Glad you had a good session, not just the fish, but the whole thing.
Beating the rain makes packing up bearable.
That slimming down thing, it's easier once you work out what is a definite need, a possible, and an 'I might need in a blue moon'.
I still find that I do carry a few 'might need' items, but most of them are now out as I've learnt to do without them.
I still carry 2 barrow loads of gear, but of that it's essentials, books, extra water and Sky food. A few bits of I might need do stay in the car permanently, like my boat landing net, extra stainless sticks.
Must admit, being able to offload and load behind the swim helps. I have actually carried everything over to the car when I left the barrow at home and the ground was too muddy to drive over. It took 2 of us, and at the end I did actually crash out spark cold fainted, don't know if it was pain, exhausted or just head rush.