As a child, growing up, or becoming an adult, means to know
what you are doing. It means you have become someone who has all the answers.
What you don’t realize as that dumb, innocent little child is that even adults
don’t really know what the hell they are doing. You continue to learn and grow
all your life, because sometimes life throws challenges at you that will leave
you stumped. While starting this season challenges and laughs seem to be our
reoccurring theme. After our long journey, and 4 hours at the border we arrived
at the landing ready to get the water running and have a nice hot shower. Boy
were we in for a surprise when we fired up the pump and discovered it was
leaking. So we did what desperate people do: we went to town and bought a new
one. We decided after getting back that instead of fixing the pump we would
head into camp, shower, and return later. Fast forward through the VERY cold
voyage to camp, we turn on the solar without a problem, and we hook up the
water pump also without any issues. Everyone was thrilled until we encountered
surprise 2. The pipes in the shower house had burst, and the pipes to the lodge
were still frozen. Broken pipes and frozen water lines meant no running water,
and no showers for 10 days! Imagine meeting your boss for the first time then
learning you have to live with him for a few days, and then not being able to
shower for 10 days (sorry Colin and Jody). We all made it through and opening
the rest of the camp went fairly smooth. Well, until we had a boat break down
and we spent over 4 hours towing it back to camp.
Our first week went very well. Fishing was good, as usual.
The walleye weren’t quite biting yet, there were fish still spawning out, and
the trout were favoring 3-5 feet of water. The water may have been down about a
foot, but the number of fish caught was not. I lost count of how many pike over
40 inches were caught! There was a 40 inch lake trout caught as well! It was a
wonderful week with great weather, great fishing, and great people. Thank you
for a great start!
For the second week, the weather decided not to cooperate.
It was cold and rainy, but per usual it didn’t stop the fishing. The sun came
out finally, just in time for tournament day, and we were able to enjoy some
ice cream in the nice weather. We had our first bear hunter last week as well,
but unfortunately he had to go home empty handed. Everything happens for a
reason though, and this week we have two more. We will see what happens!
Even with all the challenges we have had this season there
has been no shortage of laughs, jokes, or fun. Colin and Jody are wonderful. In
the first three weeks, it was rare to have a dinner without someone laughing
till they cried, or spitting out their drink. I will leave you with this: no
matter what challenges are thrown at you, or whether or not you know what you
are doing, never for get to have fun along the way. Sometimes you just have to
laugh it out.
