Ontario to Wisconsin to South Dakota!

We had another sensory overload moment as we traveled south into Wisconsin and into our old stomping grounds of Spooner, Shell Lake, Milltown and Balsam Lake Wisconsin. Spooner does not look like it changed at all in the past 50 years. Paul Bunyon still stands at the north edge of town holding his arms out where there is supposed to be an axe. I do not think there ever has been an axe in his hands in my memory. The Red Cross drug store is still operation on the corner of Main. Again, in operation for the over 50 years I have been living and coming through this area. Tony's Riverside Pizza...I will never forget the pizza's my dad and I shared over the years in that building. 

Of course there are the new things, a Dollar General on every corner, but for every new thing I see something that has been there for decades and brings back memories. The Washburn County Fair was going on as we passed through. We did not stop but a vivid memory of me at probably 10 years old flashed back. Our family was attending that fair and, much to my mother's dismay, I won an albino rabbit. At the end of the fair, they put a bunch of rabbits and pigs in a big pen and let the kids loose. If you caught an animal, you could keep it! I remember pinning this bunny to the ground, its legs a kick'in as I scooped it up and brought it over to my mom. 

My mom would not let me keep it at home, but the neighbor farmer made a pen for me, and I put the bunny in it. The next day I returned to find the farm dog eating my once pure white bunny. Talk about traumatized....

I doubt they have that event anymore. After we passed through Spooner, we took a left on Highway 70, east to Stone Lake where we met my niece Katie and her husband Mike. We reconnected with Katie a couple years ago after a probably 20-year gap. We had never met her husband, Mike. We were not supposed to meet up with them until after 7pm on Friday night, but she was so excited to get together she took Friday off and we had the full day together! She planned an action-packed day starting out at the Perlick Distillery in Sarona where she had another surprise for us. 

Her brother Steve was meeting us! Again, it has been well over 20 years since we have seen him. Weird to see them all grown up when you only have memories of them in their early teens. Not only has he grown up and in his 40's, but he is also married and has several kids. His wife, Tabitha, was there as well, a super nice person, it was nice to meet her. 

Katie and Steven

From there we went to the Garage Bar which is in.... you guessed it a garage. Well, it started out that way, now it is more of a pole building. Where else can you order 5 mixed drinks and a beer and get change back from a $20?

Our last stop of the night was at the Summit Game Farm for their Friday night fish fry. Another Wisconsin staple. We saw these guys on the road along the way.....

So delicious! (The fish fry, not the porky) All too soon it was time for bed and hit the road in the morning. We carried on south to the Milltown/Balsam Lake area. Somewhat a spur of the moment visit, we gave my sister a two-day notice asking her if we could camp in their driveway for two nights. Sister Judy and Mike live on Balsam Lake. 

She planned two days of fun in the sun visiting a few of our favorite Wisconsin bars in Milltown. In all our travels we have never run into anything like an up north Wisconsin bar anywhere else. It is just a vibe that is not repeatable anywhere else. Those of you who have experienced it will understand, those of you who haven't won't understand so I will not even try to describe it. All the bars have deer and fish mounts, all have pull tabs and all of course have shake-a-day. Here are a few pictures to give you an idea of the flavor what I am talking about. 

Wise Guys in Milltown is also the home of a good friend and our favorite bartender Julie (Jules). We try to stop by and see her whenever we are in the area. 

Next door is Hack's where we went and pulled a few pulltabs. We won over $100 on our first round, but we "reinvested it" and eventually walked out with empty pockets. 

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Who do we run into while we were there? Kevin's daughter-in-law and grandchildren! They were just in South Dakota and we missed them as we were in Ontario, what are the odds of running into them in a bar in Wisconsin?!?! Pretty good actually...

Here's another thing about Wisconsin bars; drink chips. You can win drink chips at shake-a-day or when someone buys you a drink and you are just not ready for it. Judy has a baggy she carries with her for just such occasions. 

Mike has what he described as a garbage bag full of drink chips from when he cleaned out his dad's house. He would probably break the bankrupt if he cashed all those in!

 Our last adventure of the day had us heading over to Waterside restaurant on Lake Wapogasset where we met our friends Doug and Connie. So good to see both of them. Sadly, I forgot to take pictures.

The next day, Judy had more big plans for us! While we saw Judy and Mike in Florida last winter, we had not seen the rest of my siblings in a few years. Judy was able to get a hold of everyone and set up a lunch date for us in St. Croix Falls! Sadly, sister Carol was not feeling well and could not make it, but we got to see brothers, sisters, spouses and even my niece Kristina! 

The problem with getting together with a group like that it is impossible to spend as much time talking to each one as you would like, but it was awesome seeing everyone, who knows when we will be able to do it again. 

But our adventures are far from over! There are hundreds of lakes in the NE corner of South Dakota that have walleye in them, the problem is knowing which one to fish. Luckily, we have friends who fish this area quite a bit and turned us onto a lake between Watertown and Aberdeen.  The campground was like a ghost town. Full of campers but no one around. There must have been a 3-4 dozen sites, all with campers in them, but one around. When Barb called to get a site for two nights, the guy said he only does seasonal sites but had an open one we could stay in for two nights. Being it was a weekday; we figured everyone must just come up on the weekends. 

At over 15,000 acres of water it was hard to know exactly where to fish. Where does one even start? No fear, the master fishman is here! Notice I said master fisherMAN, as in me, not my lovely wife Barb. After looking over the lake map, I noticed a couple of sunken islands out in the middle of the lake, the perfect place for those tasty walleyes to feed. And sure enough, we had a couple on within minutes of dropping our lines in the water. 

Over the next two days we caught dozens of fish. Nothing big, in fact nothing over 16". They all seemed to be about the same size, 13"-16". The only picture we took was of the smallest fish caught by your truly. Truth be told, the next fish I caught was even smaller, but I threw it back before Barb could get a picture of it. 

We were able to weed out our limit of eaters each day adding to our bounty. The freezer is officially full of walleye!

Two 5-hour drives later we were pulling into our driveway. Our Great Summer Adventure was over. Only three weeks, but full of fishing and fun! Both of the girls were glad to be home. Dakota walked around the house, her tail a wagging. She even went over to the toy basket and pulled one out and tossed it in the air. Zoey was over the top excited and got the Zoomies which I was able to catch on video. Somehow I have a feeling we will be buying new furniture sooner than later.....

Everything was as it should be at the homestead. One thing that caught us my surprise was the sunflowers under the birdfeeders! We are going to leave them to grow for now. They made it this far after all. 

Now, it is back to work. There is a list of things to be done before I head to the farm for harvesting!

Bugging Out!

 Decades of memories flooded back as I turned onto Highway 11 out of Nipigon. Hard to believe we have been coming up here 18 of the last 20 years. While some things have changed, I will tell you one thing that hasn't..... the bugs! Holy crap were the bugs bad this year. Mosquitoes, black flies as well as deer and horse flies. Every single one of them looking to leave you with a little less blood. Thank God for thermacells, electrified fly swatters and those little coil picks. Oh, and our screened gazebo. We would have been hurting without them. Even with all those things we were covered with welts. Dogs included.

We are no strangers to camping in bug country, while we do not enjoy it, we have learned to tolerate it. Things we have learned with the truck camper is that we have to tape a couple of our screens where there are tiny gaps that black flies can get in. Next up is the kitchen exhaust vent, we tape that down as those little critters can get in there too! Last, and probably most important is the closing the vent for the air conditioner. We learned that last year while in Alaska, we were laying in bed and watch mosquito after mosquito fly out of the vent into the camper. 

Barb only had one bug meltdown where she was ready to pack up and leave. She hates bugs! They love her. I can be standing right next to her, she gets eaten alive, while I don't get bit at all. Not only that, every single one of her bites swell up and itch like crazy. Mine itch, but don't swell up like hers. I did a little research; bugs prefer blood type 0 Positive. Guess who has type 0+? Yep, Barbie. They apparently do not like 100 proof blood which mine typically is, so I have that going for me.

A couple of you admonished me for not including dog pictures in our last post (Harry was not one of them). Both of the girls rode in the Jeep with Barb who followed behind me all the way from Devils Lake, North Dakota into Ontario. Zoey got the front seat, Dakota got the entire back end. 

Barb behind me

The first morning, we woke up to the sounds of a loon echoing off the trees. A mom, dad and baby loon call this lake home and were nice enough to share it with us for a few days. There is a short video below, sorry for the wind and shakiness, I was in the boat. 

Our first fishing adventure of this trip was to one of our two favorite lakes. The road to get there is an adventure in itself. 20 miles of some of the roughest gravel roads one will encounter. We made it to 20mph a couple of times, but not much over that. Back in the day I would take this road at 50 or better without blinking an eye, but pulling the boat was another story entirely. We made it to the launch in a little over an hour. The launch itself is in a river that lead to the lake, but before you get to the lake you need to cross a sandbar. The water was low enough that I had to walk the boat rather than just drive over it. 

Once out on the lake we were off like rockets to our favorite spot! 9 miles down the lake we pulled up to what we call "Secret Spot" We don't take anyone there, nor do we tell anyone about it. It is our spot. This is the spot Barb caught her biggest walleye, a 31"er. While we let it go on that day, it is long dead as the life span of the average walleye has long past. 

It wasn't long before I shouted, "Fish on!" and the battle ensued. After the best fight I have had in a long time Barb dipped the net in the water and pulled out a 25"er! My biggest on that spot. Not only did I catch the first fish which could vie for the largest of the trip, I caught the next 4 as well! A 21, 19, 17 and 16. We let the big ones go and kept the smaller ones for eating.  Why keep the little ones and not the big ones? You are only allowed to keep one over 18" in Ontario. We personally find the best tasting ones to be between 16-20". Besides that, did you know a female walleye can lay over 500,000 eggs a year? Why not leave them in the water to reproduce and keep some of the smaller males? When we left that spot I was up 8-2 on the fish count. Next up was "The Hump", a spot where we never fail to catch fish, but they are usually on the smaller side. It was not long before Barb closed the gap 8-6. 

Several hours later we put the boat back on the trailer with 8 tasty walleyes in the livewell. I not only caught the first, the biggest, but also the most! This is going to be my summer!

The next day we hung around camp waiting for our friends Chad and Michelle to arrive. For long time readers, you know them as the now former owners of Pasha Lake Cabins. They now own the piece of property where we are staying now on Paint Lake. While we waited, we launched the boat in this lake, got things organized for the week and let the girls swim. Dakota was in heaven! We do not let her swim very often as it takes several hours for her to dry off. 

Chad and Michelle arrived early afternoon and after getting all set up we hit the water to catch a few more fish. Sadly, we were all skunked, but we had a good time. While we saw Chad earlier this spring, it has been a few years since we have seen Michelle. We all hung out in the gazebo and caught up that evening drowning our sorrows and telling tall tales. Even the dogs appreciated the reprieve from the bugs!

The next three days were a blur. We fished every day, almost all day. Caught a ton of fish. Barb out-fished me two days, I out-fished her one. But the 25"er was still top of the leaderboard! We ate fish every night as you are only allowed to have so many in possession, so if you want to keep fishing you have to eat some. No problem there! We stayed up too late and got up too early. A nap of two might have been taken during midday breaks. While the weather was mostly decent, we did get a fair amount of rain. In fact, we were caught off guard a during one outing and Chad donned one of Michelle's pink sweaters. He looked over as he put it on saying "Not everyone can pull this look off!". "Nope, they certainly can't", I replied. 

The new livescope worked great! It takes fishfinders to the next level giving you an actual ultrasound-like image of the fish below you. 

Monday morning Michelle had to leave as she had to work the next day, but another one of our friends is coming up to replace her. Chad's high school buddy, Brian, was arriving for a couple of days. Again two days of fishing all day and countless fish. They got into some real hogs with the biggest one topping 29". Luckily the big fish contest is only between Barb and I and still sitting at my 25"er. In fact, I caught another 25"er just to prove I could do it again! That night we had surf and turf for supper as Brian had brought up four delicious ribeyes!

Sadly, the next day brought Chad and Brian's departure, but not before this..... 

Sorry for those of you who are queasy, I should have warned you. Yup, a treble hook right in the finger. I good news is that it wasn't my finger, or Barb's finger. It was Chad's. As we looked over our options, we were considering taking him to Nipigon, over an hour away to the clinic. But in the end, we left him alone with an ice cube and a pliers. 15 minutes later he was back sans treble hook. He said he was a man and just pulled it out, but by the way he screamed like a little girl when Barb put alcohol on his wound, I have my doubts. 

It was also our last full fishing day. After they departed, we hit the water needing four more fish to complete our take home limit. Other days we did that in 15 minutes, but when we NEED to catch fish, do you think we could do it? Nope. It took F O R E V E R! Three rainy and wet hours later we finally landed our 4th "keeper" walleye, there had been a few others, but they were small. 

Back at camp, we filleted the fish and started packing up. In the rain. We put the boat on the trailer, in the rain. Disassembled the gazebo, in the rain. Packed the Jeep in the rain. We packed the truck, in the rain. Did I mention it was raining? Guess what Barb's newly redecorated camper smells like? A wet dog of course. 

You will notice that there are no pictures of Barb holding a fish. That is because we only take pictures of big fish, and she did not catch any! Oh, she caught plenty of good eaters, but none that were picture-worthy. Sorry, not sorry Barbie!

All in all, it was a great week. We could have had less rain and less bugs, but the friendship and laughter made it all worthwhile. Both of our border crossings went well. The inspection into Canada went seamlessly, a few simple questions and we were on our way. The way back into the U.S. was the same.....for me....As I watched in my rearview mirror Barb was not pulling away. I pulled over into the nearby rest area and soon enough here she comes. They were questioning about the dogs CDC forms. Which we totally forgot about! I think that law went into effect last year. Opps! They let her through anyways with a reminder to have them next time she came through. 

After crossing the border, we finished the day in Two Harbors, Minnesota where we spent a couple hours at a laundromat and spent the night in a private campground. That wraps up the second leg of our adventure. Up next, the last and final leg. Who knows what adventures await!

A Living Hell in Devils Lake

Imagine if you will, you are at home excitingly packing for an upcoming fishing trip. Rods are all inspected. Reels are lubed and cleaned. Tackle is sorted through and organized. The boat is packed with care, and you finally hit the road! A 9-hour drive with an overnight in Gettysburg, SD you finally reach your destination. You get all set up and are enjoying the serene setting when what pulls up in the campsite right next door? Two vehicles. one pulling a 40+' 5th wheel, the other pulling biggest pontoon known to man. After parking, the doors open and out pop 4 screaming kids who look like they are 10, 8, 6 and 1. Welcome to hell in Devils Lake.

But before that happened, I did enjoy two nice days with my friends Bob and Kerry. Brothers Sobieck, Bob being my high school buddy and father of Chris at the farm. Kerry is his oldest brother. They have coming up to Devils Lake for a few years now and this year I horned in with them. Bob also brought another fishing buddy with him from back home. 

Grahm's Island State Park is absolutely beautiful. If you are ever traveling through central North Dakota, I highly recommend it. Big sites, clean restrooms and great fishing if you are so inclined. 

Devils Lake itself is huge! And it is getting huger (new word). Over the past several decades the lake has quadrupled in size adding over 70,000 more acres of water flooding homes and farmlands. There are actual homes, barns, roads and other structures10-20' under water. We went out that first night, Kerry and I in my boat, Bob and the other Jim in the other, the lake was like glass. and we caught about 50 fish between the group. 

The next day was another story. The wind had picked up as Kerry and I made it 3 miles out to where were going to start our day. The waves kept building over the next couple of hours and we could not hold the boat in one spot any more so we decided to try another spot. Instead of heading towards the launch, we went further away. Dumb move. 2 foot waves became 3 foot waves which became 4-5 foot waves. By the time we decided that we should not be out there, it was too late. We could not go directly into the waves so we had to ride the trough between them and as the boat crested I would have to turn the boat directly into the next wave so we did not flip over. For over an hour we slowly made out way towards the nearest shore. At one point Kerry asks, "Where are your life jackets?" "Under that door in the floor" I tell him. He proceeds to pull out my two orange $4.99 Walmart lifejackets, looks at me and says, "Is this them? They will never hold me!" "Put one on each arm like a water-wing", I tell him. But alas, they were not needed and we made it to shore soaked, but safe. Not unscathed though as my phone was waterlogged for the next day. 

We had fish for one meal, a boil for another, fires at night and an overall good time. 

Bob even caught a tagged fish! I had never seen one before, but if you send in the date and location of the fish, they will send you back what information they have on it. We tried telling Bob that it was tradition that he had to wear the tag on his lip for the duration of the trip, but he was not buying it. 

Which brings us back to our camper neighbors from hell. Would you believe that we not only parked next to them on purpose, but made our reservations so we would be next to each other? Those neighbors were none other than Chris, Holly and their 4 kids from the farm! 

And it was not hell at all. Chris and family, after one night of overlapping with his dad and Kerry spent the next several days hanging out with Barb and me. Barb and I fished in our boat while they fished in their pontoon. Then we would switch and Barb would jump in the pontoon with Holly while Chris and I (and sometimes kids) fished in our boat. 

I know many of you are waiting to hear who caught the first, biggest and most fish. I can tell you who caught the first and biggest, it was none other than my lovely wife Barb. As for the most, it could have been her as well, but we did not keep track, I will have to do better at that in the future. In the pictures below you can see Barb with her very first ever white bass on the left and Barb fishing with Chris and Holly's pontoon in the background on the right. 

Our three days together were over before we knew it and it was time to move on. Where to you ask? Another hell altogether. We went to visit Dino and Lisa! After a 4-hour drive, we were there less than 5 minutes before we were rushed into their truck which was hooked up to their food trailer and we were off to an event. Nothing like slinging soup on a hot summer day!

Our destination was the former Fergus Falls State Hospital where they put on a summer concert series. Dino and Lisa are scheduled to appear at all 6 events. That night was a Bruce Springsteen tribute band. We arrived an hour and a half before the event and started setting up. Well, Barb, Lisa and Dino started setting up. Dino put a chair in the shade for me and told me to just stay out of the way. 

Over the next two hours I watched the venue are go from a desolate grassy field to one packed with 60-, 70-, and 80-year-olds. There were several food trucks there, but from what I could tell Dino and Lisa's was one of the most popular. Several people asked, "Are you serving soup on a hot summer day?" To which Lisa would reply, "It is in our name, so we have to have at least one soup". They not only serve soup, but they also serve salads, wraps, sandwiches and several other things. Based on where I was sitting, I heard the Chicken and Wild Rice salad ordered the most. By the way, several people did indeed order soup. 

Pretty soon Barb came out and took down the sign offering that salad and then the wraps became the most popular thing. The band was good, the people watching even better. Dino's sister Gio and her husband Jeff were there in another tent selling their beverage Switchel as well.

The band wrapped up about 8pm and we were home by 8:45 where Barb, Lisa, Gio, Jeff, Dino and I all gathered around the kitchen table and had a few cocktails. I was the first one to call it quits about 11:00. I am not sure when Barb came to bed, but I think it was an hour or so after that. The soup business must not be that good though as when I asked Dino for a beer, I received this tab with it. $8.00 should buy an entire case of this beer. Perhaps I should start a GoFundMe page for them. 

The next day we just hung out in their garage chatting, before we went to supper in Fergus Falls followed by a boat ride on West Red River Lake.

This was the coolest part of our ride.....

Next up, crossing the border into Canada and more fishing. This is where the real contest begins as the past week was just a warmup! It might be a couple weeks until our next post as internet will be limited or nonexistent.