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The calendar said it was September but last
week in Minnesota seemed more like July. A good friend from my U of M days invited me to go
walleye fishing in Canada and when I got off the plane from Tucson the Minneapolis temperature
was in the 90's, perfect weather for shorts and the beach. This was a much different Twin
Cities September than I remembered growing up here.
My friend Gary and I and four other guys were
going on a five-day fly in fishing trip on a lake in northern Ontario. On the drive up to
Nestor Falls, Canada to meet with the rest of the party we made a couple of interesting stops I
want to mention to fellow SKI readers.
We drove a route that went near Foley and so I
decided to show Gary the Kampa homestead in Duelm, where Ralph and Sally Kampa still live. The
farms up there looked more prosperous than I remembered from the last trip. There's been lots of
rain and the corn was high and very green. We stopped and drove through the very well kept
cemetery behind the Catholic Church whose name I can't recall. The head stones, with all the
Herbsts, Abfalters, Kampas and other familiar surnames inscribed, shone like
they'd been recently polished. It was about 6 PM and the sun's angle made for some great
countryside scenes.
We decided to have a burger at Jack and Jim's bar
in Duelm. Aside from the church it is the only public building in the village. The parking lot
was full and the place was busy serving Friday night supper to families and couples who packed
the place. Life in rural Minnesota viewed from this perspective looked pretty good.
We drove on to Gary's cabin near Bemidji to
stay over night and the next morning drove through Duluth and had lunch at the famous
Grandma's Restaurant on the harbor. Old buildings in the harbor canal area have been
renovated and has become a tourist haven complete with an aquarium, quite a change from the
run down waterfront I remember visiting as a kid with my parents. I'd recommend a visit if
any of you is in the area.
The warm weather held all the way into Canada and
we fished in our Bermuda shorts for a couple of day. There were plenty of walleye and northern
to catch and release. The days of bringing back boat loads of fish are over as the fishing
regulations now permit just two per person per day to keep. Also, any walleye over 21" in
length must be returned to the water, a pretty sound conservation policy.
We were able to catch a little of the
President's 9/11 message via short wave radio but up there we'd left behind most serious
thoughts at home, concentrating on the out-of-doors and the fishing.
I'm back in Minnesota as I write this and
typical September has returned. It is 62 degrees and there is a light rain falling. It
feels good, like old times.
By Dick Kampa from SKI News,
Fall 2002.
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