I had the opportunity to spend the day on Chester Woods Lake with three very beautiful young ladies, 8 year old Joanne Lemke & her Dad Jeff, 9 year old Michaela Schultz, & my 9 year old Daughter Emily Plantz. The fish for the day was blue gills, the presentation was a plain hook with a split shot & bobber tipped with a crawler. The first pic is of Joanne with the first blue gill of the day, way to go Joanne!
This next pic on the left is of Michaela with her first fish of the day, this was the first time Michaela had ever fished out of a boat, and she had a blast! Nice looking blue gill there Michaela!
Here is a pic of my Daughter Emily to the right with one of the bigger gills of the day, good job kido!
Here is a group pic with the catch of the day, the smiles on these girls faces says it all! What a great day on the water even if Jeff and myself did not get much fishing in, we were too busy baiting hooks and taking the fish off the hooks for the girls. This was just one of the activities for the weekend, this was a campout for Pioneers from Resurrection Lutheran School in Rochester & there Families. This is a great lake to take a kid fishing as you are guaranteed to catch something, and the campgrounds and facilities are first rate, if you want to camp on a weekend make sure you make your reservations well in advance as they fill up fast. You will also need a park sticker to get in to the county park, you can buy a day pass for $5 or you can get an annual sticker for $25. So if you are looking for a great lake to take a kid fishing Chester Woods is the place to go, come to think of it that gives me a good idea for a future ARM event!
Chesterwoods would be perfect for an ARM event… great suggestion. From the reports in the Rochester forum it sounds like the bass have been biting as well.
Simply awesome Steve. Gotta love those three smiles!!
Thats what its all about-getting kids hooked on fishing. There are so many other attractions out there to kids that aren’t healthy for them so if we can in some way like this get them involved in fishing they will learn about a hobby that they can enjoy all of their lives.
Lots of fun and smiles on their faces makes it all worth while.
Thanks, Bill
PS. Holding a small morning ARM Event out there would be fun. Take the kids fishing for say 9:00-1:00 and then cook some hotdogs and chips for lunch before they go home would work very well. Or if you wanted to just keep it simple just fishing would be fun too. It would be real easy to do more of them through out the summer and early fall with just the fishing being done. Something to think and talk about.
Thanks for the report as I need to take a 3 year old and his mother fishing on July 1. How do I find and access chester woods? I will be coming from Red Wing.
Chester Woods is Located 7 miles east of Rochester, MN on Highway 14.
Here is the Chester Woods Web Site
Here is Map Quest Directions from Red Wing.
One thing that I did not mention in my report is that you can only use electric motors on Chester Lake, no gas motors allowed, you can have a gas motor on your boat you just can’t fire it up.