I felt (along with a little nervousness) for the next 20 minutes.

About half way through the battle, Al mentioned that it was possible that my No. 2 hook may have slipped from the bass and into the muskie’s mouth. I was thinking, “What are the odds?” A little while later, I got the fish back up near the surface and spotted the yellow sinker from my Lindy Rig about a foot out of the muskie’s mouth.

At that time, here comes Kyle (out boat camera man) to tell us his phone died. His timing was awesome and as he approached, he spotted Al waving my walleye net and signaling for him to get over here now!

“We need a bigger net”, said Al, and right about that time the big fish was coming to the surface. It was too late to round up a big net. We worked together and we executed it perfectly with the net we had. The fish was boated and the pandemonium reached a different level. I was freaked and I believe the other three guys could not believe their eye’s either. We boated a giant muskie that swallowed the 18- to 19-inch smallmouth bass I had hooked.

Amazing, miraculous, unforgettable and answered prayer! We had asked for hungry fish and we got it! The whole ordeal was captured on video and there is a shortened clip on Mills Fleet Farm’s Facebook page. Stay tuned for air time and network.

Thank you for listening — Walleyedan.

WALLEYEDAN Eigen may be reached at (218) 839-5598, walleyedan@walleyedan.com or www.walleyedan.com.

Click here to watch video.