Year Round Lure Of The Lake

The deciding factor in moving to this neighborhood was the nearby lake. My wife and I enjoy paddling canoes and fishing. Its a perfect lake for that. I love spending time outdoors and am always keeping my eyes open for related fun. Through the winter, I watch people ice fish on the lake as I ski by. The thought of ice fishing interests me a lot. I’ve even made some weak attempts.  A jigging rod and a pair of tip-ups have been waiting patiently in a bucket, in a corner of the garage. Along with a hand ice auger that I got,… somewhere.  I did drill some holes in the ice,…once. And I did put lines down in those holes,…with hooks, I think. Definitely killed a bottle bass,… or two. But that’s pretty much the extent of it. And bottle bass don’t count. But I don’t really know how to do it. Or do I? I do know the lake bottom topography from my summer fishing. The weed lines are programmed in my mental GPS. I do have some ice fishing tools.  I just never did the math and added all of it together. However, it was the addition of one more tool that sent me back out on the ice. While flicking through Craigslist one night a couple weeks ago, I spotted a Si-Tex FL-5 Flasher unit. Yes a sonar fish finder. Vintage as it may have been, it was better underwater eyes than I had at the time (turns out it was a precursor to the popular Vexilar units and is considered a decent sonar unit). And the price was right. $5! I could throw it against the wall for that price and get my money’s worth of fun. I love sporting technology, even if it’s vintage technology.  It was still available when I contacted the seller and it was in my possession the next day.
It was meant to be. After a self-training session on how to work the sonar, I caught my first fish on my first outing. We won’t talk about the size of the fish, because it isn’t important to the story <wink>. But I wasn’t skunked! And the rest is,…well,… history to be made I guess.  With our kids’ love of the lake and the ice, I can see this activity being a great fit for our family. Our enjoyment of the lake will really be year round.