I wasn’t sure where to post this since its a multi-subject posting… I just decided to put it in the general forum to cover my bases.
D.O.C. LOW trip, 2010.
Our group of college buddies (known as D.O.C. — its a long story, I’d be happy to tell you over a beer or three…) head up to LOW each winter for a little ice fishing getaway. In the past three or four years we have been staying at the Wigwam. Fishing, service and accommodations are definitely first rate at the Wigwam, and we always have had great experiences staying there. We will miss doing the Wigwam reef run this March 
, but I’m sure we will return in future years! 
That being said, we decided to make the venture up to the NW angle partly because we heard about the good fishing and partly for the adventure/allure that The Angle can provide.
Our trip started (for me anyway) leaving Eau Claire with 4 other guys at 10:30pm on Wednesday night. Our sixth member fished all day Wednesday on Red Lake and then stayed/fished in a sleeper out of Mort’s Dock on the south shore of URL. We arrived and set up shop sometime around 4am but found a slow bite on Red. A small handful of walleyes iced and one decent “over” by yours truly, then it was 10am and onward to LOW! (It was also about 20 degrees below zero plus windy!! 
)
We made it up to Sportsman’s main lodge around 11am, played a few rounds of a “punch out” type arcade game and had a few adult beverages while we waited for the bomber transport to Oak Island. 
We opted for the bomber transport so we would avoid another 2 hour drive, crossing customs twice each way. It ended up being a very enjoyable hour and fifteen minute ride and the scenery once we go to the Angle was a nice change of pace from the vast expanse of the southern basin.
Sportsman’s Lodge Oak Island was very nicely setup. The main lodge complex is well built and has a “rustically elegant” quality to it. The bombers basically picked up and dropped off right at the front door of the cabin, which was nice. 
The bar/restaurant was roomy and the staff was very friendly. Unfortunately, though, none of our pull tabs were winners.
The guides were very agreeable and accommodating, put us on the ice before sunrise, picked us up after sunset and checked on us often in between. At the end of the day, the guides would clean whatever fish we had kept and either send it to the lodge for cooking or package it for freezing/transport. (Fish cleaning IS included in the package price – so was the fish fry, unless you want sides/potato/etc to accompany the fish — a very nice option that allowed us to really relax and enjoy our experience in the NW angle.) I was also VERY impressed with the fish packaging. Each fillet was packed per legal requirements (a few inches of skin left on walleye fillets and skin/tail left on sauger fillets). They put 2 fish (4 fillets) on a Styrofoam tray, plastic wrapped everything, then wrote quantity and species on the plastic wrap with marker. This is the best fish packaging I have seen, and we appreciate the effort!!
As far as fishing goes, it was unfortunately
S L O W
Apparently a major storm hit a week or so prior to our arrival and the high pressure/cold temperatures that followed the front just wouldn’t go away. A lot of “regulars” that had been fishing The Angle for years said it was the slowest fishing they had seen in a looong time, maybe ever. Though the catch rates were off, we still had an exceptional trip. Our biggest walleye was a nice fat 25 incher, and we caught multiple fish between the 20 and 25 inch mark. I caught my first ever whitefish (24 inches and about 5 pounds) mixed in with some of the smaller (stinky!) ciscos… We caught many other smaller saugers and walleyes, but there were definitely long lulls between the action. All in all, we had a great Friday fish fry and were able to take fish home with us. The catching might have been slow, but the fishing (which for me has very little to do with actually landing fish) was tremendous. Great scenery, outstanding camaraderie and simply “getting away” made the trip an absolute success!
On this trip I was given the opportunity to borrow a friend’s Humminbird ICE-55 flasher unit, which was really nice considering one guy in our group didn’t own a flasher. He borrowed my aging Vexilar FL-8 and I got to use the brand spanking new ICE-55. NICE! Thanks again to my buddy for letting me take that with me!! 
Without getting into the HB vs Vexilar vs Marcum debate, I’d like share how the HB functioned for me…. I’ve had the same FL-8 for over 10 years now. Its definitely a functional machine, but it lacks many of the upgrades on the newer units. The first thing that impressed me about the ICE-55 was the display. Very bright colors. – no eye strain at all. What was really cool about it was the option to change the display color and use different color “pallates”, similar to changing the color pallate on my HB-997 side imaging unit. It offers the traditional Vexilar and Marcum colors, as well as HB’s very own (unique) color pattern. You could change things up to suit your eyes with a push of a button. I very much liked the HB colors that used blue as the weakest return as it seemed to be a “cool”, easy to see color pattern.
The display face was basically a flat screen instead of the sunken display like my old FL-8. You could view it from many angles and still see it no problem. With my old unit, I had to view it straight-on to be able to see what the screen was telling me. It was a huge benefit when combined with the bright display colors.
I played around with the zoom function somewhat, but considering the water depths that we were fishing, the size of the fish, the size of the lures we were using and the great clarity and separation the 55 offered, I found that I didn’t really need the zoom. Without using the zoom, I could still detect 2-3 inches of separation between my lure and the bottom. Not bad at all!
When in zoom mode, you can adjust which part of the water column you want to zoom in on, which would be a nice feature… I can see the zoom being a huge advantage when using smaller baits, when fishing deeper water, and/or fishing for smaller-sized fish…
When everyone in our shack fires up all of their (Vexilar) units, generally every one of us gets interference like crazy (Think 4-6 guys fishing within a confined 6 x 12′ space…) What was really nice with the 55 is that I only counted a small handful of interference blips the whole trip. I had absolutely no need to adjust my gain or use the HB’s anti-noise function while the rest of my group was consistently hitting the IR buttons on their Vex’s. It was so nice, I didn’t even think about it the whole trip until we were done fishing… It reduced interference-induced stress levels by 100% 
The dual beam selector function was awesome. At the depth we were fishing (22-28 feet), I sometimes would mark the jig on my dead stick rod in the next hole (when using the wide beam angle). If I didn’t want to see that mark on the screen, all I had to do was push the beam selector button and change to the narrow angle setting – a very nice feature to get rid of target clutter when necessary, or to toggle to wide angle and view the dead stick jig depth. Otherwise, the wide angle allowed me to see a little further to the side and really search for roaming walleyes…
The carrying case was very well built, easy to carry (very easy to grip the solid, sturdy handle through the top part of the case fabric) and very well padded to protect the unit. The padding is an awesome feature that is often overlooked, but I’m sure would help the longevity of the product the way these things often get tossed around on the ice.
After two day of constant use without charging the battery, I saw “voltage” flashing on the unit. Another nice feature that tells you to think about charging the battery. I never noticed any loss of brightness or performance while the indicator was blinking — it would be my guess that the unit still had plenty of power to function for many more hours. I didn’t run it out of juice purposely to find out, however. I charged it fully overnight and it was set to go the next morning.
Overall, the HB ICE-55 is an outstanding unit!!!
As far as the fishing went, we didn’t really identify too many “key” colors or lures this trip. Red and gold are the general go-to lures on LOW, and we did catch most of our fish on these colors (probably simply because those are the colors we fished with the most). I had my best luck on a “Macho Minnow” jigging spoon with red glow on one side and gold on the back; however, a buddy of mine couldn’t buy a hit on a “Stop Sign” in glow red (a nearly identical lure profile). The fish would just not commit to biting unless the spoon was tipped with a minnow head. They would look, but unless you offered meat, they just weren’t interested in taking a nip. Dead stick rods with plain hooks or smaller jig heads were very slow although they took some fish. It seemed like the walleyes were attracted by some sort of active presentaion, but they just weren’t as willing biters as we were hoping. I caught a (very) few fish on jigging rap type of lures. Demon jigs and smaller glow jigging spoons took some fish as well. My goto presentation was basically that red/gold spoon jigged fairly agressively then raised slightly and held still when marking a fish. If they fish didn’t take within 5-8 seconds I would have to jig, jiggle or nod the lure to keep interest and intice a bite. We marked a lot of fish, but the lack of bites overall was frustrating. But thats fishing, and we had a great time regardless.
Anyway, We had a great trip regardless of the “slow” fishing. Sportsman’s was fantastic and its always nice to get together with my old college buddies. Getting to test drive the HB was a huge bonus and was really an eye opener, showing me just how far flashers have come in the dozen or so years since I bought my Vexilar. If anyone out there owns an ICE-55 and wants to trade me straight up for my Vex, send me a PM. 
LOL… (The vex is close to being an antique which means it must be worth quite a bit, right??? ) 
Mike
… The side camera angle on the HB was the only way I could get the camera to represent the colors relatively well. I LOVED the blue color as the weak return, it really was easy on the eyes.
