A wedding in Michigan City brought my wife and I back to the Midwest in June. Since I’m originally from Chicago, and spent quite a bit of time in Wisconsin growing up, we thought it would be fun to spend a week up there afterwards. Part of that plan was for me to do the highpoint while in the area.
However, we ended up having so much fun fishing with family, I found it hard to pull myself away to drive 1.5 hours from Post Lake to Timm’s Hill. And as you well know, I have zero interest in driving to any of these state highpoints. So my intent was to start near the south end of Spirit Lake.
I was going to catch the Ice Age Trail off WI-102 at the Rib Lake/Wood Lake trailhead. This stroll though the Northwoods of Wisconsin would have been 2 miles on this National Scenic Trail before going another 8 on Timm’s Hill Trail. I was looking at a 20-mile day with a 3 hour drive, 
alone, while everyone else would be reeling in fish after fish on Upper Post Lake.
I was torn and kept saying, “Oh, I’ll go tomorrow”.
Giving Up Hiking for Fishing
We also had a lakefront AirBnB and thought fishing off the dock would be good enough. It wasn’t. We immediately wished we had something lined up that got us out onto the water. Then I remembered resorts like Bumber’s and Chief Lake Lodge who would rent boats to those who stayed with them. The closest one I found that resembled my memory is Twin Oaks Resort on Lower Post Lake. Unfortunately, they don’t rent boats but referred us to a guy who did.
Brian DeHart rented us this pontoon boat for the week, which was perfect for what we needed!
The boat was totally set up for fishing with lots of room for those who wanted to cast or relax as we drifted around. It really made all the difference in the world for us that week… everybody loved it!
We were catching everything from Perch to Crappies to Bluegills and Bass.
What we really wanted was to pull in a nice Northern Pike… or even a Muskie!
Instead, we just caught a lot of little Northerns that were fun to reel in but way too small to keep.
The Walleyes made for a decent fish fry…
…and the sunsets were spectacular.
We’re going to have to do this again, next time with more of a focus on getting Timm’s Hill.
