‘ICE’ TIMES WITH THE GUYS

 

Men from Saint Cecilia summarize their Minnesota ice fishing trip as successful — yielding lots of fellowship and great fishing. 

By Rich Wicks | Lake Panorama Times

A group of men from Saint Cecilia Catholic Church in Panora recently went on an ice-fishing trip to northern Minnesota. The five who participated were Jim Meyer, Lynn Weisz, Bob Kidney, Rick Langel and Paul Nagel. Nagel organized the trip and shared the story. 

“This was the first time we ever tried it. I organized a little trip out of our Knights of Columbus Saint Cecilia chapter,” Nagel said. “It was a chance to get some fellow Knights together and go on a little fishing trip. It was about a nine- to 10-hour drive. We went to Arnesen’s Rocky Point Resort near Roosevelt, Minnesota. It’s on Lake of the Woods. Lake of the Woods straddles the border, but we stayed on the Minnesota side.”

Each day, the outfitter would drop off the five fishermen at their heated ice shack and would check-in periodically. Then, each evening, they would be brought back onto land to sleep at the resort.

Nagel explained that the group of five did not have top-end ice fishing electronics but used some modern devices.

“We fished for three days. We did not have live scope, but we had Vexilars. It basically tells you how deep the water is, and you can see your jig and kind of tell when there are some fish swimming around there,” he said. “We were mostly fishing in 20 to 30 feet of water.”

Those familiar with ice fishing know how easy it is to accidentally lose items to the bottom of the lake.

“Inevitably, anything you drop will fall down the hole,” Nagel said. “We were not immune to that. I won’t go any further because I don’t want to embarrass anybody.”

Nagel recalled the frenzy of activity that occurred whenever someone hooked into a large fish.

“When somebody’s got a good fish on, you either get your other lines out of there, or you’ve got a tangled-up mess,” Nagel said. “And then somebody gets down on the floor to be ready to grab the fish.”

During one of those frenzies, an entire fishing pole was lost.

“In the commotion of reeling in a big one, another pole got pulled through a different hole in the ice,” Nagel said.

Despite the occasional comical mishap, Nagel says the fishing was good. He compared one member of the group (Rick Langel) to a celebrity fisherman who had his own TV show years ago. 

“Rick was the Babe Winkelman of the trip in that he caught virtually every type of fish that was up there. He caught eelpout, walleye, northerns, perch, sauger,” Nagel said. “He was like the Kellogg’s variety pack.”

However, Langel was not the only person catching fish. Nagel recalled that the group had to carefully manage how many fish they kept to stay within state fishing regulations.

“A 16-to-19-inch walleye is just perfect because you can eat it,” Nagel said. “If they’re bigger than that, they’re fun to catch but you’ve got to let them go. We were at our limit at the end of the second day, so we had to eat fish that night in the restaurant. You can bring your fish to the restaurant if you want, and they will cook them for you. So, we had to eat fish just to make more room in our limit for the next day.”

Nagel summarized the trip as successful, yielding lots of fellowship, great fishing and no major problems. 

“We fished for three days and nobody was bleeding. All in all, a fun trip, and the guys said, Lord willing, they’ll do it again,” Nagel said. “Maybe we’ll even add to the crew.”