Many Cook County locals love their snowmobiles and our soon to be 2-year-old son, Bo, has an infatuation like I have never seen. If you happened to attend the radar races on Poplar Lake last weekend you might have noticed a starry eyed young buck admiring the rumble of snow machines while wandering through the crowd.
Bo only has a handful of words and “mo mos” is his favorite. He points out of our living room window to show us either Mommy’s mo mo or daddy’s mo mo every day.
Actually the little guy loves anything with a motor, including the vacuum cleaner, but his favorite machine in his 22 months of existence is the snowmobile. Rachelle and I would entertain his passion by doing laps around our driveway this winter until “we” finally had enough. If it was too cold for him to be outside, which was most of the winter, he would sit inside of the heated truck while watching me do laps around the driveway. Every time I wanted to park the sled he would scream for more.
Two of the littlest snowmobile fanatics in Cook County—Bo and Sophia Christianson—enjoyed watching the snowmobile drag races on Poplar Lake last weekend.
I was unable to attend the race since I was guiding a group of anglers on Gunflint Lake that day, but Rachelle and Dianne Wimmer took the kids down to Windigo Lodge to watch them ride. I heard that young Bo was lucky enough to take a ride with Cindy Crawford on her sled. Thanks Cindy, you really made his day!
It was a pretty nice day and the lake conditions on Gunflint were perfect for fishing. The lake trout actually cooperated even though we only landed two fish. Every one of the seven people in our group had one on and a “squandered opportunity” is as good as a catch in my book. It was just nice to see some action for a change.
Gunflint has been giving up a few lake trout this week, especially on the warmer days, and the plowed roads leftover from ice houses and Mush for a Cure make it easy to fish from a lake-worthy vehicle.
The lakes have been freezing up solid with the low temperatures, but I think it is a small window of opportunity before it begins to warm up and get sloppy again. All it takes is an afternoon of bright sunshine and temperatures in the high 30s or low 40s to start melting the snow and causing things to turn slushy again. I was afraid to run down the east end of Gunflint but the few brave souls that ventured in that direction said it was not a problem. I guess I am getting a little prudent as I age. I have been told that kids will do that to you.
We are only five weeks from the spring fishing opener and I do not foresee any open water by then. Stranger things have happened, but we are still drilling through 30 inches of ice with no signs of winter letting up quite yet. It would take some serious sunshine, wind, and a lot of warm rain to get things melting but right now it seems worse than it was last year.
Ice fishing in May, or even June for that matter, could be a reality this season. No wonder we cannot get the governor to fish the Gunflint Trail for the famous spring opener. I cannot say that I blame him.
Cory Christianson has worked as a fishing guide on the Gunflint Trail since 2000. If you have any fishing or wildlife reports or stories to share, send an email to: christiansoncory@hotmail.com or call 218-388-0315. You can also visit Cory’s website at Gunflintfishingguide.com.
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