Boatless in Minnesota

From my Nephew, Kevin

Last Friday my dealer called to tell me that my kicker motor had water in the oil and a new seal kit needed to be installed, however it would not be done in time for the weekend fishing.  This seemed OK as I needed some quality time to get some stuff done around the house, as well I had a pretty good offer on Sunday.   Bill called me from Mille Lacs and asked if I could help him on Sunday. Seems like it would work out for all of us, my dealer could keep the boat over the weekend, I'd get the garden and other things finished, and Sunday I could head up and spend some time with Bill.  So Saturday I finished planting the garden, sprayed my apple trees with Sevin to chemically thin them out as they have a ton of apples on them, mowed, and attempted to clean the pole shed  (Good Luck with that!)  One of the nicest things that happened this week was my nephew Kevin texted me on Monday exclaiming that I should have something special in my receiving department so I left my meeting to check it out.  I pretty much figured what it was but upon opening the box only confirmed those suspicions, some Willamette Valley wines, a Pinot Noir and a Chardonnay, both very fine wines from one of the best Pinot Noir regions in the world.  He certainly knows how to tug at his Uncle's heart strings and I look forward to enjoying these soon as I added them to my wine cellar, never the less I'm always excited to have something from him.  I will definitely post how well these vintages are as I do like Oregon wines for sure!

So a quick update on the boat, uffda.  So Joe at Frankies has reportedly fixed the network system that

Wave Pro Air Adjustable boat pedestals

is been an issue from opener.  How in the heck did a seal on a new kicker motor go, well, I guess it's possible, let's hope this is under warranty!  The trolling motor bracket is the second one I've gone through so far.  When we returned from Canada a few week back my friend Bruce experienced some terrible back issues and landed in the hospital for a few days.  We got talking about different seat mounts to help balance the ride somewhat and he ended up with Smoothmoves, something that I was looking at since the Sportsshow, but a little research and I decided to go with the WavePro style.  They seem less bulky and Frankies carries them so it seemed a bit easier just to call and order a couple, which I did!  It should make those long rides into camp a whole lot easier.  It has an optional air pump that one can use to adjust the ride softness so I am sure it will take a little getting used to. The other reason to order from Frankie's is they have said that they sell a lot of these and knowing my Ranger, I am confident that they will do it right on the selection and install.  Maybe I am just getting more lazy these days, but it will be nice and if I do get my boat for this weekend, it's going to be windy on Mille Lacs so that would be a great way to test them out.  On Monday I get to bring my boat back in to get a Bimini top made for it.  I have never been one for a top however as I get older, protection from the sun and rain seem to make more sense, especially when we fish Lac Seul where it is mostly vertical jigging off the side of the boat.  This wheel boat stuff is hard to get used to after spending 36 years in a tiller type boat!

Sunday was spent at Lundeens helping him to get his rigs ready for some up and coming guide trips. We cleaned his big ProLine first, mounted some electronics, and started it before we moved to his 16 foot Lund that we used to crappie fish last fall.  He was installing Structurescan 3D so I helped him run the NMEA 2000 network as well as fishing the transducer cable up through the side of the boat. We had originally planned to take the big boat out on the lake but there was something wrong with the motor, so it was good that we got the smaller Lund taken care of first as he ended up using that for his trip.  The walleyes have really been biting on Mille Lacs with a report in Wednesday's paper that a Launch with 20 guys went out for 3.5 hours last week, caught and released 374 walleyes.  That's a lot of fish for sure.  There are rumors that I may be back on Lac Seul on June 24th, time will tell for sure!