tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-83726046979982947602024-01-19T22:57:21.967-06:00stories from adam mellaadam mella fishing camping adventure gunflint trail minnesota wisconsin trout pike walleye canoe bwca quetico national forest park superior nicolet chemquamegon northcountry woods cedar wilderness hiking boundary waters rocks berries ice boats hammocks beer whiskey live living humanist steinbeck vonnegut quammen reading writingUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger56125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-33520097445059178972014-02-27T20:30:00.000-06:002014-02-27T20:30:55.204-06:00Lake Superior Ice Caves<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-5176827391252954992013-03-28T17:04:00.001-05:002013-03-28T17:30:20.501-05:00An unusual approach on Rose Falls<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Rose Falls has the feel of an ancient place, where if you touch one of the massive cedars it might awaken from a long sleep and say something profound in an eerie voice. Here gravity pulls water out of Duncan Lake through a narrow cut in the rocks, cascading 136 feet closer to our planet's center. All of us have access to this rare, raw power. <br />
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I arrived on the Gunflint Trail in late April that year and everything was old, but new to me. New job, new co-workers, my fishing gear stacked neatly in the corner of my new one-room cabin. I shivered in my new bed the first night, reading Grapes of Wrath by lamplight, chapter fourteen: "muscles and mind aching to grow, to work, to create, multiplied a million times."<br />
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The cabin wall was papered with park maps, there was Rose Falls roaring above my pillow.<br />
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Deek and I spent several days ripping old carpet and glue from hardwood floors in Clearwater Lodge, sanding them down smooth. Strangers still but here for the same reasons, we started making plans for our first day off. Fishing wasn't an option, and with most of the lakes still frozen, neither was paddling. <br />
"Maybe we should take a hike," suggested Deek. <br />
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Having spent the previous six years stuck in a cubicle, I was in absolutely terrible shape, but it still sounded like a good idea. I had to get out there. Spring was in the air and my legs were yipping.<br />
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It had been a decade since I first climbed the Stairway Portage at Rose Falls, during my first summer working at Clearwater. My dad was visiting, we camped two nights on Daniels and caught a pile of smallies. And we took a day-trip to Rose and saw the tumbling waters and sleeping cedars and all the other tourists eating snacks. It was a great trip. <br />
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Ten years later Deek and I sat around sipping beers after a long day of lodge restoration, watching the snow melt, imagining the rush of spring water being pulled over the rocks. Yes, we agreed, tomorrow we would hike an unusual approach on Rose Falls.<br />
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The vast majority of all Rose Falls visitors in any given year arrive by canoe during the months of July or August, and that's a great way to see them. The second easiest route to the falls is snowshoeing across snow-covered lakes, but of course the falls are frozen solid then, very quiet and stunning still. <br />
Here in the springtime, though, when the falls are most impressive and least visited, the approach is by rock... A wild beast feeling. <br />
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There are a number of over-land hiking routes leading to Rose Falls but the most direct and difficult is the Caribou Rock Trail, running north from Hungry Jack Road. Even for someone in fit condition, this would be a serious test. Deek and I had originally planned on taking the easier route up the Daniels Spur to the Long Portage, but had found the Daniels Spur a knee-deep stream of meltwater, boots swamped. No doubt the Long Portage would have been even soggier. After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy we decided on a third option: South Lake to the Border Route to Rose Falls to Caribou Rock.<br />
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The South Lake Trail was kind to us, and we glided along at a fast pace, shredding layers and searching for moose shed. Dropping into a cool and shaded lowlands, Deek proclaimed, "This looks like a bullpen, I bet there's a huge bull moose watching us right now." He looked serious.<br />
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We reached the Border Route before noon and stopped for a break on a massive rock outcropping overlooking South, Rat and Rose Lakes. The day was warm and the legs still felt strong. A light rain started falling. We pushed on along the undulating Border Route, beside a small beaver pond chirping with life and the glowing green of spring.<br />
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By the time we reached the falls my legs were getting sore but there we recharged. The falls are at their prime in early May, full of spectacular energy. We could hear Rose Falls roaring ahead on the trail for a full half hour before we finally reached the gorge. Sitting on the rocks below the main drop we had lunch in a cloud of mist, the abundant humidity and thunder erasing all the dry quiet of winter. "That the earth can do that," I said, shiny-eyed, and Deek nodded.<br />
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The sun crept low behind the clouds and we turned south towards the truck along the Caribou Rock Trail. At first I thought the trail builders were maniacs but eventually I realized there is simply no reasonable land-route from Hungry Jack Road to Rose Falls. The trail was steep and mostly slick rock. We'd climb and climb, cling to small branches sliding back downhill, but always keeping an eye out for interesting wildlife. <br />
Deek pointed out blueberry bushes in the making, smoking cigarettes on the top of each vista. Could he be trusted? He seemed to know a lot about plants and I knew almost nothing at the time... and he had worked more summers on the trail, so I paid attention. <br />
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We crossed the stream between Bearskin and Duncan and Deek said, "One time here I almost stepped on a huge snapping turtle sitting in the stream." I wasn't sure if he was crazy or a genius. We hopped across the rocks, all of them rocks this time, then pulled ourselves uphill, away from the center of the world once again. My muscles wheezed, then breathed.<br />
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And there goes Duncan, and there we see Moss, and there is Bearskin ahead, the lakes were melting in the rain, winter just turned into spring, just then.<br />
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The last two miles of the hike something happened, where we got too tired but still kept stepping forward. It was a triumph of will... Or hunger. And this was the same feeling I had the first time I hauled gear up the stairs beside Rose Falls without stopping for rest. The feeling you get in the park so often: lungs and muscles burning sweetly, a wild beast feeling. The feeling after a hard day of work, peeling off your boots. Or catching a toothy fish. Or kissing a girl by the light of a campfire. When you hit the top of the hill on an impossible hike and take a deep breath in a new place.<br />
<br />
That <i>you </i>can do <i>that</i>.<br />
<br />
But of course there was a price, well worth it: For three days I couldn't hardly walk, let alone sand floors. The hike had the last laugh, but we made it to the falls and back, we heard what the ancient cedars had to say on that day and nobody else did. Or will. After dinner I rolled into bed, by the light of a lamp with no shade, legs whimpering beneath the wool blankets, but laughing. I re-read chapter fourteen of Steinbeck's masterpiece: <br />
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"Having stepped forward, he may slip back, but only half a step, never the full step back. This you may say and know it and know it." Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-64089677148042523542013-03-15T01:33:00.002-05:002013-03-15T01:49:41.628-05:00Drilling through 29 inches of instinct and ice<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">1 - Across the snow and ice I walk, listening to the lake, imagining the depth contours below, how the fish will swim along this shoreline. Down there lives a beast I seek. Often I look for animal tracks on the surface. Where are you going, wild things? But really I wonder: <i>Where I am going?</i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">2 - There is something invisible in this world that reveals the perfect place for a fishing hole. This force gives my instincts mass. I read <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/05/science/chasing-the-higgs-boson-how-2-teams-of-rivals-at-CERN-searched-for-physics-most-elusive-particle.html" target="_blank">an article</a> about a similar mysterious force, the Higgs boson, "an elusive, missing snowflake in our theory of falling snow."*</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">3 - Looking at a frozen lake blanketed you cannot see a single particular snowflake, or a single molecule of ice. This is impossible for the human eye. But there they are, millions and millions, together a soft quilt across a hard sheet of ice, a barrier between <i>me </i>and <i>them</i>. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">4 - My skin <span style="font-size: small;">perceives</span> the snowfield as it fluctuates and breaks back into singular flakes, shimmering between the sky above and the water below. Eventually I am satisfied and stop my feet, drop the drill from my shoulder, right hand on top pressing down, left hand the engine, driving the blades round and round. This is something I've done thousands of times before.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">5 - However: This is the end of February on a big lake. Two feet of snow on top, twenty feet of water below, the ice membrane a deep and strong field in between.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">6 - The blades of the drill must be sharp at the perfect angle, creating the perfect friction. It would be a mistake pushing too hard or turning too fast. Great force in short bursts works better. One violent turn of the handle at a time, a steady <span style="font-size: small;">rhythm</span>, and for each turn I am one inch closer to the fish.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">7 - The first few spins are effortless, the blades of the drill just getting teeth into the ice field. The arms whir with youthful electricity.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">8 - Five inches down, life is easy. Ten inches down, the hands are still lively. Fifteen inches down, ice particles start grabbing at the blades... And then they grab at the arms, and then the shoulders, and the feet. Friction spreads quickly through the body, soon the lungs and guts start burning, then they howl. It's odd, to a person watching on shore this must seem like nothing at all. Such a stationary and simple thing shouldn't be so hard, but it is. Vision narrows with primal determination: Keep going, keep going. Sixteen inches, seventeen inches...</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">9 - The muscles become looser, but heavier. The mind must be quiet, but aggressive. Energies increasing against resistance. All of these competing forces pushing towards a breaking point. How much further to liquid water? Can I turn the handle one more time? Three more times? A thousand more times? What is my limit?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">10 - When I was 18 I got my first job in the boundary waters. I had never been up here before that. I've been wondering ever since why I sought that job, how it all came to be, that first step in the right direction. Some invisible force, perhaps, something I will never really understand. On my nineteenth birthday I got drunk and watched the northern lights at the end of an old dock. And after you've seen that, what is there to understand?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">11 - Then a few weeks later I moved back south.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">12 - It seems to me that everyone is just looking for their place in this world. Part of me is upset I didn't see mine right away. Maybe I just couldn't comprehend it. I guess I was stuck in an in-between, I wasn't air anymore but I wasn't quite water.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">13 - Twenty inches and the top of the auger blades begin disappearing into the lake's frozen skin, the teeth so far away... At this point each turn of the handle requires a steep increase in energy. A reckoning. The ice and snow fight back now, but I get meaner. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">14 - Twenty-one inches, twenty three, twenty five... Managing a small newspaper in the city, married, bought a cute house with hardwood floors. We adopted two kittens, planted lilacs and tomatoes in the yard.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">15 - Drilling a hole through deep ice requires great energy but so often that energy is wasted, it seems. Nothing substantial is caught there. It was not the right place. Or maybe, the right time.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">16 - Thing is: I'm stubborn. Twenty six, twenty seven... I get what I want. I won't ever stop looking, twenty eight... </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">17 - The reason I'm always yearning, why I'm grinding ice to slush, is that I'm demanding of myself. I can't take naps. I never get sick. But there is a sickness, this constant cold desire, never satisfied. And I try so hard for optimism, but this world makes it so difficult. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">18 - Is the lake even down there anymore? Has it frozen solid? How many turns of the handle has it been now?</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">19 - My teeth grind and jawbones clench, twenty eight, <i>twenty eight</i>, I'm seeing red... </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">20 - As has happened so often in this life the doubt creeps in. Maybe the whole world is an icy heart. Maybe I'll never catch another beast.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">21 - My arms are dead, my lungs are empty, my mind goes blank, twenty eight, <i>twenty eight</i>... The last grinding punch is the most difficult as the bottom gives out, but then everything breaks free and the blades taste the lake again, the barrier between us has been obliterated. Every single cell in my body howls with happiness. And there is excitement in this new possibility. Maybe, just maybe, this is the place.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">22 - Seeing wild liquid water in the winter always electrifies me. I place my bare hand in the lake and splash it on my forehead, and instantly feel better. I snap back into myself.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">23 - Then I realized something I already knew: No energy is ever wasted. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">24 - Energy <i>is </i>mass.**</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">25 - All the hard work, the mistakes and successes, the tired muscles and happiness, each and every infintismal moment big and small, snowflakes falling on a frozen lake, piling up, there is the origin of instinct. What happened drives us to what will happen. These are the animal tracks in the snow.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">26 - In my twenty-ninth year I said goodbye to the city and the girl I loved and I moved up north again, to the Gunflint Trail. Some invisible force brought me back here, something I will never understand.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">27 - I breathe deeply and bait the hook, always hopeful. Watching the minnow drift down through the ice field into the vast darkness, I know something it does not, but I still know very little. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">28 - Farewell, little one, bring me back a big one. It's an old trick, knocking a hole in the ice for water and meat. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">29 - And I want that meat badly, I'm so thirsty for cold water, but I want nothing more than this: A permanent life in these boundary waters that have given me everything and energy and mass.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">* - <span style="font-size: small;">"</span>Chasing the Higgs<span style="font-size: small;">,</span>" <i>New York Times</i>, March 5, 2013</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">** - E=MC2</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">-30-</span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-33075644106525554672013-02-06T00:47:00.000-06:002013-02-06T00:47:26.909-06:00An elusive lake<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />There is an elusive lake filled with trout, says Ed. I read about it in a <a href="http://samcook.areavoices.com/2012/03/07/challenging-day-of-lake-trout-fishing-on-gunflint-trail/" target="_blank">Sam Cook column</a>. He never found it but we should. It's just loaded with lakers. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />This conversation I file under "future adventures." A few weeks later I am still thinking about it. The difficulty only increases the desire.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />There are two reasonable options into this lake. One is shorter but requires more bush-whacking. The second is a longer hike but the trail passes nearby. Looking over my F13 Fisher park-map in the out-house I visualize the approach up the frozen creek. A small space heater roasts my right thigh, and I burn the course into my gps.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />The Packers lose miserably on Saturday night... and we move from early ice to the mid-season. On Sunday we watch more football and play cards, we feast solemnly on slow-roasted beef.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />Monday rises cold and quickly. Too quickly. After breakfast KB and I lazily gather gear, sip on coffee and watch the sun hit high noon. No urgency. But at one there is an itch, let's go blaze this trail, let's go find the lonely lake. It's too late in the day and too cold, but we go anyways.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />Should be three miles in, or maybe three and a half. Wonder what this path used to be? Somebody's old drive-way, some dreamer. Something goofy with almost anyone that would live up here. Someone cut this path and the trees try and erase it. It feels level but the whole way we're going downhill, deep into the park. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">A helicopter flies over, are they counting moose? Are they watching us? We take a few wrong turns. Sections of the trail are so overgrown we are crawling on our bellies. In a cluster of birch sits the metal remains of an old buggy, rusty and haunted. And then we reach the valley, where even in winter the water keeps running north. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The trail levels out and when it turns back north my gps grows wary. <i>Turn right. Turn right!</i> An organ starts playing in my thorax, somewhere in my guts a bass drum starts kicking. It's over there, I can feel the gravity. Off the trail the snow gets deep but we bounce through the marshlands and tall grass poking through the snow.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />And then the landscape opens up. And there it is, the elusive lake. Off a deep point I punch four holes and set the traps. We snuggle against the shoreline out of the wind, chewing frozen granola bars. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />This is fun, but this is crazy. And our eyes say:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /><i><span style="color: #76a5af;"><span style="font-size: large;">This is ourrrr lake!</span></span></i></span></span><br />
<i><span style="color: #76a5af;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />Yesss it is!</span></span></span></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">But we've left ourselves too small a window here, and lacking live bait, we fish for just one-half-hour, unsuccessfully, then point sore legs uphill, into the wind. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />We cross the creek, meander along the valley of the marsh gawking at the rock-cliffs, up to the west, across the secondary creek, <i>up and up and up</i>, and under the fallen trees. But I don't remember that tree. Or that one. Then: there's the old buggy. And: look at the size of that cedar! </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />We reach the truck in the blue of night light dissolving into blackness. And now we know the way. It is so burned into our thighs. And another day we shall return, but today, oh today so hungry, we are <span style="color: #cc0000;">done</span>.</span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-10346045926711507522013-01-06T16:03:00.000-06:002013-01-06T16:03:37.043-06:00Big Walter<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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My brother Andrew visited the northcountry last week for some ice fishing in the park. The first two days were so-so but on Monday he pulled this big walter on the close trap around noon. It was, without question, the largest walleye either of us had ever seen caught. Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-81360248972634977612012-09-28T13:23:00.000-05:002012-09-28T13:23:35.882-05:00september cedars<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-73045875020053371412012-05-21T10:39:00.001-05:002012-05-21T10:39:56.361-05:00Capsized on Caribou Lake<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Capsizing a canoe is rarely a choice, and it's also rare that one would make that choice in May. But this has been a really warm spring, and therefore, I think the decision was correct. I'm not sure I would've made the same choice, given the chance, but it's impossible to know. <br /><br />
Erik and I wanted to put some walleyes in the freezer so we paddled four miles out to the far end of Caribou Lake the other afternoon with dark clouds to the north and calm winds out of the south. It was an ideal afternoon for paddling. We passed four guys on the portage over from Clearwater carrying their loaded canoes in teams of two. They hadn't caught any walleyes. I wondered why they were leaving the lake now... primetime was near. We saw four other canoes on the lake as we paddled east, one of them had a stringer of fish hanging off the back of the boat, and every campsite was occupied. The lake was busy. The air was very warm, the water was also warm. We got to our spot and started jigging minnows, and I caught a little pike right away. A saw-whet owl squeaked at us from the hilltops. I switched to one of the bigger creek chubs, hoping for something monstrous. But nothing happened. <br />
<br />There was not enough wind for drifting. Eventually we gave up on live bait and decided to be more aggressive. We started trolling crankbaits along our favorite section of shoreline. On the second pass Erik caught a nice 16-inch walleye. I took the picture above and Erik put the fish on the stringer. Luckily the camera is waterproof. I put it in my pocket, then I bombed my rapala away from shore, and then I heard a commotion and the canoe rocked quickly to the left and then hard back to the right, all the way over on its side, and I twisted my neck to keep my eyes level with the water as it touched my right knee, and then my arm... I sort of jumped out and pushed back on the canoe to keep it from rolling completely and the water was not so warm anymore. I spun around and Erik was in the water behind me. Either I couldn't breath or I couldn't talk, I wasn't sure. We were in deep water but fairly close to the shoreline, and somehow everything had stayed in the boat besides us. Even my fishing pole was floating in the boat, which was filled with water but upright. I'm not sure how it ended up there. I still couldn't talk, but we both started swimming for shore with the boat on our right, my knee-boots were full of water but I didn't have difficulty swimming. Then we were on the rocks and we gathered our gear by the cedar roots. Finally I caught my breath, the shock of the cold water loosened its grip on me. <br /><br />
What happened? <br />
<br />The walleye almost got away. I mentally tied the stringer to the canoe but I guess I didn't, Erik said, and I looked down and saw the walleye swimming away with the stringer, so I decided to dive in after it. I had to laugh. I tried picturing it. What would I have done? He said he caught it by the last loop on the stringer somehow. I knew we would capsize, he continued, but I jumped in anyways. I couldn't let that walleye and stringer get away. <br />
<br />We still had an hour of daylight left so we wrung the water out of our clothes, I emptied my boots, and then we got back in the canoe and resumed fishing. The saw-whet chimed again. The air was still really warm so we were fine even though we were still wet. It had been years since I had capsized, and Erik had <i>never</i> capsized before. We made it through 300 miles of Quetico together, with a fully-loaded canoe across diabolic waves and never came close to capsizing... We laughed, thinking about what the people on the campsites on the opposite shoreline were saying about the show. Well, I said, we gave them a professional demonstration on how to handle the situation. <br />
<br />After a few more passes and no fish, we turned for home one final time, and just before we ran up into shallower water I felt a ting-ting, and then a heavy strike. I set the hook and gave a <i>yep</i>, calling for the net. And then we had a second 16-inch walleye! Erik attached it to the stringer and then threw the stringer safely in the bottom of the boat. The sun was down and we had about an hour of visible light so we gave maximum effort across the three miles of Caribou Lake. We had just enough light to keep the headlamps in our pockets through the portage, which was good since they may have not worked anyways, and as we finished the final mile of paddling on Clearwater a planet rose and shined brightly in the west - probably Mars. Back at camp we cleaned our meat, and then I drove back to my cabin and put on dry clothing. It was well after ten. I had the next day off. I was mighty thirsty. My arms felt electric. <br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-28240217020863051152012-05-07T13:36:00.000-05:002012-05-07T13:36:06.481-05:00Nighthawk Lake<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAGwfXQEpnfmNpwU0SdeG3FPDFw6s8SKPevGB33N3C0jq7dMrqF17a1Xq2Q9jEfthln-ZzB78MgMbiRVokjeGaHiBYcTPkWSlw25nUWdb7fSnv6-SUv5AnRoF_VuImnsWz2ZJC6QY6R5ix/s1600/tc3.5.17.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" border="0" height="128" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAGwfXQEpnfmNpwU0SdeG3FPDFw6s8SKPevGB33N3C0jq7dMrqF17a1Xq2Q9jEfthln-ZzB78MgMbiRVokjeGaHiBYcTPkWSlw25nUWdb7fSnv6-SUv5AnRoF_VuImnsWz2ZJC6QY6R5ix/s400/tc3.5.17.jpg" title="Nighthawk Lake, 5.5.12" width="400" /></a></div>
The rain stopped on Saturday afternoon so I <a href="http://www.wildalmanac.com/logbook_entry.php?id=94">took a hike</a> in search of The Big Black Boulder. After swamping my boots and locating the large erratic, I came upon a small lake that looked appealing with Lima Mountain in the background. I did some research back at the cabin. Nighthawk Lake has pike and walleye and, since it is a long way from other lakes within the <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&ved=0CKIBEBYwAg&url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FBoundary_Waters_Canoe_Area_Wilderness&ei=RBWoT-mWJejB2QWW5OWmAg&usg=AFQjCNFIvXXTQ9MDiS6SGyB1_ezY60EuWg&sig2=02PRU0vnDIk4Z9mh984b_g">BWCA</a>, and over a mile from the nearest access point, I am guessing it never gets fished. Although I will probably chase lakers on Minnesota Fishing Opener this Saturday, I plan on coming back to Nighthawk with a canoe and some big bucktails in the near future.<br />
<a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_1014048744"><br /></a><br />
<a href="http://www.wildalmanac.com/logbook_entry.php?id=94">Full logbook entry from the hike and more pictures on Wild Almanac</a>.<br />
<br />
-30-Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-20312673836974977572012-04-19T15:25:00.001-05:002012-04-19T15:29:13.392-05:00Fixing The Pearl<i>“For it is said that humans are never satisfied, that you give them one thing and they want something more. And this is said in disparagement, whereas it is one of the greatest talents the species has and one that has made it superior to animals that are satisfied with what they have.” <br />- J. Steinbeck, The Pearl</i><br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5733210072439471298'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy-5aDOxOyMCAZi6jaZIU_oCzLQ5f7M8c923ot4WkP6Qq84pvaWOsxw7wexDzCRc-Ih6vYQuttKxqIAGonPFAy7hS57Wyoz67TrlTW3F7DYknWVA5b39ht3o1psFB_Tw8VznTTHvCYuRHP/s288/0.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />In the summer of 2011 I read <i>The Pearl</i> and bought a used Wenonah Minnesota II, a lightweight and super-fast kevlar boat with a pearl-white gelcoat finish that was covered with battle scars, which meant I got a really good deal. It worked fine but it was beat-up, and I felt immediately bonded to this canoe. I gave it a good cleaning with the power washer and threw a coat of bondo on the hull, and then Erik and I paddled it 300+ miles into Canada and back. I returned to Wisconsin in November and stuck the boat next to the shed and in the spring I assessed the damages.<br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5733210174973298738'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4VF2hbqUiV96sYIW3CuRPM4y6smmgEvdqYoi361G2mWXgDsjALBw6A45Y1O67qTioLnqVChkgyuMBeN4C2YgkdtuAOg7jTcy4bjtuQzqC1lLPTHf4K3Q7avVc1r9Y7fpubkm9IpuCyrdc/s288/1.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5733210276574859970'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYTPONc_Ozpu7s-Sfl9-ncUOX2P3Y6cNCOoX_rLAXOGNH_5HVnlvoR4HtHH5x7ujBkSdL0ExDp9PMHhrN-w1U_VKoX9NgLrn0fdZ6q8VlP2Qp0zyslXlZkuzdfGiAs_c72Grmo-UZuFjCR/s288/2.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />There was a few bad cracks where the actual kevlar was exposed, the bondo had been badly gouged on the Big Adventure and what remained had yellowed significantly. Bottom line: The Pearl was in bad shape, probably the worst of its life (1997- ). Luckily I (1981- ) had some experience working on kevlar boats and also, lots of free time. I carefully chipped away the bondo layer and then smoothed out the gelcoat with an orbital sander.<br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5733210465240291170'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibs21Gk9TZJIV-ehOHRH2-bZZYPfdO84N5npq3LIqw5hUWE-8IZ8os4QLhWLz7oC62Guen5yu2-8B-01dqgTw6BCKrvaVKEVbn0K6hvaVZ1l-6TVpOfvnluUeLLt4PpQHZ6dWMRD9_WBBS/s288/3.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />Then I bought two quarts of wax-finished white gelcoat, putting a double coating on the most vulnerable parts of the hull. Gelcoat requires a hardening agent and you have to work fast before it starts curdling ... And also if it's sunny it might start smoking. So you kinda have to slop it on. Initially it looks a little patchy. The final step is resanding with fine grit and then bathing the entire boat with mineral spirits to clean up the dust.<br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5733210616330351762'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSKKoKfsGmo4-EjxVG5yJCcDHMpn106jZWkf5JGikme1jDWLyTurhgmpgC6scuMDeJYzmglBWqrsdXRGtrgixiXiQXUEtJxsqnArlYt9o5m6WXAjqraH7AV27UDSajZDQmgwCT-LhdpEbp/s288/4.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />I'm pretty satisfied with the work. It felt good smoothing out those scars, giving a beat-up canoe another chapter in life. Now about that interior...<p><br />-30-<br /><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-15836903630041614492012-04-09T18:00:00.001-05:002012-04-09T18:00:11.574-05:00Lure thrown in tree<br /><br /><center><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5729539625457227074'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSnvN96UIyT4Z_uiMDevW9vGVdh8mDfAO7NBWJxY6C8ByZwzug9PHbRadZMs-MAqDX_aYecvQo57mTkKZCOervPdJ97R9owa5N9R_k7WEWhDHAqVo-aJzwhAKgNF3Jama9SE7Ux-YA_19g/s288/0.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='316' style='margin:5px'></a></center><br />Rushing water pushes against my stomach as my feet sink into impossible muck, and I grip with my toes and lean carefully back towards the shoreline, balancing right on the edge, trying to hug the inside corner while remaining upright - and most importantly - perfectly quiet. Reading the banks and the water, always inching forward. At once, I am an animal and invisible.<br /><br />At least that's the idea. <br /><br />This is not <i>A River Runs Through It.</i> This isn't the idealized postcard of troutfishing, it's more of a struggle. I don't even own a fly rod. For the most part, Wisconsin's trout streams are narrow and choked with overhanging branches of all sorts. Just reaching them is a challenge sometimes. People do fly fish but I don't understand how, aside from the country club waters in the driftless. I prefer a more direct approach.<br /><br />As I balance on the steep and squishy bank I see a clear window into a good hiding spot - maybe a foot squared, 25 feet up on the right. I flip the bail on the reel and avoid limbs above and behind me before bombing my Rapala towards the target. And it's not close. Snapping back on the rod tip I narrowly avoid a Lure Thrown In Tree (LTIT), splashing the middle of the deep run and shattering my invisibility. <i>Shit</i>, I mutter to myself. <br /><br />Waist-deep in the stream everything is a balancing act. <br /><br />We score LTITs just like we score Fish Caught and Fish Missed. It's a good way to measure your success and efficiency. And it's fun to give your buddy a hard time when he wraps a lure in the top deck of a tree. <i>Hey, take it easy! You're spooking the fish!</i> But an LTIT isn't so bad. It shows you are pushing yourself. You can catch fish with safe casts, but the difference between an expensive lure in a branch and lure that gets crushed by a hippo brown trout is usually a matter of inches one way or the other. And I hate losing lures, but I keep aiming for impossible windows around every corner.<br /><br />After the first few pools I tune into the wind and my hands calm down. I take one more imperceptible step and the next cast reveals itself. I visualize the path, a side-armed snap, the lure flying six inches above the water, skidding perfectly under the branches and landing an inch from shore. I let go and time slows. My breath jumps and my guts feel an electric jolt, eyes narrow to a perfect focus. Splash. Before I complete one turn of the handle the fish attacks...<br /><br />And then I attack. The trees clear out and there are two animals in the rushing water, taking risks and seeking rewards. <br /><br />-30-<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-16004111717038611812012-03-27T16:54:00.001-05:002012-03-27T16:55:27.906-05:00Driftless<br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5724698225204304578'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGQ7JsRpXYzMrhn6gpsS9NEKe-TagKfB7Ou6FBFIGLa8XpE4gXZKXYNpBVMQ7hWQKClgRFAlDG8KD8Q3fSdJa614GpEAzc2krlx9KlajtHjxc4u4w32QZXDErO4QYUL3QbUBIvO6ceROX1/s288/0.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='237' style='margin:5px'></a><br />It was just too nice out so I grabbed the tent and my fishing gear and sped southwest into The Driftless, that old glacier-free pocket of Wisconsin where valleys outnumber towns. Ryan and his doggie met me in Richland County and we built a big bonfire next to a stream and a weathered rockwall. The coyotes yipped and barked at the crescent moon. We enjoyed some whiskey, and after midnight a dense fog moved in... Tiny twinkling stars of water vapor drifted in front of our headlamps and then - it seemed - through us. The coyotes screamed, closer now. We marveled at all of this. Pretty lucky, we concluded, to be here and now...<br />We spent most of the next day wading up blue ribbon trout streams, beneath scattered clouds and perfect spring lighting. <br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5724698327770953362'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKjJMORXIWhkFi-rGycRKXEKqVSXnDKAyrJ5rI1vKVkp7Dkg0SwhT2ngkfh9DVbaODrNy33kpyKsnjmDICVcPso9R49z2f5Tpiq46Wszf5-niH8ZvA730K2U6fOdPUWnsXgEg7poOpGxMW/s288/2.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />Sometimes the general scenery out there is so stunning that I find myself missing the fine detail, but the fine detail is what makes a perfect moment. I'd catch a gorgeous trout but be so consumed with getting a good picture that I'd never actually look at the living fish. <br />I realized I had not been fully present in the moment. <br />Sometime before noon Ryan put a perfect cast above a deep and menacing root system in the strong middle of a big bend, and we saw a bright flash, and Ryan made a strange noise that told me it was a big fish. The brown trout was 18 inches, his biggest so far. There was no world beyond that bend of rushing spring water, and we burned the fish into memory, and watched it swim away. <br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5724698550896608466'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjse1HNaXiRZWDD0aDkv4TxpckgeJ2Z3hbGAr8DNQMxcjPEvgxs0caRSO2afdZ73tGBsAIYYMCuPaG2cMISNf4vAyFlNi9WaZTWuWScq3oEZtqGPkwJHwcWG77oeGUDONPqCBDhYmvdWZjC/s288/1.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='236' style='margin:5px'></a><br />I was driftless for two days and nothing beyond where I was standing in the stream mattered. I was quieted. I let the fire die down on Sunday night and climbed in my sleeping bag. Something woke me at 5:30 and I saw the fire burning brightly. Strange, I thought. I rubbed my eyes and expected to see a coyote stoking the coals. I went back to sleep. <br />On Monday morning we woke to cold rain so we packed up camp and headed for home, where glaciers had made room for more people, and pretty quickly I began thinking about what I would do tomorrow, and next week. And what was happening elsewhere... And should I make tacos tonight? What about all the things I need to get done in April? ... And what if, what if?<br />-30-<br /><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-57881177024448480732012-03-08T19:29:00.001-06:002012-03-08T22:22:40.300-06:00Snowmelt into the stream<br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5717742671222251954'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjJRJChme-IwUTNIKbKhiYTJWLPnZgEPtQMu53qWY9IH1zAyA2Wlv_L956EaC3ulauhb91ejxlBfRJfaOXvOb7w6dKrpRdZfNB-UuvEKOZOVQ2LXr-qLpjmwHBPjs_SEJcifp__-jJ0Mcd/s288/0.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='237' style='margin:5px'></a><br />It's been a dry winter and the Town of Mecan finally got a reasonable snowfall on Friday, maybe five inches of snowman snow. Deensie showed up right before whiteout conditions set in and we went out ice fishing for the final time of the season... We couldn't see the shore in any direction but I got a pike and Deen got a catfish so we had to celebrate the successful end of a successful campaign. Old-fashioneds all around! And that was the end of our winter.<br />The next morning we got up early for stream trout catch-and-release season opener. Deen's wife Stacey and my buddy Ryan joined us on my favorite stream up north of Puckaway and we stepped into the cold waters from snowy banks. The terrain was a frightening contrast of seasons. Trees heavy with snow drooped their branches into the deep bends, the sky and forest were light and the stream fast and dark. The air warmed and the snow slowly melted from this odd world. Upstream we snuck against gravity and clear current, zipping rapalas into small windows close to cover where montrous browns lay hiding:<br /><i>Here it comes back to me just watch for the quick flashes that flood my eyes with adreneline, wait for the weight and the wiggling beautiful fish... There! There!</i><br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5717744340245238354'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmtKAFbXGgo63opXYanoP1Scts0c3_1wPIRr1-yUH3MIepuIPuxnqUK_j2VdMeVrw8lSzOWCFslB7zc-SNJZsN11tJ5c82_UE_gMVspsgp8Hf5ohxvywQ_UGm0344NoMRoI2MEpzag9P6g/s288/1.jpg' border='0' width='237' height='421' style='margin:5px'></a><br />On Monday it was warmer still and me and Deen came back. The valley was a different place. Most of the snow was gone and the fantastic crisp white was replaced by infinite shades of brown. Even the stream seemed brown, full of the snowmelt and sediments. The trout didn't really mind though. Neither did we. It was good to get off the ice and chuck a lure around again.<br />I was so sore when we got back home, even my toes were shot from squishing through the muck and stumbling over grapefruit rocks, but it was a satisfying sore. In stream wading I had used every muscle on my frame quietly, against quiet resistance, the constant murmur of water rolling downhill. I felt like I feel after yoga in the morning. Tired but light. Like water resisting gravity. Bouncey.<br />How is it that burning fuel creates more energy? What would happen if I performed Warrior 3 in a set of rolling spring rapids? Yoga and trout fishing, two new things in my life, and how did I ever really appreciate springtime before? Awaking from deep sleep? The streams all swell and I stand there, quietly, breathing and watching the snow melt... I adjust my feet and exhale, find my target between two trees dipping into the current, factor in the wind and place my rapala an inch from the undercut bank. My breath catches for a split second before I turn the handle. <br /><i>Flash! There! It all happens so quickly.</i><br /><a href='https://picasaweb.google.com/117351896356038095322/AdamMellaAdventurer?authkey=Gv1sRgCLHs1JuQhaCkrwE#5717745775779129522'><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBZP16vaKzYapxvMz5wOgCu1EasgwahpVJN2cIHPBhIyaffzrvaP-4l5QtFyr0KDPE2oSIJqXmDM-iVUeEcpt9qq8TpFMEBmEPWSMyyBEKDv7BepkdH3YQBjY06PhadpN5QoHoUpHUnrxd/s288/2.jpg' border='0' width='421' height='237' style='margin:5px'></a><br />I can't blame the trout for feasting... If a lure were to land close to my cover I would snap hungrily, too. That is what we do.<br />-30-<br /><br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-29744536119926070892012-02-14T16:31:00.001-06:002012-02-15T12:39:28.329-06:00Cold North Dakota Hot<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-SYvjz1C8W-iefkUZ1g8Fu9aaf3d37RqFfrMjoVjKWRjHVLMcx2yPcGVFe_Gmqk5nBZ4gFfwQGf8VE-gKwPEuqa_w0PD1m_Z48x6PEshH1LMfOgFb-0aoOeLJugx3ADiAB2rjq4rM1CCR/s1600/dl6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-SYvjz1C8W-iefkUZ1g8Fu9aaf3d37RqFfrMjoVjKWRjHVLMcx2yPcGVFe_Gmqk5nBZ4gFfwQGf8VE-gKwPEuqa_w0PD1m_Z48x6PEshH1LMfOgFb-0aoOeLJugx3ADiAB2rjq4rM1CCR/s400/dl6.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
My good friends Tyler and Mary have been living in North Dakota for several years now and I had been planning on visiting them via the Amtrak 'Perch Express' the entire time. And the Winter of 2012 allowed me the opportunity to follow through on that, so I did. On February 8 I boarded the Empire Builder in Tomah, and after twelve hours of drinking smuggled wine and reading and a quick nap, I arrived in Devils Lake, North Dakota. Ty was waiting for me in the pre-dawn darkness, truck idling. The Prairie. I was wide awake and hungry.<br />
<br />
We went out for breakfast, where I got the 'Cedar Sausage Breakfast' (which is one big sausage the size of a large brat, <i>delicious</i>, dippy eggs and potatoes, coffee and toast) - a good start to the trip. "This whole part of town is below the lake," Ty said as we drove to get bait, pointing out the 'lake level' markers on the street light poles, 12 to 15 feet off the ground. <i>Huh</i>. Devils Lake is filling up like a clogged bathtub, and when the water reaches the edge, they simply build a new levy and move the shoreline back. They can't let out as much as they are taking in, otherwise Fargo would flood downstream. So the shoreline of this lake is very odd... Roads just disappear into the lake... Old farms are now surrounded by ice and fishermen. Sunken timber from the old shoreline is found throughout the lake. This is all happening on a super-massive scale. Devils Lake is already well over 100,000 acres and it's growing every year, and from what Ty tells me, they don't really have a long-term plan. I was unsettled by this, just as I was unsettled to see lakes six feet below usual levels up north of Ely in October. On the one hand, I like things that cannot be tamed, but I don't like seeing big trees and street signs sticking out of the ice and I don't like seeing rocks exposed that have been submerged for centuries. For as much as I enjoy fishing and exploring waterways, I guess I'm uneasy about depths in the same way I am about gravity. <br />
<br />
We had three full days of fishing until my return train's scheduled departure, and the first morning served up the best weather of the trip. The temperatures were mild by North Dakota February standards, and the wind was calm. But an hour after setting up camp the wind howled and the clouds moved in... some flurries appeared... the thermometer dropped into the single digits and exposed fingers quickly froze solid. Days two and three were sunny, but ultimately, even colder. Both of my big trips out of state this winter have reminded me what a real winter should feel like and I believe there is something inherently good in confronting frostbite. <br />
<br />
I expected North Dakota to be more desolate, flatter, but in many ways it reminded me of large portions of Wisconsin - big snow-dusted fields rowed with scrub trees covered with the subtle pink light of winter, the deer are like our deer, the people, too. Other than the wind-chill and the insane size of the lake, the other main differences in the fishing is you get four lines per person, which is the most I've found. However, they don't allow any big live bait. If you want something bigger than a fathead, you must deploy deadbait, and in this role we cast Blue Herring from Puget Sound. This required some tweaks in rigs and strategy, but overall the pike seemed happy with our offerings. Also, the lake's food chain is all built around these tiny freshwater shrimp, which is why the famous Devils Lake perch get so fat. Which is also why the pike get so monstrous. Most tourist fishermen who visit Los Diablos (as I was calling it for some reason) chase these 'jumbo perch' but it's no secret I am only interested in the biggest fish in the lake so we basically set out as many big blue herring as possible the entire weekend, with one rod dedicated to jigging in the shanty.<br />
<br />
Day two was pretty slow fishing and we only managed one fish iced with a few more nice pike lost to underwater snags (likely timber). Ty had something gigantic on that ran into some sort of tangle-den, so even the slow day had exciting moments. The first and third days, on the other hand, were simply excellent. We had lots of action despite the cold and the fish were all fat and healthy. Around noon on Saturday I was jigging a minnow head on a spoon and I caught a decent pike, the first one I ever caught jigging, and I screamed the entire time I was reeling it up (I usually don't have the patience for this tactic). <br />
<br />
The highlight of the trip happened at the end of the first day, when we each caught our best fish of the year within a five minute window. Both pike were truly trophy fish, but the way we caught them made this a truly memorable five minutes. We had one hole that had already caught a few fish, and about a half hour after I caught a nice 30-incher nearby, that 'hot hole' went up and Ty caught a 35-incher with something huge in it's gut. As that fish was pulled on the ice, the line snapped, so after getting a picture and releasing the giant, we grabbed a nearby tip-up and stuck that in the hot hole. I started de-icing some other traps, but only minutes later I turned around and <i>the hot hole was up again</i>. I ran over and suddenly the entire trap jumped sideways in the hole. I knew that meant the line was snagged on the trap somehow, so I just grabbed the line and the fight was on. I had no way to give the fish more line so I basically had ten feet of line between my frozen hand and an angry, beast pike. Luckily the rig held and I caught my best fish of the winter - a ridiculous 37-incher. We couldn't believe what had just happened <i>and I still can't</i>... I've gone entire winters without a 35-inch fish, so to see one that big and an even bigger fish caught from the same hole within five minutes was simply mind-boggling.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM4z9lxXJf_iDvgJc_MxD-Vo5XZfnYS1wqKpqNwSIVpr2mbfhWfu2u0dFUd3mVKFv8uMzxnzVdyf0r58-wwBUsXnrQfHjeSG-llXu2YRGL6pzmVGOvhFFEyOzRJPKEtYHFDCVtZ5jHrMNL/s1600/dl3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM4z9lxXJf_iDvgJc_MxD-Vo5XZfnYS1wqKpqNwSIVpr2mbfhWfu2u0dFUd3mVKFv8uMzxnzVdyf0r58-wwBUsXnrQfHjeSG-llXu2YRGL6pzmVGOvhFFEyOzRJPKEtYHFDCVtZ5jHrMNL/s400/dl3.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCIOj1symPXSVWeTuXnQpuMj4SDvvOtPKKSpvGwqAp4wecfz-y-C59GyZlEZC3vGBRlILMM1Qk6a9XjF4XFYF_PG6PPBWLqx8EE8fE_4r3Gwy5fgaOwVAR7gsKpABVrvBLezUR0vusx1Bp/s1600/dl4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCIOj1symPXSVWeTuXnQpuMj4SDvvOtPKKSpvGwqAp4wecfz-y-C59GyZlEZC3vGBRlILMM1Qk6a9XjF4XFYF_PG6PPBWLqx8EE8fE_4r3Gwy5fgaOwVAR7gsKpABVrvBLezUR0vusx1Bp/s400/dl4.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">So we fished during the day and at night we celebrated and I caught up with Ty and Mary and their cats and new dog, and it was a very good visit. I said how glad I was to have visited finally, and they agreed. I said how relieved I was that I didn't have to drive back. Too often, the looming drive back home seeps into the end of a visit... That thought takes time away from enjoying the company of friends you don't see enough, and without that thought lingering we just laughed right up 'til the end. And on Saturday night they drove me to the station and I hopped back on the Empire Builder... I think I said '<i>Au revoir</i>' and did a dramatic wave before hopping aboard, or maybe I imagined I did. I finished whatever wine was left in my nalgene and watched the speckled lights of farms floating by on black waves. No stress. Bliss. When I awoke the sun was up and the Mississippi was wobbling by the big window to my left, bluffs of the driftless towering up beyond the windows on the right. It looked warm out again and the thought of spring trout streams tickled my neck. <i>Did that all just really happen?</i> My camera battery was dead. We crossed back into Wisconsin and then I was home and I slept for a long time.<br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">-30-<br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>You can view more pictures and the official stats from the trip in my <a href="http://www.wildalmanac.com/logbook.php?id=38">Wild Almanac logbook</a>.</i></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-34581737450744617042012-02-07T23:48:00.001-06:002012-02-07T23:55:31.688-06:00Urban Waters<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGfMTU8tk0ZLt_-jLRObHiRrHjOx1r2h2qbAogvIZ3ezmKib7Hwa-TsEXDlwAT3N5NOOG89zplmqEEhhAoews4DTeYREMsapKRdqaIM96j-F8LD4_iI79aIyU4uul8G9p-7crjWm5UWov6/s1600/CMPike.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGfMTU8tk0ZLt_-jLRObHiRrHjOx1r2h2qbAogvIZ3ezmKib7Hwa-TsEXDlwAT3N5NOOG89zplmqEEhhAoews4DTeYREMsapKRdqaIM96j-F8LD4_iI79aIyU4uul8G9p-7crjWm5UWov6/s400/CMPike.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Probably no, I'll never escape the gravity of the city. Some days I feel like it's the only place with light and some days it's a black hole, from which no light escapes. What am I doing out here? What am I doing in there?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Weightlessly I orbit, and once again I was pulled back into Madison on Friday night. I saw some old buddies, we had some drinks and went out dancing. It was electric. My buddies in the band had people over after the show and then the sun was up. The darnedest thing. I had come down here for some ice fishing on my former home waters, but how can you go to bed when you finally get in a room with your old bowling team and a barrel of beer? </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">So we got a few hours of sleep and then we got some breakfast, and then we made our way through the traffic to the lake. And somehow the spot off the American flag was open, so we set our traps on the premium coordinates and got used to fishing with each other again. There I was, surrounded by houses and noise and incoming commercial air traffic with Fritz and Cheeto. There was no wind. It was maybe the finest February ice fishing weather I've ever experienced. Last year we had three good chances at a really big fish on this spot, and that's why we had come back here, and then at 4 the closest flag jumped, and Fritz caught the fish above. It was as if a long-term plan had finally been realized. We whooped it up and probably worried some of the neighbors. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Before dark Cheeto caught another pike, and then a third flag popped and it was my turn...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">And I busted the pike badly, and I could tell right away it was not big, but was excited to get one on the ice anyways. I felt the fish running around the beam of light... fighting against the light... or maybe against the gravity of my pull... This was natural. It was how it always was.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">I pulled the pike through the hole and looked it in the eye. <i>Now you and I are the same on these urban waters, you poor wild one.</i> Of course the fish was wounded. There was some sort of infection, something hurtful that had never healed properly. </span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitEqKeH2ZdHVkiOM4GBUao1lRsMhek44FDhF_ToBzVLihliAWOnbra0qtxI2-Bjd1RRM69qN99XjRXSqIkuzuJnU85zHAbz58regJwBvDDR35xzLeKLqsnZTn6frkKRuPRf8bVcq3QU2RC/s1600/Wounded.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitEqKeH2ZdHVkiOM4GBUao1lRsMhek44FDhF_ToBzVLihliAWOnbra0qtxI2-Bjd1RRM69qN99XjRXSqIkuzuJnU85zHAbz58regJwBvDDR35xzLeKLqsnZTn6frkKRuPRf8bVcq3QU2RC/s400/Wounded.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">And I was disgusted by this, but why should I be? Weren't we both still following our instincts despite it all? I put the poor boy back into the lake, and we both weightlessly set back into orbit around these bright lights. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">-30-</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-33950663442485497122012-01-30T15:43:00.001-06:002012-01-30T15:44:12.784-06:00A good day for Brussels sprouts<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCS2GrqbHnODKina1eB2w11kTG5UbFdiYeoqQlwShj-Sm79KEJr4-fCVPbCQAXEYl2RXFLVByRHuJyLK6LfrX-ZItWQaU88kDxaaQi2yHLZSBfXmiR-ATb9PoezXTcySrWUlgw6lCnuceQ/s1600/b1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCS2GrqbHnODKina1eB2w11kTG5UbFdiYeoqQlwShj-Sm79KEJr4-fCVPbCQAXEYl2RXFLVByRHuJyLK6LfrX-ZItWQaU88kDxaaQi2yHLZSBfXmiR-ATb9PoezXTcySrWUlgw6lCnuceQ/s400/b1.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">After a long weekend up north the thought of any beer or meat or cheese was extremely unappealing. The fridge was close to empty so I paid a visit to my friendly grocer this morning, and was surprised to find some Wisconsin-grown "chop chop bok choy" and these Brussels sprouts. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Haven't eaten Brussels sprouts in years, but for some reason they looked really tasty, so I put them in the cart. I had nothing in mind but figured I could find a use for them. When I got back home I jumped online and found a recipe for <a href="http://smittenkitchen.com/2011/11/dijon-braised-brussels-sprouts/">dijon-braised Brussels sprouts</a> that I had bookmarked a while back. I was excited until I realized my kitchen didn't have half the ingredients (who drank all my white wine!?!). </span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisdQvWd8PiBrIQwYSZDZqld0DPwfNOcYkkhTa8CLDFGz6C7Jtf3oCI31w8tLWYKureAshmW7Fj1_Wxdn6dV6tiL2l274anJqNObOJCMUgnYUK-3rcYvv2o9H0s-3EUN8TNWA0XIZeyIr1w/s1600/b2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisdQvWd8PiBrIQwYSZDZqld0DPwfNOcYkkhTa8CLDFGz6C7Jtf3oCI31w8tLWYKureAshmW7Fj1_Wxdn6dV6tiL2l274anJqNObOJCMUgnYUK-3rcYvv2o9H0s-3EUN8TNWA0XIZeyIr1w/s400/b2.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">It mattered not. I <i>had </i>to have Brussels sprouts for lunch. Now. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">So I improvised. Halved and sauteed the sprouts in butter, then added chicken broth, salt and pepper to taste, and some green onions. After letting that simmer for ten minutes I realized I didn't even have Dijon mustard! Drat! But there was no turning back now so I added some <a href="http://zups.com/products-page/customer-favorites/mustard-hot/">Zups Hot Mustard</a> (which goes well with anything) and completed the dish. It was really good. I always remembered Brussels sprouts being terribly bitter but these were rich and sweet. </span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Total cooking/prep time: 22 minutes.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">-30-</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-55846937670315281972012-01-23T22:57:00.000-06:002012-01-23T22:57:43.992-06:00Bed of Thunderstorms<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUpRocjS36RHrsZYztoHYaNrxA1UEu1_6dffXor62SfALxh7tcdROrtdcrBJPJAjnmcmc7P5fgJoiHB5OARrL_E-RaZC1YSq4IVbShfnBnMdw2bFsZL7OgKS8UUB5aGHYkXs-O6VnlNdf3/s1600/D4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUpRocjS36RHrsZYztoHYaNrxA1UEu1_6dffXor62SfALxh7tcdROrtdcrBJPJAjnmcmc7P5fgJoiHB5OARrL_E-RaZC1YSq4IVbShfnBnMdw2bFsZL7OgKS8UUB5aGHYkXs-O6VnlNdf3/s640/D4.jpg" width="360" /></a></div>Winter camping has a way of turning the natural world upside-down. This has been something on my to-do list for a long, long time, and I finally had the chance to give it a try last week, returning to the park I spent seven months of 2011 exploring. And this was a good excuse to visit my good friends Erik and Tori, who are lucky enough to have each other and an off-grid cabin in the northcountry complete with a wood-burning sauna.<br />
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And what better way to see the Boundary Waters in winter than by dog-sled?<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrh3svknWjrMpNFqdiC2l32IJYuu4Jn-NWGaxyaC92Sc9wbl_5zTgu2Hz8yieVezKCqQ74IeceQYftJPzltsCnzpGLY7Tt0CS0GEP5B3jzBTaXBERBjZAe7T26Mtb2BA0dNFXH5henrq7k/s1600/D2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrh3svknWjrMpNFqdiC2l32IJYuu4Jn-NWGaxyaC92Sc9wbl_5zTgu2Hz8yieVezKCqQ74IeceQYftJPzltsCnzpGLY7Tt0CS0GEP5B3jzBTaXBERBjZAe7T26Mtb2BA0dNFXH5henrq7k/s400/D2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>The reason Erik gets to stay up north year-round is he works as a dog-sledding guide in the winter months, and so we followed up <a href="http://www.adammella.com/2011/11/wildfire-at-mcniece-lake.html">a perfect fall trip into The Quetico</a> with a two-night winter trip up to Knife and Ottertrack Lakes on the border-route. Myself, Erik and Tori were joined by fellow adventurers Ed and Nick, out of Duluth, and so five sleds and twenty-five doggies set out into the Park on Tuesday morning over a crisp two-inches of snow. My team, pictured above, featured a crazed yearling named Proby (top), lead dog Possum, Xena, Brillo and Cash.<br />
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Everyone else in the group had already run dogs before and as we harnessed and hooked up the teams, the lake access became a scene of organized chaos. I wasn't sure what to expect. I was definitely a bit intimidated, but was told Possum would follow the track automatically, and that I should use the brake as needed through portages, and then suddenly all sleds were cut loose and we were off into the frozen wild. In the moments before we turned the dogs loose they were all going crazy and yipping and howling and barking, but once the sleds were set free it was business time and the quieted huskies happily began churning out miles and miles of pristine borderlands. The cold froze in my beard and stung my face but the dogs simply loved it. You could tell. They ran with purpose. This was a paradise.<br />
<br />
A twenty-mile day by canoe is a strong effort, but we quickly gobbled up nearly that much distance in just a few hours, and I only crashed my sled once along the way (but I didn't let go). We quickly found a wind-protected bay on Knife Lake and got the dogs all settled in and fed (frozen mink - yum!). Then we got to setting up camp and collecting a huge pile of wood, and finally Ed and I peppered the bay with traps. Although we didn't spend much time fishing we did pretty well during the trip, each catching a nice Lake Trout.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivIS2x_OqLtWB331w1qof2MFr6K6uL7njQQqO2GZmGF9MgO_Qsmg2bvwhmEy0ljFWzGLe5hpE7WAoLqHuVDSvr5knJZGNnrsSjtLhk5mzC-pKk_q0vkNl0iMhO6Je7XExkUtAmRDegGYFp/s1600/D7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivIS2x_OqLtWB331w1qof2MFr6K6uL7njQQqO2GZmGF9MgO_Qsmg2bvwhmEy0ljFWzGLe5hpE7WAoLqHuVDSvr5knJZGNnrsSjtLhk5mzC-pKk_q0vkNl0iMhO6Je7XExkUtAmRDegGYFp/s640/D7.jpg" width="360" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhopyzGbQS5RPLB8Z5Aqh42cpOob40RmIuVNH2NPoWL6-g-3AStJGPA6aOXrK3gzR-foYTIJCiDs4Bwjv7MUqyXUvf9F3hv_ZStL2GkCPnEigGD56YClNBv8nqUoteg4CC7Alb5uwMoH6Er/s1600/D3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhopyzGbQS5RPLB8Z5Aqh42cpOob40RmIuVNH2NPoWL6-g-3AStJGPA6aOXrK3gzR-foYTIJCiDs4Bwjv7MUqyXUvf9F3hv_ZStL2GkCPnEigGD56YClNBv8nqUoteg4CC7Alb5uwMoH6Er/s640/D3.jpg" width="360" /></a></div>There is really no way to prepare yourself for spending three days in sub-zero temperatures without the benefit of permanent shelter. It's one thing to travel through The Quetico when it's around the freezing mark at night... quite another to travel through the northcountry when it's <i>well </i>below freezing the entire time. No matter how big a bonfire you build, things simply freeze and never thaw. Putting your contact lenses in upon waking becomes a hazard, assuming your contacts are not frozen solid. And although we had a big tent with a wood-stove, I was determined to earn my 'sleeping on the frozen lake' badge. I had my 15F bag stuffed inside a -60F bag, and the first night was very comfortable sleeping beneath the stars. The second night the lows dipped to 30-below and it was colder than that with the wind-chill. Weather radio warned against exposure... keep your pets inside, it cautioned, as our dogs slept on the snow nearby. The clouds and flurries of the day broke around midnight and as the stars twinkled above the lake really started to sing, seismic molecules whistling like whales from the deep.<br />
<br />
As I snuggled into my sleeping bags, the ice shuddered and boomed, and I could not sleep on this bed of thunderstorms. Like everything with winter camping, the world was askew... the storm on the horizon was beneath us, and the only calm in the Milky Way overhead, vivid and steady.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzkYKAlgIEVZnkphUDDB9Man8ks4QJ6MfO3umDg4nWcjfhNuvwWGoEyIQfpTHOkCE-nOZrcsK1MDhmQDqv1JTgcsC4KgtlcbnKv7hl4o7MOHyCBR6clioyIWpNuFaPvFh_0GsGMTqi-fZR/s1600/D8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzkYKAlgIEVZnkphUDDB9Man8ks4QJ6MfO3umDg4nWcjfhNuvwWGoEyIQfpTHOkCE-nOZrcsK1MDhmQDqv1JTgcsC4KgtlcbnKv7hl4o7MOHyCBR6clioyIWpNuFaPvFh_0GsGMTqi-fZR/s400/D8.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>In the morning we pointed the dogs west and our faces were burned by the wind. Like every trip to the northcountry it was over too soon. And you would think there would be comfort in a heated cabin, in a huge cheeseburger and good beers, in a sauna so hot it made breathing difficult... but there is nothing in life like the power of a thunderstorm, real or imagined. Already, I miss this frozen bed, and how I got there.<br />
<br />
-30-<br />
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<i>For more information on dogsledding in the BWCA, visit <a href="http://www.whitewilderness.com/">White Wilderness</a>.</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-65131185185375224502012-01-11T20:55:00.000-06:002012-01-11T20:55:45.464-06:00The old-fashioned box trap<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwqHTY9G8W9dNLyQPouIsaL17m3rStrXh16XZ93796K311rkxFEsTPsCidMOhbvRzJOX2g-sVkwfmRQAh4hEpfPwVEDvRj0uH69-EvoCLhaoVLd8uMeydn3rkdIVuVZWHnDgMp1JRfaaDg/s1600/am1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwqHTY9G8W9dNLyQPouIsaL17m3rStrXh16XZ93796K311rkxFEsTPsCidMOhbvRzJOX2g-sVkwfmRQAh4hEpfPwVEDvRj0uH69-EvoCLhaoVLd8uMeydn3rkdIVuVZWHnDgMp1JRfaaDg/s400/am1.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSbUdvIQvf4_nam8uIeRgPtRvKg2lkHDrvy71y_oO1WXNxrkP-GIhgJZfMPOqXbY1AnjnTjy2cy4NlCR91-Oaor73K2r3-gKdWy0jR_cScS76gQMgMJISjoSrgC4Y_FOYMy2E6nK5TA6L6/s1600/T1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSbUdvIQvf4_nam8uIeRgPtRvKg2lkHDrvy71y_oO1WXNxrkP-GIhgJZfMPOqXbY1AnjnTjy2cy4NlCR91-Oaor73K2r3-gKdWy0jR_cScS76gQMgMJISjoSrgC4Y_FOYMy2E6nK5TA6L6/s400/T1.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">Something doesn't belong here...</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I easily obsess. Ice fishing became much more than a hobby, for me, a long time ago. And let's call it what it is: Out there on the frozen lake, we are trapping wild beasts. I realize it's an odd way to spend so much time. The spread is this machine from my mind... It is a creative outlet... I construct from frozen water, this pattern... I feed it small fish and it brings me big fish, and I take their picture. I am very particular about my machine, but it is always organic, derived from the day, and so I never have complete control over it's design. I only want the best for my spread, so I take good care of my traps, the mechanisms of this device. Probably, I'd be better off directing that attention towards more important things, but will I ever? I wonder. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I have more traps than I need, but it's good to have a deep tool-box. And they all pretty much look the same and work the same way, when you get down to the moving pieces, and then there's this box trap I got my hands on. My buddy Tim stopped by for the weekend and he brought this old-fashioned gizmo from the roaring twenties. This old relic is the kind of trap my Grandpa Walter would have used back in the day. It's a beast of a contraption and awkward to use, and there's a reason they don't make them like that anymore, but Tim quickly explained that it did one job better than anything I was currently using.</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtQ1H5lgMQJsDuV7tQX3eJLCp65TW8_KDW2oK4ONaQ51Nm4rCNoehyqnTwC-8HhTXNMD8tKZ-SjJdcJAsUDtiYzLs3bGYgb0QdRqmHU60Ah_LzXypjdUeMFiRC1uWGGl8QKtp8ZhRtdMlz/s1600/am2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtQ1H5lgMQJsDuV7tQX3eJLCp65TW8_KDW2oK4ONaQ51Nm4rCNoehyqnTwC-8HhTXNMD8tKZ-SjJdcJAsUDtiYzLs3bGYgb0QdRqmHU60Ah_LzXypjdUeMFiRC1uWGGl8QKtp8ZhRtdMlz/s400/am2.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">The old-fashioned box trap, Tim noted, is perfect for running monster bait. The reason is the box keeps the hole from freezing up so often, which allows you to use a huge bobber to keep the monster bait under control.</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVqU1tsiBj2-pwZWhPecOg4i2eBamqQpv_SBh32wq9pSbvFT65QQghls0zVwNUQcV77Ljv4E6l680dPy_dUZtckNW60xpo42ePj5XmET5iG9HuUFIVpUd5NlCjXSKaoA8ozlaEhuquyRpV/s1600/am3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVqU1tsiBj2-pwZWhPecOg4i2eBamqQpv_SBh32wq9pSbvFT65QQghls0zVwNUQcV77Ljv4E6l680dPy_dUZtckNW60xpo42ePj5XmET5iG9HuUFIVpUd5NlCjXSKaoA8ozlaEhuquyRpV/s400/am3.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">Our foot-long friend Glen, pictured here, is such a bait. As I said before, when I put little fish into the machine, it produces big fish... So what happens when you put big fish into the machine? Aha! <i>A-HAA!</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Well at least that's the idea. Tim agreed to loan me the box trap and two jumbo suckers, Glen and Gary, since I live on the lake where the <a href="http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/eek/critter/fish/pike.htm">Wisconsin State Record Northern Pike</a> was caught and this type of monstrous presentation seems appropriate for the setting. Nothing has happened yet, but I know this strategy requires great patience. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">And I am willing to be patient to get what I want... So I spend days and days sitting out there trapping, seeing, waiting for the biggest fish in the lake to wander by and think, <i>Oh my, Mister Glen, you Handsome Devil... Why, I bet you are quite delicious! </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">And I watch the other folks out there fishing with worms and catching little perch, smaller than our friend Glen, and I can't understand why there are people who don't want the biggest fish in the lake as badly as I do, and I wonder what kind of machine I am to think that way? Am I an old-fashioned box trap in this world? Do I not belong?</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">-30-</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-48766396611572071362012-01-04T22:56:00.001-06:002012-01-04T22:58:16.673-06:00Riding the Pine Highway: On proper tip up etiquette and procedure<div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvMkwDm0W_qA1vPYDX1W6mQ-FoxtHhTPQBqhpiD16kB_hmMCWJcP96HxxnfKi-2nsWM_oNuEBJdT8Jn5IXhuufXFoA8gapQvrtQMZFVtnIK0B2nUp-ghdMDiVGo4KbR993jvv2HTIRVvdg/s1600/P88.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvMkwDm0W_qA1vPYDX1W6mQ-FoxtHhTPQBqhpiD16kB_hmMCWJcP96HxxnfKi-2nsWM_oNuEBJdT8Jn5IXhuufXFoA8gapQvrtQMZFVtnIK0B2nUp-ghdMDiVGo4KbR993jvv2HTIRVvdg/s400/P88.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Everyone calls the moment differently...</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">It all depends on the situation, of course. Who you are with. Where you are fishing. How long it's been since a fish has been caught, and a multitude of other factors. The classic is calling it by name: <i>"Tip-Upppp!"</i> I use that out of habit nine out of ten times. Sometimes I just yell "Flag!" Other calls I've used include "Yep" and "There it is!" Occasionally I'll just start running towards a struck trap with swift silence. The key is not the words or actions used but the tone. When your trap has been hit you must convey the excitement of the moment in your call... You must let your fellow anglers know - instantly - that the time for action has arrived. A big rule we have on the ice is "No Running or Yelling!" There are exceptions, like if we are playing football... But excitable actions like running or yelling are primarily reserved for the big moment we are all seeking out there on frozen lakes.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">I would say there is a sort of honor in getting to make the call... Of course you have to be the first to see the flag to sound the alarm, and so over the years I have developed a 'constant scan' when I am on the ice with bait in the water. I do this automatically, like breathing. I program the spread into my internal GPS and then I spend the hours looking for the slight change in picture that tells me the moment is here. It's not that I'm looking for the risen flag, so much as I'm looking for the motion or ... or what is out of place here. The sensation of that realization is one of my most alluring addictions, and I'm not ashamed to admit such foolishness. I take pride is editing the spread, on noticing, on sensing the attack. It's one thing to land a fish using a fishing rod and nets, but quite another when the line is in your hand, when the net is literally your hand... and so every second is crucial for success. </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Watching your traps is just one part of the big picture, out there. Unless you are in the right spot at the right time, with your traps set at proper depths with the perfect bait, you are already of-pace. It takes many correct decisions just to get that bite, and even then nothing is guaranteed. </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">The complexities of ice fishing dynamics could fill a book but there is no substitute for actual trapping experience. You really must know the thoughts of your fellow anglers, and this can only be achieved through many days and nights on frozen waters. I have a telepathic connection with my main crew of ice fishing buddies - Chinwhisker Charlie, The Warden, Silly Deen,Wolfspotter and Slowhand Lucious - but we only share that bond because of the systems we have perfected through the years. And I would say the system allowed us to more quickly form the bonds that join our thoughts on the trap-line.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">(Another fun part of ice fishing culture is the selection of a fun 'ice fishing character' that is tuned for precision setup and flag-watching and hand-to-hand combat with massive cold-blooded fishes ... mine is Ike Walter).</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">We call our system "Riding the Pine Highway." The origins of this peculiar name are unimportant... It was coined after a day of drinking beer in sub-zero temperatures and it is fun to say. So it stuck. What that phrase means is the subject of tonight's post.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">You could say the Pine Highway is a philosophy... But I guess it's more an extension of the laws of nature. At the heart of this system is this truth: <i>You will be judged by your peers</i>. Each angler is responsible for his or her own traps (or 'rigs'), and when it is your turn on the Highway and the moment arrives, your form and results carry weight. There is pressure to do well, but what the system really requires is that you are honest in assessing your effort once the moment has passed.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Pine Highway is a communal system designed to give each angler the best chance at catching a fish. When I first started ice fishing each guy would bring his own rigs and it was kind of an 'everyone for themselves' deal. If you were new to the sport and didn't know what you were doing, you learned by watching... The Highway is more of an apprenticeship, it offers a sense of teamsmanship in the cold wind. I am sure we are not the only ones that use this sort of approach, but I don't think it's the norm. Essentially, when we are using the Highway, each angler will put his or her best three traps into the collective trap-line (you are allowed three lines in Wisconsin, at least). So say four of us are fishing. Normally you would have your three traps and if you happened to pick an unlucky location, then that was your problem. But with the Pine Highway, all twelve of those traps are now in play. We use a 'shotgun start' method, so that if you have a good rig with a good bait in the right spot, and it goes up first, then you get to take that flag. Eventually a 'lineup' is created through this process and then the sharing begins.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Riding the Pine Highway indicates that you are 'up to bat' ... that all of the group's traps are now yours. So instead of fishing with three traps you are now using all 12 ... or all 21 ... or all 30. Whenever that next flag pops it is yours to take. Doing this ensures everyone gets some action and usually everyone ends up with a fish at the end of the day. At this point I am always hoping I catch a big one, but if Chinwhisker catches a monster then I consider the day a huge success. And if I have a fish on the board, then I am always hoping my buddies get the next one. So I guess I'm a Bolshevik. </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">The key 'moment within the moment' comes when you are on the Highway and a trap springs... Hopefully you catch a fish, but often there is no fish to catch. Sometimes they hit the minnow and drop it before you can reach the line. Sometimes the minnow is a rascal and the flag is false. The brilliance of the Pine Highway system is giving the 'rider' the power to 'make the call.' Was it really a fish or not? If not, you are still on the highway, but remember, <i>you will be judged by your peers</i>! Even if you end up getting two 'falsies' in a row it is usually time to jump off the highway, making way for the next in line. There are only so many flags to go around on most days, and so, you don't want to be greedy with your opportunities. On good days we might go through the lineup three times fully. Sometimes it's your day and sometimes it's not. This is the nature of trapping.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">While I enjoy the basic philosophy and real-world application of the Pine Highway, it is not a perfect system. Like communism, it fails on a larger scale. The more people in the system, the more impracticle it becomes. Once you have six or seven people on the highway, it is likely the people in positions six or seven won't get an opportunity unless you are on a high-action lake. So there are still cases where 'every angler for him- or herself' is the best option. But, in groups of 2-6, the Pine Highway is an ideal method for giving everyone the best chance for success, and that is why we have enjoyed utilizing the system whenever possible.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">-30-</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-36038507924769082832011-12-21T19:55:00.001-06:002011-12-21T23:44:12.395-06:00Solstice Pike<div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Author's note: This is the second part of my 'rare solstice' series. Part one was <a href="http://www.adammella.com/2011/06/solstice-wolf.html">Solstice Wolf</a> (June). -am</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_0ZqeenEhJaZEDlKu5vq-bd4aCKC1OnbEslRUV1oo0PQbnqqffbrk9AMOeDIzBYbuLIMJulW7dFXYXOanIIkv22A5uJaaiC73q4XGKHmJVOKiZauHIRYg4bbl6QbiGORaEYqxNLkleQkM/s1600/Pikey.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_0ZqeenEhJaZEDlKu5vq-bd4aCKC1OnbEslRUV1oo0PQbnqqffbrk9AMOeDIzBYbuLIMJulW7dFXYXOanIIkv22A5uJaaiC73q4XGKHmJVOKiZauHIRYg4bbl6QbiGORaEYqxNLkleQkM/s400/Pikey.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">This is not a rare fish, but a rare result when you know the whole story. I have been fishing Lake Puckaway for seven winters now, dedicating numerous days each 'early ice' to this massive lake me and the boys half-jokingly refer to as "big, shallow and evil."</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">December of 2006 was really good fishing, and December of 2008 was some of the best ice fishing I've ever experienced. But in 2007, '09, and '10 we didn't catch squat. December on Puckaway is an unquestionable indicator. When you catch fish in December you will catch them all winter, it seems, and when you don't, you might as well not fish there until summertime. This evil lake has a definite 'switch' in the winter... it is manic-depressive... feast or famine. And it is most definitely evil. </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">I will not go into the official file, but there is ample evidence as to this lake's evilness. We are all convinced the waters and surrounding land are possessed by an entity we simply call 'The Father'. Nothing comes easy here. And you might ask, <i>Well why don't you go fish somewhere else?</i> This is a reasonable question. However, the state record northern pike was caught here, and whenever we are able to overcome the The Father's sinister defenses, we have earned amazing rewards. Not state records, but we've caught the kind of fish here that make you keep coming back even after two straight winters of catching absolutely nothing. We are not chasing reason, but something more like unlimited potential at great risk.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Since I've been living here I've been keeping my eyes open for omens: <i>Would it be a good winter or a bad winter?</i> It seemed every other day I would swing the other way. Things would be going really good for me, I would be feeling an electricity, and then the next I would be feeling gloomy and questioning why I had even moved here.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">And then there is the squirrels and the cat. </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">There are hardly any regular gray squirrels here. There are lots of black squirrels and albino squirrels. I see them all the time. It's somewhat disturbing but mostly I laugh. It seems when I see a black squirrel on my morning jog the day is depressing and when I see an albino I have a really great day. If I see my turkeys and deer it will be a so-so day. And any day I see the black cat I might as well just not go outside. I think I am becoming like the lake, living here full-time... I am developing a polarizing switch of sorts. I like it here and often thrive on the solitude, but it is really lonely sometimes and I become suffocated by the emptiness of this existence. Especially when I can't fish, when I am stuck inside with my ... thinking. So now I guess I'm predicting my life on some kind of self-fulfilling 'critter sighting' scale. It works for me.</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">I awoke on the shortest day of the year and just knew I was gonna see that cat on the porch again. Finally I got up and made some coffee and I knew I couldn't sit inside again, so I got my gear together and went outside. And right away I saw the albino squirrel. <i>Hey buddy!</i> He ran off. Then I got to the lake and somehow it had added a few inches of ice overnight even though it barely got below freezing. I decided to go out by myself, and I eventually found myself on Jerry's Reef, or close enough I figured. As described in the previous post, the ice had formed and then broke up and melted, and then refroze earlier this week. The result was strange fields of heave ice, where huge blocks of original ice had been caught in the secondary shell. It was the thickest ice out there, much safer than the smooth stuff, so I put my traps amongst the heaves and got some reading done (<i>Hell's Angels</i>). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW9FGPvI5zF0wrZn9oghX0XhgSm06fBlV0xcDYa5erHFxhpdzqNAo9rZ9Pz1nkEhRHsRrTt-FtxkZYKWar3F0SYxGGw_YlJ-rUSBtGbi4Xw5fddv3UNIF-VxuXYRFOCYwV4GvkFEdKipbI/s1600/Heaves.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW9FGPvI5zF0wrZn9oghX0XhgSm06fBlV0xcDYa5erHFxhpdzqNAo9rZ9Pz1nkEhRHsRrTt-FtxkZYKWar3F0SYxGGw_YlJ-rUSBtGbi4Xw5fddv3UNIF-VxuXYRFOCYwV4GvkFEdKipbI/s400/Heaves.jpg" width="400" /> </a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">At noon I heard the emergency siren in Princeton so I had a shot of bourbon. The air was calm. Around 12:40 the sun popped out and I noted this. 'Light changes' often spark a bite, for whatever reason. You can't argue with the data. And sure enough, at 12:49 I looked up from <i>Hell's Angels</i> and the middle flag was up. I trotted over and the line was not moving. But when I looked down the hole I could see the line was <i>waaay</i> off to the side, and then as if on cue, the spindle began moving again. Muscle memory took over and I quickly set the hook and landed the little pike. It was only 25 inches but nice and fat and feisty...</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">But as I've said, it was a fish that filled me with excitement for what it represented. I knew exactly what a December pike would mean since I got back here. And then at 3 the sun peaked through the clouds again and another flag popped... And I missed this fish but it was most certainly another strike, and so as I watched the sun set on the Winter Solstice I started doing the calculations. The data was very promising. I knew we were looking at a special winter. I texted the boys the good news, and I felt hunger and was satisfied, so I picked up the traps and marched home. <i> </i></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Back daylight, today belongs to the darkness.</i></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">-30- </span></span> </div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-38371437349466266932011-12-15T15:09:00.001-06:002011-12-15T15:11:49.484-06:00First ice, no ice [+video]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiprrkfqGJgpVlBAUAAgYiqlodhPeJl-qekPQ4o0khFQe0mbhpzp7W64s6IBAEkkTQoq_nR0xQcGKw77iQ1wDtrMBZxRsMDciHV4zQtZJSrELye3t9lSohcfJkyLsVLhuKR-b9Ba2gITV7k/s1600/DSCF2094.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiprrkfqGJgpVlBAUAAgYiqlodhPeJl-qekPQ4o0khFQe0mbhpzp7W64s6IBAEkkTQoq_nR0xQcGKw77iQ1wDtrMBZxRsMDciHV4zQtZJSrELye3t9lSohcfJkyLsVLhuKR-b9Ba2gITV7k/s400/DSCF2094.JPG" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">The boys came up to The Fort last weekend for our annual 'first ice' trip on Lake Puckaway (<i>The Puckopener</i>), and we just <i>barely</i> had ice. This will be my seventh winter of keeping general logbooks of the things I do (primarily outside), and every year so far we have had walkable ice (1.5 inches or more) by December 10. Some years are creepier than others. For as much as I ice fish, going out on the ice for the first time each winter is alarmingly unnerving. I have never <i>really* </i>gone through the ice and I don't ever want to, but I do take some chances. And this week's weather is proof of that.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Yesterday it reached 50f here in Mecan, Wisconsin, and it rained for 24 hours straight. These are two of the primary enemies of ice, naturally. But ice has resilience! We could all learn a thing or two from ice. I always say, based on the scientific data of my logbooks (of course), that "it takes a lot to make ice and it takes a lot to melt it, too." Well it might not be purely scientific but I've found lots of truth in that 'rule'. I've been ice fishing in t-shirt weather in the spring. Long-term trends matter a lot more than current conditions.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Anyways, so then the wind picked up today. And that shot any ice fishing plans I might've had for this weekend. The lake is nearly wide open again, so we'll need two or three really cold and calm nights to get back to square one again. Frustrating. I have a winter to live here full-time and we're now two weeks off the normal pace. More time to write, I guess.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Since the ice was so scary last weekend we didn't go very far out and so we didn't catch any fish... but we did enjoy the ice nonetheless. And so I present my newest video project: </span><span style="color: #45818e; font-size: large;"><span style="color: black;"><b>Slidin'!!!!!</b> <span style="color: red;">[warning, there is some cursing in here, sorry, I got excited]</span></span></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/OZKneTtv0S4?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">* - Going in shin-deep on shore in the spring doesn't count.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">-30-</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-14837043523670075952011-12-14T21:23:00.004-06:002011-12-14T21:36:16.747-06:00Best Albums Ever<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJwJT5klckmOu1vP142H4gTkdh02smb6zfyUs4fr_OHVFIFXkA4Tl4bSyq1ujnnEau2-UzKTTu2wlZkV_pdXyV6SXMgv5Ot-U5m3TeP0ZXBf6nvkJUXFV4XeZ8ULFoUj3IFHg4zNx3wy28/s1600/records.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJwJT5klckmOu1vP142H4gTkdh02smb6zfyUs4fr_OHVFIFXkA4Tl4bSyq1ujnnEau2-UzKTTu2wlZkV_pdXyV6SXMgv5Ot-U5m3TeP0ZXBf6nvkJUXFV4XeZ8ULFoUj3IFHg4zNx3wy28/s400/records.jpg" width="382" /></a></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJwJT5klckmOu1vP142H4gTkdh02smb6zfyUs4fr_OHVFIFXkA4Tl4bSyq1ujnnEau2-UzKTTu2wlZkV_pdXyV6SXMgv5Ot-U5m3TeP0ZXBf6nvkJUXFV4XeZ8ULFoUj3IFHg4zNx3wy28/s1600/records.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br />
</a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">One of my favorite things about the end of the year is ‘best of’ lists, especially for music. I always seem to find an album or two that I had not heard of that eventually finds a permanent home on my iTunes. Since I have an older laptop there is no way I can keep every album I have on iTunes, so I end up with a constantly-rotating A-team and an external hard-drive filled with stuff I may never listen to again. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The other night I decided to clean up my iTunes, and then I dug through my archives to bring some old favorites up to the A-team once again. This got me thinking. Every album on my current iTunes is something I could listen to start-to-finish, but what are my all-time favorites? Without a time limit of some sort this list could take a week or longer to build, so I decided I would trust my gut through a course of rapid-fire cuts. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">First I scrolled through the 209 albums currently on my machine and pulled out my favorites over the course of about 14 minutes. The only rule: one album per artist. I kept it simple, going on estimated total plays with weight for total plays in 2011. This left me with 21 albums... Then I quickly (5 minutes) widdled this list down to my top ten (<b>in bold</b>):</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Antlers - Burst Apart</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Arcade Fire - Suburbs</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Avalanches - Since I Left You</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Beck - Sea Change</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Bob Dylan - The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Deathcab For Cutie - Plans</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Dr. Dog - Fate</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins - Rabbit Fur Coat</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">My Morning Jacket - Circuital</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The Notwist - Neon Golden</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Postal Service - Give Up</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Spoon - Give Me Fiction</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Talking Heads - Fear of Music</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Ween - La Cucaracha</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Weezer - Pinkerton</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">White Stripes - Elephant</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Wilco - A Ghost is Born</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Then I gave myself another 15 minutes to consider which of these ten would be in my top three, but I didn’t really need 15 minutes. I weighed many things in making these final cuts, but each of the top ten had deep meaning for me, and I would happily sit and listen to any of the albums in the top 21 every day for the rest of the <strike>month</strike> year.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">This is what made the final three the Best Albums Ever (other than great artwork) (in alphabetical order):</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Avalanches - Since I Left You (2000)</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2HfIinwpuoMGExNYirhFreT6Plmm56Cp-hPGmwO-F_VPfv6v3AkA7XzVNApMkgfU2gBhiSCRVAHn0nJKjW4Nu2hl_3Zo3EslQhJGIZ0H3-KVuPLeM9W8VuATmoundiM1F97yJNwe0ydny/s1600/since-i-left-you.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2HfIinwpuoMGExNYirhFreT6Plmm56Cp-hPGmwO-F_VPfv6v3AkA7XzVNApMkgfU2gBhiSCRVAHn0nJKjW4Nu2hl_3Zo3EslQhJGIZ0H3-KVuPLeM9W8VuATmoundiM1F97yJNwe0ydny/s320/since-i-left-you.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Highlight track: <i>Frontier Psychiatrist (this video is amazing as well, despite weird screenshot)</i></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/U8BWBn26bX0?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><i> </i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Why: I stumbled onto this dance/electronic album while I was DJing at 90fm in college. It is widely considered one of the top ‘sample albums’ of all time, in that each song is electronically quilted together from strange samples across the entire audio spectrum. Plus it features great beats. For me, it represents late nights and the irresponsibility of youth, but I still love listening to it, even if it's daylight and I’m by myself, and I guess that explains why it stands the test of time. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Bob Dylan - The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963)</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggVc442nM2J_jUEmTqTEX9fU71LMW89OwSwjZh7cMKGOXXfc03zrBM8m5VErmmOCgP-cvBPD-EFj0cMctcaLvrpRXcDEJBUDrTwY6KGJXdLmLn_wUoh56VIoxsQVWda49_qQkvvWoSE1vk/s1600/freewheelin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggVc442nM2J_jUEmTqTEX9fU71LMW89OwSwjZh7cMKGOXXfc03zrBM8m5VErmmOCgP-cvBPD-EFj0cMctcaLvrpRXcDEJBUDrTwY6KGJXdLmLn_wUoh56VIoxsQVWda49_qQkvvWoSE1vk/s320/freewheelin.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Highlight track: <i>I Shall Be Free</i></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/a7ncHTbfD1w?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><i> </i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Why: It’s hard to pick a favorite Dylan album, but this one stands out for a variety reasons. Rebellious and fun, dark and lighthearted at the same time, it is an album that changes with my moods and always leaves me feeling better. In a world where we are increasingly looking for the next big thing, and rarely happy with what we have, </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Freewheelin’ </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">is a treasured heirloom, representing all that is good about American music created before I was born.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Wilco - A Ghost is Born (2004)</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrGskvUsdgZ6rlVAs0r1TtZhqUhUBMdjNulLTQZlbmyC1WZlGOBj1j0SRfFoGQpRuVuO7UYEvx421mzhqwq9I7tEuPyssw5BQyaBqHZv5zZltW-ovZswb39Pv21KVF9dt4ho0MMGO9JqA/s1600/wilco.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrGskvUsdgZ6rlVAs0r1TtZhqUhUBMdjNulLTQZlbmyC1WZlGOBj1j0SRfFoGQpRuVuO7UYEvx421mzhqwq9I7tEuPyssw5BQyaBqHZv5zZltW-ovZswb39Pv21KVF9dt4ho0MMGO9JqA/s1600/wilco.jpg" /></a></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Highlight track: <i>Hell is Chrome</i></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/FqDWVErme40?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><i> </i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Why: This, for me, is the best existing example of rock and roll, and the first album I ever listened to 100 times in a row. Something here speaks to me beautifully. Whenever I’m stuck on a writing project, I put on the headphones and click on this masterpiece that so perfectly illustrates my transformative adult years... The blurring of traditional instruments with an electronic age, the pain of growing up with the hope of what will be. An album that can make you think or set your mind free to thinking.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">-30-</span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-48986106115593997972011-12-05T18:24:00.001-06:002011-12-05T18:28:45.767-06:00Visualization<div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVswmheEaR9g3swYyCaZtueo1Ut3fl1lSdKj2sx211OXI1m8qCXrlXzz4hPgblUx4djSwF7nI9QJu8rrv3R75F-nNUczcufS5QYRFlnbhsDCgkrRyl8ZkZzNyBvOcqR6h0-CHkRKn2wcdu/s1600/eye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="390" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVswmheEaR9g3swYyCaZtueo1Ut3fl1lSdKj2sx211OXI1m8qCXrlXzz4hPgblUx4djSwF7nI9QJu8rrv3R75F-nNUczcufS5QYRFlnbhsDCgkrRyl8ZkZzNyBvOcqR6h0-CHkRKn2wcdu/s400/eye.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6dm9Tsnvc5BTpUZZiuRhTtJgf7Hgy8ktQo0StVTjKyetN6cETtOliLaUCL9KINGVUiZV_P5ze7EvsC124MUiz7xMgwrVIh9r06yb7ND23yGLsHayZk7klywIDd_GpsaMcAOPKri9DXeo9/s1600/eye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br />
</a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">How powerful is positive thinking?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">I read two things this year that have me wondering... The first is from Bill Bryson's <i>Short History of Nearly Everything</i> (<a href="http://www.huzheng.org/bookstore/AShortHistoryofNearlyEverything.pdf">pdf</a>):</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><i>"You may not feel outstandingly robust, but if you are an average-sized adult you will contain within your modest frame no less than 7 x 10^18 joules of potential energy - enough to explode with the force of thirty very large hydrogen bombs, assuming you knew how to liberate it and really wished to make a point. We’re just not very good at taking it out."</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">OK? So think of that next time you're tired.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">The other was from <a href="http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/7295185/nfl-green-bay-aaron-rodgers-greatest-season-qb-ever-had">an Aaron Rodgers interview</a> on the reasons behind his meteoric rise as an NFL quarterback:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><i>"An inch one way or the other and it might be a totally different outcome in the Super Bowl. Afterward, everybody was like, 'How did that happen?' But that's a play we've worked on for years. Years. That's where all this comes from - to be able to step into that throw, with seven minutes left in the Super Bowl, up by less than a touchdown, knowing it's third down and you have to make a play. I've thrown that ball to Greg, that same exact ball, 100 times in practice. Same exact route. So when I break the huddle, that's what's flashing in my mind. I've completed this throw in my mind 1,000 times before the ball even leaves my hand."</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">OK? So both of these passages startle me. I keep re-reading them over and over. I look at my hands and visualize this obscene amount of power locked in a white orb of light... Then I eat the orb. No matter how good I feel when I roll out of bed in the morning, I have not figured out how to use most of that power, but when I watch Rodgers play the game at a mind-bending level on Sundays, I wonder if he has somehow unlocked his orb. It seems like he is living a half-second in the future from everyone else on the field sometimes. So maybe there is something to this visualization he is talking about. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">I started digging around (not too deep!) and there's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_visualization">a story on Wikipedia</a> about how the Soviets got the best results from their Olympic athletes when they used a 75/25 blend of mental-to-physical training. OK? The hockey player that spent 75-percent of his time training <i>mentally </i>was superior to his comrade who spent all of his training time skating and pumping iron. The story is cited from a book about karate, so I'll say it's 75-percent legit and move along to the money quote: "The Soviets had discovered that mental images can act as a prelude to muscular impulses." Awesome.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div>So I'm giving this a try lately, trying to unlock my white orb in everything I do. Yet the combination of jogging and dancing in the same weekend gave me sore legs! I still have this knack for drinking more beer than I really need. Sleeping in remains a guilty pleasure.<i> </i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">At the<i> </i>very least I am learning a lot about the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Thought_Movement">New Thought Movement</a> tonight, which includes kooky things like animal magnetism and metaphysical beliefs like the law of attraction. And of course there are books written about those topics and I'm getting too far from the main point. I am interested in the ability of the mind to influence future events, certainly, but maybe I'll get to that after dinner. On one hand I am certain that each and every choice matters (see last week's post), and that positive thinking really can make a difference, but...</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">The thing is: Life continues to startle me... And I like that. No matter how much you visualize, no matter how much you prepare, life and the people you share it with are unpredictable variables, all of them containing the power of thirty hydrogen bombs. That is a scary thought. Or maybe it's a thrilling thought. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: left;">-30-</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-56584094939286278842011-11-30T20:36:00.004-06:002011-11-30T20:45:08.942-06:00Wildfire at McNiece Lake<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="font-family: inherit; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3rxs9-RDQkw5Jq4a1DulNUnMvxjuUePbT5-3mEvRTzzvgeHSClUzQob31rjg6PDRSJ6BNw4Y1m8wAehG5MtsHcTIqF76FPDaP_Qbeu72O-hlbxqmxEnQP8B9uqH5zcdSvIMeywI6N6qk3/s1600/MNIIHON-041111-133634.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3rxs9-RDQkw5Jq4a1DulNUnMvxjuUePbT5-3mEvRTzzvgeHSClUzQob31rjg6PDRSJ6BNw4Y1m8wAehG5MtsHcTIqF76FPDaP_Qbeu72O-hlbxqmxEnQP8B9uqH5zcdSvIMeywI6N6qk3/s400/MNIIHON-041111-133634.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Photo credit: Erik Danielson</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">In April I decided to abandon a career I enjoyed so I could take a seasonal job up north. I decided to go hide in the woods for seven months. I didn’t know anyone up there, but I met people I liked, and so when Erik asked me if I wanted to go on a month-long canoe trip in October, I decided that I should. I decided to buy a canoe and new boots, to get my passport renewed, to paddle whenever possible in preparation for the big trip. I decided to stare at maps after work, wondering what we would find out there. And while three of the original six participants dropped out before departure, I decided to get in the canoe and paddle further than I ever had before.</span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">We had two re-supply stops in mind (Atikokan, Canada and Ely, Minnesota) but we decided against a set route, and so each day we would wake up and have our coffee, listen to the weather radio and start paddling, not sure where we’d end up. This is a great way to see something you’ve never seen before. We decided to enjoy ourselves instead of setting goals and hurrying to reach them. And sometime around lunch we’d look at the map and say, this looks like a good spot. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">On the fourth night we found ourselves on a huge rocky peninsula, looking north across Agnes Lake. We ate our soup with fresh dumplings and looked out on the massive lake. Later, reading in my hammock and watching the big sky, I thought, I’m really glad we decided to ride the south wind up here. I might've seen the aurora in the distance but I was so tired... </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">And we moved forward in space and time, and the sun rose on Friday, October 7. We knew it was going to be windy and that we’d have to get off Agnes in a hurry, so we had our coffee and moved north again, through Silence and Sultry and Noon. We stopped for lunch on Shade Lake, and that’s when Erik spotted the plume of smoke to the north. It had been very dry, and now with the heavy south wind blowing, we weren’t surprised to see signs of forest fire. The smoke was in the general direction we were headed, but it was impossible to say how far away it really was, and we didn’t want to backtrack into the wind, so we finished our salami and cheese and decided to keep moving. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">That afternoon we hit lots of little lakes, passing from Shade to Dell to Grey and Yum Yum, and every time we got a glimpse of the smoke plume it looked closer, always to our north. At Yum Yum we had another decision: Keep heading towards the smoke or go south towards the Yum-Yum Portage, which by all accounts was a nasty path best avoided, despite it’s fun name. It was getting late in the day and nobody wanted to test the Yum Yum or the wind, so we pushed north into Shan Walshe Lake, and suddenly the smoke seemed much, much closer. It wasn’t scaring us the way it should have, though. We had heard there were virgin pines on McNiece Lake, so we put the boats and packs on our shoulders one more time and moved closer still. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">At McNiece it seemed we had finally gotten beyond the smoke (or maybe directly in it’s path), and I said to Erik as we pushed away from shore, this might be the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. But we paddled on anyways, both secretly hoping, I think, that the fire </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">would </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">be right around the corner... And it was! Pretty quickly we realized the fire was actively burning our only other route out of McNeice, which wasn’t a big lake. What to do, what to do? Back-tracking to Yum Yum now would mean paddling and portaging and setting up camp in the dark. There was a perfectly good campsite on McNiece itself, on the shore opposite the fire zone, so we decided to stop for the night about a mile from an active wildfire. Yeah... It was one of those decisions you make where you don’t even need hindsight to know it’s crazy.</span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">But crazy isn’t always wrong! </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Here we were in the true interior of the park, five days of travel from anywhere, partially trapped and partially thrilled to be trapped. Canada doesn’t actively fight forest fires in wilderness areas, so we knew we were on our own up there. We started a fire in camp and fried up pike tacos with our last fresh avocado, always keeping an eye on the smoke and the wind. Erik and Paige and I all had huge grins on our faces and we kept giggling and remarking how crazy this was, saying things like, what in the hell are the chances? and, geeesh! and, hooooooly shit! It would be easy to say we were there because of fate, but no, I don’t believe that. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">I knew why we were here on this night, but I didn’t know how being there would change me. How, every decision I had ever made brought me here and now, somehow, and how being here would alter <i>all </i>of my future decisions. The Wildfire at McNiece Lake taught me an important lesson about the choices we make. The problem, of course, is trying to say what it really meant so that someone else can understand it. I just want to explain the rarity of this experience without comparing it to a conversation with a yeti, or the sensation of feeling the wind in your hair for the first time.</span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Darkness crept in but the fire shimmered across the lake, like northern lights within the rocks and water. Somehow, the wind got stronger - in excess of 50 mph - and we heard trees toppling all around us. Trees were exploding in the fire, booming across the lake. Thunder clapped, but we did not move from the exposed rocks, staring out at this glowing storm of destruction and rebirth. I thought about the things I had been thinking about a lot this year, watching massive pines erupt in flames, the fire creeping along the ridgeline very slowly underneath, releasing the explosions. Old things died. Something new started whirring in me, like the fire had released a sprouting seed in my guts. It was late when I got in my hammock beneath the rainfly and then very soon the rain started, heavy drops with an intense smokey taste. And the wind kept roaring. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">And we moved forward in space and time...</span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqSwdxtoN8PASV5LWZ_82uwC8HnHuX8i_Jlu5QgMpkAFd2yuGpo5RPdiac-6wwjBVIy-Ezr0clSvfAv8SaVGv_p3Zzuxgd_U3IIKwIDsb64xFb-7aQJRRdUDGEIIWZwUNFx5OuxM778OAk/s1600/DSCF1410.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqSwdxtoN8PASV5LWZ_82uwC8HnHuX8i_Jlu5QgMpkAFd2yuGpo5RPdiac-6wwjBVIy-Ezr0clSvfAv8SaVGv_p3Zzuxgd_U3IIKwIDsb64xFb-7aQJRRdUDGEIIWZwUNFx5OuxM778OAk/s640/DSCF1410.jpg" width="360" /></a></div></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">In the morning the wind had calmed and there was a haze lingering in every direction, but the big smoke plume had been drowned out, so we packed quickly and paddled directly into the difficulty. The shoreline was charred, individual trees were still on fire on both sides of the path, and we were over a mile from the next lake with no way to know what was going on in between. We got out and took pictures next to burning logs and laughed in disbelief. And this next decision we never really talked about. It would take each of us two trips to get everything through and we knew the path ahead was as dangerous as anything we could find out here, but we all understood this and knew we needed to do this, so we said nothing more, grabbed our packs and started into the wildfire. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">It was early in the morning but already hot, and as we walked over blackened earth and through fallen burnt trees, the humidex spiked. The forest was either burnt or still on fire, and I was covered in sweat by the top of the first hill. So many downed trees blocked the actual path, the one-mile portage kept increasing in length with every step. I felt like I had gotten myself in good shape for this trip, but halfway through I was using every bit of fuel I had to keep moving at a reasonable pace. Finally we reached the shores of Kahshapiwi Lake, covered in ash and blood (from where?!?), and we looked back. The wind seemed to be increasing again and we still had a food pack and both our boats sitting on McNiece. There was nothing to be done. The decision had already been made. We headed into the wildfire again at maximum speed.</span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The whole walk back I was thinking, How in the hell are we gonna get these canoes through these trees? It just kept getting hotter. The second run through was a true team effort, especially across the worst-hit sections, threading an 18-foot canoe through a tangle of charred branches, around standing pines that were burning themselves hollow from within and threatening to fall at any moment, shoulders and arms and lungs screaming for rest but something bigger pushing the legs forward. I found fuel I didn’t know I had and became a machine, incapable of stopping or being stopped... My eyes became cool water... I burnt the pathway into my memory, took a deep breath and then we were out. We could see smoke rising from the trees behind us, all along the shoreline to the north, and there was a sense of quiet triumph. </span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">I drank mightily from the lake, and I was not the same after that. I can’t explain it any better, I can only live in a way that shows people how it changed me.</span><br />
<br />
</div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div><div style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">-30-</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-16108192445672718272011-10-02T23:29:00.000-05:002011-10-02T23:29:47.853-05:00You're always warm and dry<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoURzpkk-Shaa1D4Ay7wH5X4ltQK-DZbDXGmNSx2ThXW0KDQ2M1cZrTIihP79SElP1rCpLFbho6lCAbDqknKhj4LWKbkpSOEkT77-Vzab5lEcIDqAHAsdRWDKCOTGST9pXwcp0qLBygQ7z/s1600/dddd.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoURzpkk-Shaa1D4Ay7wH5X4ltQK-DZbDXGmNSx2ThXW0KDQ2M1cZrTIihP79SElP1rCpLFbho6lCAbDqknKhj4LWKbkpSOEkT77-Vzab5lEcIDqAHAsdRWDKCOTGST9pXwcp0qLBygQ7z/s400/dddd.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
I am now within a planned unemployment... I am now without work for the first time since I got my paper-route when I was 12. I should revise... I'll be without work-ing for someone else. Over the next three weeks - maybe four, five, ? - I plan on putting in the hardest work of my life. Lots of thinking and something like a hundred lakes by human-power!<br />
<br />
I am going on a long trip from home. The adventure of my lifetime. But, yes, I have been away from home for months now. A cabin in the woods is nice... my ultimate goal... but this one is not home. I didn't build it. I got here when there was snow on the ground and there'll'be snow on the ground again before I leave it, but it's not home. It's got almost everything I need and a great location, but this is a temporary hiding spot at best. A good, quiet spot. I sleep here, I read here, I keep spring water in a big jug on my porch, mice intrude and die here, there are maps on the wall of every lake I can paddle to in a week, I think in the dark here, but this is not home. I love this spot, but I have no one to share it with, and so, it's not home.<br />
<br />
But I will miss it... Like all my important places, particles of me will always live here - I have just a few more nights under this roof, I should expect no more...<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGQDAjjCfYDj3wmnas-wfnq-VAwS_lY9TkCeno3okCgLjrZrkYqkqdj5cPiobAhGAMBojr0CKpt-LdndfKot9r9knm33eJMjTsJlZJg11jNBC-KhI_fokeUPk4GKxx1LEFcrsKrYHgTcDl/s1600/annexx.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGQDAjjCfYDj3wmnas-wfnq-VAwS_lY9TkCeno3okCgLjrZrkYqkqdj5cPiobAhGAMBojr0CKpt-LdndfKot9r9knm33eJMjTsJlZJg11jNBC-KhI_fokeUPk4GKxx1LEFcrsKrYHgTcDl/s400/annexx.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHxc6d_VxdHx59O0MJ54M1naubyfaNxbtVRy4P2lbUWJ6p6CKbv3Rr72AZ7W1kvPK1-4xL8JhxwEJJFRhGD8C8hLQwTF2dU5jPRQqn-hufrOCdjxsxkB3Z8nmNYJs54RUrL7ppn3BIibYW/s1600/CLVista.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="105" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHxc6d_VxdHx59O0MJ54M1naubyfaNxbtVRy4P2lbUWJ6p6CKbv3Rr72AZ7W1kvPK1-4xL8JhxwEJJFRhGD8C8hLQwTF2dU5jPRQqn-hufrOCdjxsxkB3Z8nmNYJs54RUrL7ppn3BIibYW/s400/CLVista.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<br />
Realizing I may not return to this place again, it hurts, and that's been the theme of this year, leaving home behind. It's been a tough, tough year for me. And I could write a book about the last year, and someday I might, but I can't write that book now and I'm not sure anyone would read it, anyways... We've all felt the pain of leaving home, and it hurts. No fun.<br />
<br />
What I want to say... What I want to write about now, is not this year of hurt and regret and an expanding horizon, but of what comes next - for there is certainly a guilty excitement in the reception of a blank slate, no matter how you got it. I don't know what I'll do with it beyond the next month, but I think I know what I'm aiming at. This story, this searching for a philosophy of life, is fueled by the hurt of leaving, yes, but it is centered entirely on the thrilling prospect of finding home again.<br />
<br />
Finding the true home.<br />
<br />
Tomorrow morning I will embark on the greatest adventure of my life, at age 30, into the wilds of Canada with a paddle and a canoe and two fellow adventurers and some amazing boots. And determination. And nervousness. And regret. And hope. And so many questions, <i>so many questions</i>. Plenty of time to think. And decisions. And optimism, somehow.<br />
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I'm not always optimistic but I will do a better job of controlling my perspective going forward, and I think that is what the next month and year and life is about. That is what this story is about. I haven't figured out much of anything this summer, but I realized pretty quickly that my worries and complaints about life were my own problem... Maybe breathing good air helped me see it... Maybe it was the quiet, but I see it, even if I don't believe it all just yet.<br />
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Here is how I got on this thinking: I read Sig Olsen's <i>Open Horizons</i> a few weeks ago and in the book he tells a story from his guiding days up in the Quetico. This is where I'm going in two days. The Paddler's Paradise. It seems to me the story occurred in my exact current week the way it struck me. This story happened in the fall, during a spell when the sun never shone and it rained on and off for days and days and days. And it was cold. I listen to the cold rain wake me up in the morning, before the sun, and I shiver in my little cabin and think, how am I gonna handle this weather for a month in a tent (or a hammock!), not another group of humans within six or sixty lakes in any direction?<br />
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It was this kind of week when Sig was guiding some guesties into the northern wilds, packing his canoe in the cold rain, when an old-timer guide named Buck Skelton gave him some advice that changed his life, and the advice seems to have changed my course, if not my life entirely. This is what Buck told Sig: <i><b>Remember, no matter how wet and cold you are, you're always warm and dry</b></i>.<br />
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This Quetico adventure is the test of that philosophy. I know I will be cold, out there, rain on the roof of the tent at night, questions rolling through my mind, snow maybe... I am going on a long trip from home. I have been away from home for months now, and if I never get back home, it won't surprise me... I had to put in an address change today and I do not know where my next home is, but until I find it I will keep looking, everywhere. Maybe the answer will hit me out there, in the wild, or maybe I'll think of a new way to think of home...<br />
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<i>But can my mind finally calm the wind? Can conviction still shivers? Will I be honest with myself and accept what I say? Will the quiet be truly quiet?</i><br />
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Where I get stuck is on the idea of control... If it is always warm and dry then you control your environment... Your life... And this is a nice notion, like a warm blanket... ... it's just a matter of wrapping yourself snugly. But it's bullshit, of course, and besides, I like my wild, <i>Wild</i>! I like the unpredictability of this world. Sometimes you <i>are </i>stuck in a storm, you <i>are</i> wet and cold. Sometimes life is terrible, uncontrollable.<br />
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And sometimes the forecast surprises you with a string of 70s and sun for your ride into the October north.<br />
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No, you can't ignore reality on the bad/good ::: days/weeks/years. But that's not what Buck was talking about. Buck's wild <i>was </i>wild, the rain very real, cold to the bone... but there's a way of knowing the chill can't last, and also, that you can't control so many things... And <i>that's </i>the key I think: Acceptance of now, improving tomorrow.<br />
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This is today. This is you. They are they. Here is here. Home is where you are tonight and who you share your dinner with. That's my best guess, and I hope it's a truth I can build my boat with as I look out on the lake and wind... And I will give this boat a vigorous test! So I say, be warm and dry and well.<br />
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-30-Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8372604697998294760.post-39914789164490198792011-09-26T17:41:00.000-05:002011-09-26T17:41:26.110-05:00Paddling to the Packers game<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCu0iu78uoJAYHboc1n_ZRRvv7I6YIThHtQhifS-hRFWj8sSqG5G6bQHSIdI5qvEp6buAPSb4P47VwGLgsCT9s_OOD6Kmy-siVAp-_AfJFtfPf28QHRtdMOQARW4xoZrKy32h9Zr6KbSRx/s1600/aa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCu0iu78uoJAYHboc1n_ZRRvv7I6YIThHtQhifS-hRFWj8sSqG5G6bQHSIdI5qvEp6buAPSb4P47VwGLgsCT9s_OOD6Kmy-siVAp-_AfJFtfPf28QHRtdMOQARW4xoZrKy32h9Zr6KbSRx/s400/aa.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
There's no TV up here. And I like it. Almost always.<br />
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Living without television for the last five months has been good for me, and I didn't miss my DVR at all until the NFL season began. I follow the Packers very closely and while I was fine missing preseason games, it hurt deeply to have missed the Carolina game entirely (it was on the same channel and time as the stupid Vikings). Listening to the Saints game on the radio out around the campfire was fun, but the NFL game is made for HDTV. I <i>needed </i>to see my team.<br />
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So as Packers-Bears day approached (one of my favorite holidays), I knew I had to find a television. My co-worker and fellow UW-Point alum, Doctor K, is a long-suffering Bears fan, and we both had Sunday off, so we hatched a plan amongst a feast of Saturday-night drinks to paddled to the nearest tavern. Thus, we could fish along the way and ensure a safe ride home after the game. Brilliant. I had paddled to the same tavern earlier in the summer with Erik and it honestly only took about a half-hour longer than driving.<br />
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The fishing wasn't that great, but I caught the biggest (and only) smallie, so I naturally took it as an omen for Packers victory. We decided to head in early to watch the Vikings blow another lead and get started on some beer. The Vikings fans in the house were amazed that a Packers fan and Bears fan would share a canoe or a pitcher, but we explained that great rivals also respect each other. Then I made a wise-crack about the Metro-dome and resumed cheering for the Lions in a boisterous manner.<br />
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Being near the end of the Gunflint Trail tavern season, we had two choices on tap: Extra Pale Ale or 90-Shilling. We ordered the EPA and immediately killed the barrel. Free beer! Then with the game about to start, we ordered a pitcher of the 90 (go Raji!), and dispatched <i>that </i>barrel as well (more free beer!). Things were looking up!<br />
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Of course the Packers went on to dominate the Bears and I got lots of friendly looks at my Packers sweatsuit... and eventually we enjoyed a perfect September sunset on the ride home.<br />
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I've been to more taverns than was probably necessary in my 30 years, but before this summer I had never taken a canoe out for a night on the town. Much like living without a TV, I also recommend giving this a try where/when possible. You don't need lake-front property, either, especially if you have a canoe, which can be portaged many city blocks from water to final destination. So any place where you have water between your home and favorite tavern is eligible. If you want to paddle to a Packers game, however, you better plan on doing one before ice-up.<br />
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Da-duh-da...du-da-da...<br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #274e13;">Go PACK Go!</span></b>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com