A New Hobby

The winter of 2006 was the most boring I have ever endured. My family usually gets out on the sleds or snowmobiles and we have even been snowboarding on the mountain in recent years, but '06 was altogether different. No one had any snowmobiles, and no snowboards, so all my wife and I seemed to do for fun was watch movies. I enjoy a good movie, but that winter was just flat boring.

This winter, again due to my good buddy Kirk, I found a new hobby, ice fishing. I had never been ice fishing until earlier this winter, and actually the first time I went I was not that impressed. Kirk took me out to Mantua Lake and we didn't catch a thing, plus it was cold, windy and fairly miserable. Well, the next trip redeemed Kirk and his crazy idea. We started going to a local place called Porcupine, and just like other fishing I had done, or hunting as well, I got that adrenaline rush and feel in love with a new hobby.


Though it can get fairly extreme at times, especially when Kirk drags me out for a midnight ice fishing attempt. Again my wife and all others I know view it as stupid, it is incredibly fun and my son, Dane has gone out with me a few times. He likes it quite well, and of course loved that he caught the bigger fish that day.

The first trip to Porcupine was earlier in the season and being out on the ice was still a bit sketchy to me. Early in the year the ice was about 5 or 6 inches thick which is plenty to fish on, but out in the middle the ice was crystal clear, and when the snow was cleared from a good area it was as if we were standing on a pain of glass about 3 inches thick. That was a bit scary to me and just overall creepy the way it made you feel peering down, deep into the water, know that it was hundreds of feet deep, and all you stand on is a nearly invisible sheet of ice. Truly the closest thing I think I will get to walking on water.

The ice fishing season is almost over. The temperature is getting quite warm, though it is still fairly cold at nights. In fact we went ice fishing this morning up to Porcupine and the ice was over two and a half feet thick, which burns the arms hand drilling the fishing holes through ice that thick. It is plenty deep to fish on for quite a while, the problem is the edge melts enough that it becomes impossible to get out onto the ice. That's okay though, its almost mountain bike season and I need to get in shape.