Walking on the ice has always felt unnatural to me; it always feels like something I shouldn’t be doing.  And as we rolled onto the ice on Saturday, it still felt odd….but I sucked it up, and pressed on.

My inaugural ice fishing trip took us to Duck Lake, near Springport, Michigan.  Duck is probably one of the best fishing lakes in southern Michigan, and since my sister and her boyfriend live on the lake, we headed there to see what we could pull through the ice.

Riding on the back of Jeff’s quad, with a sled full of gear in-tow, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t puckering just a little bit.  I’m not sure why it feels so strange to me, but it does.  Since there were trucks on the ice, though, I relaxed a little; and once I noticed the 9 inches of ice Jeff had to drill through to get to water, I relaxed even more.

Using Jeff’s hunting blind as a “shanty”, we started to setup.  Of course, the 20mph winds blowing across the ice didn’t help to make setup any easier, but it was nothing that anchoring the blind to a couple quads couldn’t fix.  And with that, it was time to fish.

This trip was actually quite the family affair.  There were 8 of us total – Jeff, Matt, Ron and his wife, my sister, Melissa and her boyfriend, Justin – all within hearing range of each other…… in three different shanties….. it was fun.

And now here comes the point that everyone has been waiting for:  What did Arthur think of his first ice fishing trip?  Honestly, I loved it!  We all had a blast hanging out, I managed to pull my first fish through the ice (there really is a fish in that first picture, even though it’s hard to see because of the lighting), and even though the fishing had slowed somewhat, I still had a good time.  Plus, ordering, and then eating a pizza in the shanty was just icing on the cake (they have a party store at the launch that sells pizza, and we had quads to make pick-up much easier, so we figured why not).

I could have stayed on the water all day and thought nothing of it.  It felt great to be outside, being able to see the fish in the “lighted” hole was definitely a one-of-a-kind experience, and I can’t wait until we get to go again.

And for anyone who truly knows me, they know what an incredible thing that is for me to say.

It was a great time, and I’m honestly sorry I haven’t been doing it until now.

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