August 21, 2011 -- On Leech Lake (Five Days and Counting)

This morning at 9:30 a.m. the temperature was a very chilly 50 degrees. I've kept the windows open pretty much all the time since early June, but not today. I shut all the windows and turned on the furnace since the temperature inside the house had fallen to 65 degrees. Plus, I just wanted to make sure the new furnace would fire up after sitting in the off position for several months.

The sky was mostly cloudy with just a bit of blue here and there and the wind was calm to light at 5 mph out of the north.

Since it was Joe's last day at the lake, I wanted him to do whatever he wanted. We started by going on bike ride around the loop -- from our house to the community center, up the dirt portion of Sucker Bay Road to Ottertail Point Drive to 26th Ave. and then back to our house on West Shores Road. An 8-mile round trip. We had a wonderful ride and I noticed that some of the sumac is starting to turn red.

After our bike ride, Joe did some yoga and then went swimming in the lake. Then it was time for some fishing.

We started our fishing adventure by jigging fathead minnows in front of our house in 10 feet of water. The water temperature has dropped a bit to 74 degrees. We caught a couple of rock bass, but that was about it.

I then moved the boat to Second Duck Point and had us drift back toward our house. During the drift Joe caught a totally chunky 10-inch perch, which we normally would have kept, but since we were leaving for St. Cloud on Monday it made no sense to keep the fish so it went back into Leech Lake. The was true for the 12-inch perch I caught during the same drift.

We then decided to go try jigging off Ottertail Point since we had marked fish on the Lowrance then other day when we were muskie fishing. Once there we caught a few small perch, although I caught a giant jumbo perch that was nearly 14-inches long. But like the other fish, this true jumbo went back into the lake.

After several drifts around Ottertail Point without much luck we decided to move again. I throttled up the motor and we sped quickly to Duck Point. Just past Duck Point, inside Duck Bay, we dropped Minnow Raps into the water and began trolling in 9-11 feet of water. About half way across Duck Bay Joe hooked into a nice fish. When we got to the side of the boat we could see it was a walleye, so I got the landing net ready and got the fish into the boat. The fish measured a perfect eating size -- 16 inches. But as was the case with the perch, this lucky walleye went back into the lake.

After nearly four hours on the lake we came ashore. Joe got the grill ready because we had decided to have a steak dinner for Joe's last night at the lake; this trip anyway.

Our meal of steak, sauteed mushrooms and onions, grilled potatoes and green beans was delicious. We finished dinner just in time to watch the sunset, which is setting now at just after 8:15 p.m. CDT. With the sun behind the western horizon it was time to get a fire going in the fire pit at the cabin and finish off our dinner with some s'mores.

For the next several hours, Joe and I hung out around the fire, played some ping pong in the game room, talked and of course, made the s'mores. Finally, well after midnight we made our way home. Joe wasn't quite ready to end his final day at the lake, so he made some malted chocolate milks for us as we started to watch a movie on DVD. Unfortunately, the time of day, coupled with the great meal and all the fresh air from being outside for nearly 10 hours was too much for both of us and we needed to go to sleep.

It was a fun, activity packed day and I hope Joe enjoyed it. Tomorrow we are going to drive south to St. Cloud so Joe can see his Grandma Coyle before he leaves for San Jose on Tuesday. I'm going to miss Joe being at the lake. Heck, I'm going to miss being at the lake myself, but life marches onward.

Good night.

[Note: Since Sunday was such a busy day, and we had another busy day on Monday before leaving for St. Cloud, and because I was on the road for nearly 7 hours on Tuesday, I'm a bit behind on my posts to this blog. I will attempt to catch up on Wednesday.]