Definite congradulations on winning your battle with cancer and being able to take this trip of a lifetime. I thoroughly enjoyed your post and I thank you for taking the time to make it.

John Boecker

They were here in Chicago on Saturday night and I couldn’t go. Had to run a half-marathon yesterday morning. Always a great show which is one reason of many why they are my all-time favorite band.

No Red Wing fans out here? I’ve never owned a pair of Danners but my Red Wing/Irish Setters have lasted and lasted.

One resort I went to had a steak/burger fry the first night we were there. Guests brought a side dish. It was a great way for the guests to meet each other and for everyone to meet the resort owners. Made for a more enjoyable week once people knew each other a bit.

One other thing. I’ve stayed at resorts where the owners where out and about every day making sure that the guests were happy and satisfied and I’ve also stayed at places where the owners practically hid from the guests. If you did find them it was like they didn’t want to hear about your concerns or answer your basic questions. You couln’t find them if you had a issue or problem no matter where you looked. It was the places where the owners were present and approachable that I returned to again and again. Just making the rounds every day making friendly conversation made all the difference in the world.

I’d also be very interested to hear a current, or former, resort owners take on this. Owning a resort has always been a dream of mine as well. Seems like once you got the cabins in good working order you’d be good to go with the same type of maintenance issues needed for your house. My biggest question for that current/former resort owner would be why people seem to be selling off the cabins individually these days rather than selling the whole resort? Is it just that hard to make $$ owning a resort these days for the reasons already laid out here(gas prices & $$ concerns in general keeping people from taking vacations)? Just this year the resort my family has gone to for years near Hayward had people staying 1 and 2 nights when I don’t ever recall seeing that before during the peak vacation season. Maybe business is just that competitive/tough for resort owners these days? Maybe people want to go to water-parks and stuff like that these days rather than the good old northwoods resorts that I grew up going to? It’s sad if that’s the case.

If you are just looking to fish I’d recommend Chip Porter out of Waukegan harbor. He’ll put you on fish for sure. If you want to stay closer to the city I don’t have a name for you but there’s a ton of boats that run out of Burnham harbor. Just tried to get onto Chip’s website to get a phone# for you and it wouldn’t come up for me.

Hope this helps.

Well, Chris, if you can put up with Kenny breaking your stuff and Greg and I you must be alright!! Hope you have fun chasing muskies!!

John Boecker

I’ve fished the bay a number of times and the best advice I could give you would be to hire Chris for a day before dragging your boat up there and flying blind. It’s big water and it can be treacherous with the seiches, sandbars, floating logs, etc. I’ve fished with Chris every year I’ve gone up there and there’s never been a year where something different isn’t going on that changes the way you need to fish. You could stumble around out there for days and not figure it out. Normally we try to fish with Chris for a day and then head out for a day on our own. He’s out there almost every day, he knows what’s going on, and he’s a great guy to spend a day in the boat with.

Good luck!

I thought that the judges made the right decision. Oscar wasted too much time, especially in the latter rounds, trying to back Mayweather into the ropes so he could flurry. Possibly could have worked inside more often if he would have jabbed more. Did seem like Oscar was concerned about getting tired. I don’t like Mayweathers style, in the ring or outside of it, but he’s effective at landing a high percentage of his punches. Loved the white leather sombrero—-NOT!!!

Undercard fights were boring too. Think they just wanted fighters/fights that would go 12 rounds. If there is a rematch there better be better undercard fights or I won’t spend the $55 on the PPV again.

I’ve got a 14 foot jon-boat that sounds like it would be perfect for what you want. Just the boat, no trailer. Bought it from a guy I work with for $100 so I’ll sell it to you for the same. Have a 1970-something Merc 7.5 I’d be willing to throw in for another $200. Runs great but no reverse.

Let me know if you are still looking.

I believe Hayward, WI. is right around 3 hours from the cities, correct? If so, I strongly recommend Totem Pole Lodge on Lost Land Lake. Great activities for kids and a nice sand beach like you mentioned. Lost Land is part of a two lake chain connected by a channel. Speed restrictions on the lakes so no wave-runners or ski-boats to worry about. The owners, Mike and Mimi Anderson, are good people to deal with as well.

Hope this helps.

I’ll second that recommendation for Sunset Lodge….I think. That’s the place with the cool old log lodge, right? Cabins are yellow, I think. I’ve stayed at two resorts right next to each other and forget which one is which.

No doubt! Nothing like going back to basics sometimes!! I worked on Vermilion at a camp for three summers and always thought it would be a great lake to ice-fish. Need to get up there one of these winters.

Sounds like a blast to me, Big D!! Can’t think of a better way to spend a New Years weekend. We haven’t gotten decent ice this far south(Chicago)in quite awhile so I have to just read all of the reports on here and dream!

Hope you knock ’em dead!!

I’ve owned one Leer cap and the design of the rear window/latch was terrible. I was constantly replacing rivets, it almost fell off once or twice, etc. Finally just dumped it. Bought it used so there was no warranty. The dealer I bought it from stopped carrying them because of the number of complaints he received.

I’ve never owned a ARE cap so can’t give you any insight there. I own a Jason now and so far it’s been fine.

Hope this helps

I’ll keep my ears open for you, den, but I can’t imagine that there will be any floating around for that game!!

If the trend continues with the way the Bears have been approaching games(i.e.not showing up against teams they should beat like the Cards and Phins)they will lose to the Jets and beat the Patriots. If I was a betting man though I’d say they’ll beat the Jets and lose to the Pats. Lets not forget though that after this east-coast swing is over they’ve still got the Vikings(home), Rams(away), and Bucs(home) waiting for them the next three games. None of these games will be gimme’s especially with the way the defense is being run on lately. They could easily end the regular season with four losses especially if they clinch home field advantage for the playoffs and sit the starters 12/31 against the Pack. I’ll be at that game though so, in a way, I’d love to have them need to win to clinch the bye. The Pack would have a chance to be spoilers and add on the fact that it might be Favre’s last game at Soldier Field….it doesn’t get any better than that, does it?

Go Bears!

But aren’t you concerned that by the time that o-line really gels and gets experience playing together that they’ll be protecting what will be essentially a rookie QB? I’m assuming here that Favre won’t play past the ’07 season here, obviously.

Like you said though, no doubt the Pack have improved since week#1. If they can find another WR or two in the off-season they’ll be that much better for next year. The defense has been stout and Woodson has played much better than I thought he would.

It’s always a great game when the Vikings and Packers get together and I look forward to watching it. Hoping for a competitive, injury-free game. Good luck!

Bigpike- Very interesting points you make here about Ted Thompson. I don’t disagree that the team is developing and showing improvement but wouldn’t you agree that he has put the team in re-building mode when he didn’t have to? 2-3 years ago he had a solid offensive line protecting one of the best QB’s in the game and blocking for one of the better RB’s in the game. The team was in the playoffs every year. All they needed was some help on defense. He lets the offensive line leave in free-agency and chooses to replace them in the draft. Just seems to me that he wasted two years of his key players careers when he had most of the pieces in place to make a run at a Super Bowl.

I’m a Bear fan so what the heck do I know but that’s just my outsiders view of the situation. I’m a football fan and try to keep up with all the teams in the division.

Here’s a Bears fan that agrees with you 100%, Vikefan!! I’m not getting excited until the Bears at least win a playoff game and I’m sick of talking about 1985. Injuries happen and so does overconfidence. Winning the first four games won’t mean much if we lose the next four so lets keep things in perspective here.

Have a good one, guys.

Thank you, mossydan!! That’s a lot of info but it’s exactly what I needed. Sounds like there’s a lot to learn here and I can’t wait to get started!

Thanks again, everyone.

Thanks to everyone who offered their suggestions. There are a few archery pro-shops near me to check out. My first thought was that the pro-shop would steer me towards spending more $$ than a retail store like a Gander Mtn. would but the point of knowledge and expertise makes a lot of sense. Just don’t want to spend more $$ than I have to getting started. Once I get started and start reading some bow-hunting posts and magazines I’ll be a more knowledgeable buyer. That’s my theory anyhow.

Thanks again for taking the time, guys.

P.S. Will also take your advice and post this in the hunting forum.

It’s been 3 or 4 years since I get the replica of the musky but at that time replicas were more expensive than a skin mount. Not twice as much, but definitely more expensive. Worth it though, in my opinion. More life-like than any skin mount I’ve ever seen and will stand the test of time.

I used Ron Lax for a musky and he did an outstanding job. Believe he’s located in Conover, WI.

Hope this helps

Am I the only one who thinks that Childress kind of looks like a shorter version of Shaw Grigsby?

Just wondering.

Should be a very interesting season, guys. A lot of interesting stuff going on in the NFC North. New coaches, new players, same old rivalries. Bears should be the favorites to win the division again but who knows how it’ll all play out? Easy to speculate that the Vikes and Pack are re-building a bit but they could both come out smokin’ hot!! Can’t wait to see how AJ Hawk does for the Pack and Greenway does for the Vikes. Should be entertaining.

Thought I read somewhere that baking soda was good for this and would not harm fish.

Does “We did catch a bunch of smallies in an area they stated they never would have thought of fishing.” mean that the ‘JFN’ bite is on, Chris?

Glad to see you’re on the fish as always!!

Talk to you soon.

John Boecker

I was up last year and it had to be close to where you will be. I was on Seperation Lake which is part of the English River system. Anyways, we did extremely well on jigs tipped with crawlers. Didn’t try minnows but we did try leeches and the walleye definitely seemed to favor the crawlers.

Good luck!

First time I took ‘my lady’ muskie fishing I bought a brand-new rod and reel for her to use…..because I needed a new one. She claimed she could cast a bait-caster but let’s just say that I had my doubts. But we get out there and on the very first cast she rears back, fires a cast, and follows it right into the lake!!!!! Luckily it was only 4 feet deep or so…..which made it a lot easier for her to walk around until she found that rod and reel!!!!

She was a good sport about it until little kids on shore started laughing at her standing there in the lake in all of her clothes. That part didn’t go over so well….

Had to get rid of her though. Can’t have someone abusing my tackle like that!!!! Just kidding!!!