Rogers On Red

[Onin24Eagle]

I don't do the facebook thing so I'm going to say my thing on here.

Rogers has a picture on their page of a large tub full of walleyes (about 100) and only 5 kids posed in front of it.  Of course there are a bunch of people commenting on how bad that looks. 
I'm posting here to defend that picture.

There's a group of kids, aged 7 - 14, that go on a school field trip every year.  They come up to Minnesota from Kansas.  The trip lasts about a week and a half and includes various activities such as snowshoeing, broom hockey, skiing, and of course, ice fishing.  They spend 2 nights on Upper Red Lake and rent houses.  I don't recall exactly how I got involved, but I did, and I am part of this group.  This year we had about 80 kids, I think the exact number was like 77 or 78.  We rented all but one of Portavilla's houses and 4 houses from Up North and I also brought my own wheelhouse just for good measure.  I had 4 kids in my house with me and we caught only 9 walleyes and kept only 7. 

We left the lake yesterday morning with just over 100 fish for the entire group so we didn't exactly slaughter them.  The picture shown on Rogers website was taken by Rogers resort (we DO have a group photo) and it was taken when we were packing up to leave so all of the other kids at that time were packing out all of the stuff from their respective houses and the only ones in the photo were the kids in the house that is right behind them in the picture. 

I just wanted to put that out there so at least some people would get the whole story behind the photo.  These kids had a BLAST and tonight they get to reap the rewards as there's going to be a big bonfire and fish fry before they head back home tomorrow morning.

[corny13]

Good Job!   Sounds like a lot of fun for the kids...

[Onin24Eagle]

Thanks Corny.

Even though all I did for 2 days was tie hooks, bait hooks, untangle lines, cook pizzas and answer a billion questions about fishing, I too had a blast.  I tried my best to teach them what I could.  I do know that the kids that were in my house now know how to tie a polamar knot.

[The General]

Sounds like a blast to me.  Too bad people have to get the undies in a bunch so easy.

[HD]

Sounds like the kids had fun! Post the pic so we can see....

[Onin24Eagle]

I'll post the pic when I get it.  They put together a CD and DVD of their trip and mail it to me every year.  It usually arrives about a month after they go back.

[Boar]

way to give back! i take our local.4h families for a day each.year to get them.out and have fun on ice. it truley is sad how society is so quick to point fing by just a picture.

[snow1]

Kudos to you! this is a outing burned into their brains that will last a life time,greatt job.

[Onin24Eagle]

The past two years I've been nothing short of impressed watching these kids when they come up.  They call it the Winter Survival Camp and it is exactly that.  The two nights they spend fishing in the week and a half that they are up here are probably the two most comfortable nights of sleep they get.  There's a landowner just outside of Bemidji that lets them set up camp on his property.  The day they arrive they haul all of their gear back into the woods and have a massive army tent set up with barrel stoves and all of their cots, gear, etc within 3 hours.  They basically run it like the military with the guy in charge being the general and the other adults being the majors with the kids broken down by rank from sergeants down to privates and each group given a specific task to perform.  They know when they get up here each year that it could be -30 degrees out so there's no time to waste and every person has to rely on the person next to him to do his job or they'll freeze. 

Each year they come up I watch in amazement at how disciplined and organized these kids are.  They're also some of the nicest, most polite and courteous kids you'll ever meet.