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Ice Fishing in Minnesota


Jerry

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Mary, I can't help wondering if you ever went ice fishing when you lived up North. I realize the Brits get the warm Gulf current so their winters are not conducive to driving a vehicle out onto the ice to build a cabin with a fireplace to keep warm, try dropping a hook and line down into the lake, drink alcoholic beverages to keep warm....

 

We've often mentioned ice fishing in the News from Lake Wobegon and some of you have expressed disbelief at the very idea ? well, here's your chance to see it up close, first-hand, February 11-13 when APHC will broadcast live from Bemidji, 225 miles north of St. Paul ? all for $550 per person double-occupancy ($650, single).

 

You book a flight into Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP) Friday afternoon, departing Sunday evening. We'll provide the rest.

 

* Deluxe motor coach transportation to Bemidji including box lunch.

* Two nights at the AmericInn Lodge (high-speed Internet, indoor pool, free "breakfast").

* Friday night bonfire by the lake, with hot beverages and GK leading the singing.

* Four hours of ice fishing (catch-and-release) on Lake Bemidji Saturday, including poles, bait, fishing license, and box lunch.

* Saturday live broadcast of APHC.

* Saturday night walleye dinner with GK and other cast members.

* Sunday morning breakfast and horse-drawn sleigh rides.

 

(Of course GK stands for Garrison Keillor, my favorite living poet.)

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The answer is yes Jerry; the first 8 years I lived in MN I was very close to 3 lakes. As a matter of fact I only had to walk a few feet from my house to be standing on Big Deer Lake - which is about 250 miles north of St. Paul.

 

Did I enjoy it, yes - but then I could go out with the guys and sit in a warm fish house and drink, fish and listen to tall fishing tales.

It was amazing to get a fish on the line and then try to maneuver it up through a 3-4 foot hole in the ice!! Wonderful experience but I do not miss the cold!

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Mary, I've belonged to a Unitarian-Universalist religion since growing up Presbyterian. This morning I was invited by our Church of the Larger Fellowship to watch a short video of our pastor, Meg Riley who usually communcates with newsletters and emails.

 

I'm telling you because: she's evidently in Minnesota -- she said it is 20 degrees below outside which is colder than usual. She lit a candle in the her kitchen window and we could see the neighborhood scenery -- very evocative of my life in Illinois years ago.

 

She wore a heavy wool sweater, almost a turtleneck type, and her accent was NOT as strong as it could be, but some of the inflections sounded sort of Lake Wobegon.

 

I've got to send in my dues.

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To correct a misconception- the actual Lake Rice is harvested exactly the way the Native Americans did it -200 yrs ago. I know because I riced for 8 years! If I was a good enough story teller as some you would be amazed at the experiences I had ricing in a canoe with two thin sticks and another person pushing the canoe with a duck bill! So many kinds of spiders!

 

But there has been paddy rice grown in the more southern regions of MN and that is a business.

 

As far as sales of Lake Rice - we would trade - that is the rice we turned in was measured and calculated as to what it would be after the drying process, then we would be given dried rice. It was a very welcome staple in the winter months.

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Can't argue with that Mary; I think there was/is a tribe called the "Cree" though, which I thought were located north of the Gt Lakes; but I'll have to check some of my books! :wink: I've trawled some of the web sites, but I can't find a link or a book title that provides a concise history of (all) the native Americans. I believe, some of the largest tribes (prior to European arrival), were located along the coastal regions, but were seriously depleted by disease brought by the Europeans? And the Iraqois, had an early form of democracy, uniting a Confederation of tribes? :? There is also the theory, based on the three liguistic groupings, that the original native settlers, came via the Alaskan land bridge from Asia, in three distinct waves? Aside from the claims of Viking assimilation; there is now a theory of early settlement by Europeans, moving (like modern Eskimos) along the ice age Atlantic ice bridge, from S/France into N/E America? :?

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