King185, Raapala, Cougareye, and BigPike it was great to meet and see you guys again. My belly is still bulged out from that lunch. It was clear that the ‘eyes were just as hungry as we were.
I hope we have started a tradition here. 
Sully
Yes the cook out was allot of fun, good to meet you guys. Wow that was good food, thanks for bringing the deep fryer King, it made for some awesome frys and fish. Hope to make this a tradition…. 
Hey Bigpike (and brother and nephew), Cougareye (and neighbor), Raapala, and Jason (and Catherine or is it with a “K”?) – it was great to meet you all out there and share some excellent gnosh and a few beverages… I like the idea of this becoming a WI opener tradition!
The GTG was an excellent way to break up the day. Good food, good fellowship… what can get better than that! The food was awesome and plentiful – nothing like a mix of dogs, brats, burgers, and fresh-caught fish to go along with new friendships! By the way, Bigpike – you should change your handle to “GrillMaster”!
Got back home later this afternoon and just pushed myself away from the table… an excellent meal of Wissota Walleyes and Chips (a little pun there 
)!
For those interested, I thought I had the contest all tied up – I had caught a 22 and a 22.5 inch northern, not beasts but I thought maybe they’d be big enough to win the pot. Oh, I was wrong 
. One of the guys in my brother-in-law’s group best-ed me with a 23 inch northern….
I had an excellent time on the water – the weather could have been better, but as someone 
mentioned to me earlier in the day, that bad weather was keeping away the riff-raff!
As to a fishing report: I had my limit of under 14″ers before lunch and threw back another bunch of 16 to 17.5 inchers. I couldn’t manage to find anything over the slot but it was sure was a blast catching that many walleye.
Two of my sons drove over last night and the three of us hit the water again this morning… we ended up with 8 fish between 12-14″, a hefty little perch, and another handful of slotter that went back in to grow up to be trophies someday. The winds were nasty, making boat control a real challenge (we were trying to drift and drag jigs along a particular area to be unnamed 
).
Hope to see you all on the water again someday soon!
(ps: pictures to follow… 
)
(pps: Jason, let me know how that pickled pike recipe turns out – if it’s good, maybe you should post it on the site )
Sounds like I missed out on a good time. I knew if I made plans to fish Wissota on Saturday that some how I would make it into the top 10 for the FLW Tour in Red Wing, MN last week. Sure enough I made the top 10 and missed out on Wissota for opener. Oh Well Next year guys.
It was fantastic to meet you guys and this was a great idea. It was too bad I wasn’t able to make it over in the morning to enter in the contest (busying drying off and changing attire 
).
I didn’t have as great of luck as everyone else getting on the walleye. My goal today was to try some different locations. I did end up with three around 13″ and a few others but my numbers were not that great. Oh well, I am going to keeping try new locations and learn this lake a little better. A couple bonus smallies and pike (22″ and 27″). The 27″ must have been hungry because he already had someone else’s jig and grub. In trying to find some different locations for walleye I found some crappies and had a blast. Got around 30 total and kept around 14-15 in the 12-14″ range.
Thanks again for bringing the grill, deep fryer, knife and board, etc.
Back to work 
Great meeting everyone! Thanks Jason and Tim for cleaning up those fish! Lunch was a great idea. Let’s keep it in mind again for next year. I really enjoyed fishing Wissota and plan to hit it a few more times this year.
Bigpike, thanks for bringing the grill, hope that youngster in your boat got back to some fish in the afternoon. Glenn, thanks for organizing and bringing the deep fryer.
Eric
Just thought I’d share this story… my brother-in-law had a bunch of buddies over to WIssota for opener as well (a bunch of White Bear Lakers) – this was their second year of holding a Wissota Opener GTG. I think next year, they’re going to call it “3 rods and a prop”…
From what I gather, my bro-in-law lost three fishing poles (2 to breakage and one is now sitting at the bottom of the lake) and his prop got dinged up when “someone” cut a bit too close to an extended sandbar! I know some of those guys are lurkers on this site – come on and sign up or I’ll post more details and maybe even a few names .
If any of you WBL guys are reading this, sounds like you all had a pretty good time and had pretty full bellies Saturday night! Was great to meet you all and look forward to seeing you again next year….
Just realized I never posted the pics from the GTG… here they are!
another…
one more…
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