Spring Bay Resort
MuskieFIRST Outing
Lake Vermilion, West End
Cook, Minnesota
August 18-23, 2012

My friend Jonathan and I made our second visit together to Spring Bay Resort but it was our first MuskieFIRST Outing. We checked in on Saturday afternoon and had planned to stay and leave the following Saturday. The outing was a lot of fun with the resort providing pulled pork sandwiches, 10 oz. ribeye steak, fish fry, dock seminars, and musky lure giveaways. For me, this was a trip I will never forget.

Fishing was slow every day. Whether we casted shallow, deep, weedbeds, reefs, rocks, points, daytime, nighttime, etc. (our usual spots) fishing was challenging nonetheless. Since this was a Muskie Outing our target was to try and catch the largest musky in camp. We didn’t see any fish but three of the guys in camp said they caught one, largest was 49″. Other stories we heard were the muskies were following lures down deep and typically slow and lazy. Jon and I did both land a handful of smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, northern pike, and sunfish. It wasn’t until Tuesday when I started catching nice largemouth bass in the lily pads using a Banjo Frog. Evening seemed to be the best bite for bass but they were biting during the day also. Each bay had nice weedbeds and lily pads on the back end, the key was to search for these spots and cast them. Largest I pulled from the lily pads was a 19.5″ largemouth on a Pop-R and that fish bit just on the outside of the pads.

On Monday evening I will never forget that day. We had gotten back from a nice topwater bass bite near the resort. I had just gotten out of the shower and came into the dining area when Jon said he has some sad news to share. Jon said his father had passed away. I was speechless and in disbelief. Jon said he had to go home early morning. I decided to stay for a couple more days just to wrap up the trip and come home to attend his father’s funeral. On Tuesday morning, we drove to Virginia, MN where Jon rented a car and then he drove home. It was sad to see my best friend leave after a short couple of fun days together but I was more sad that he had lost his father.

Early Thursday morning, while at the outing I met a new friend name Brian and together we went out a did a little musky fishing. Although I didn’t land anything, I helped Brian land his biggest northern pike at 38 inches. It was a whopper! We got back to the dock around noon and I checked out Thursday afternoon. I was able to attend the funeral that Friday.