and then down near LaCrosse on the 18th.

What do I need to see and do?

Go fishing if you can.  Skip the fishing hall of fame, it sucks.  Famous Daves on Round Lake (I think) has great food.  

From LaCrosse, take a drive down Hwy 35.   Stop in at one of the Lock & Dam's and check it out.  They are quite the engineering marvel for how old they are.  The Mississippi river is pretty cool to travel along.   Possibly boat hotties on the river too.

Quoted: From LaCrosse, take a drive down Hwy 35.   Stop in at one of the Lock & Dam's and check it out.  They are quite the engineering marvel for how old they are.  The Mississippi river is pretty cool to travel along.   Possibly boat hotties on the river too.

Thanks.  I live about 10 miles from a Mississippi lock!  I especially like going out there in the winter to watch the eagles.

Quoted: Quoted: From LaCrosse, take a drive down Hwy 35.   Stop in at one of the Lock & Dam's and check it out.  They are quite the engineering marvel for how old they are.  The Mississippi river is pretty cool to travel along.   Possibly boat hotties on the river too. Thanks.  I live about 10 miles from a Mississippi lock!  I especially like going out there in the winter to watch the eagles.

I love watching them ice fish in the Genoa National Fish Hatchery.

GO TO THE FAMOUS DAVE'S!!!!!!!

After action report -

- I have a decent case of Muskie fever now; I will be going back without the family so I can focus on fishing.

- The locals laughed when I talked about the temps cooling down to 85F at home.  Their idea of drought is pretty different than here, also.

- Famous Dave's is sufficient, but it's not the best barbeque in the world.

- Didn't get to fish much, both spinning reels broke down, but mostly had to entertain the rest of the family.

- The cabins at Riverside Motel in Hayward are pretty nice, especially if there are only two persons.  The downside is their location in the middle of town.  The owner is a tightwad German.

- The Fishing Museum is excellent, if you appreciate such things.

- Gas was $2.76 most of the time.

- I also want to get back up to Bayfield for a few days.

If you don't have anyone to fish Musky with, I'm willing to drive down from Superior and go half and half on boat/motor rental.  I have 4 baitcating musky rods and a TON of huge lures for those monsters that I'll gladly share with you.  You won't get to use my few 'special' lures though.  The last 'special' one I borrowed got buried in some wood underwater.  

I've fished Grindstone, and Teal lake down there.  I would love to put some time in on the Chip flowage someday.  They both seemed to have lots of smallmouth bass in them too.

Quoted: If you don't have anyone to fish Musky with, I'm willing to drive down from Superior and go half and half on boat/motor rental.  I have 4 baitcating musky rods and a TON of huge lures for those monsters that I'll gladly share with you.  You won't get to use my few 'special' lures though.  The last 'special' one I borrowed got buried in some wood underwater.   I've fished Grindstone, and Teal lake down there.  I would love to put some time in on the Chip flowage someday.  They both seemed to have lots of smallmouth bass in them too.

That sounds good, especially since I probably need some advice.  The Chippewa Flowage looks awesome, it seems to get more traffic than some of the other lakes, and I wouldn't enter it without a good map and a compass at the bare bones minumum because I don't like to get lost in small boats.  One guide I talked to at Pastika's lives close by and has never been on that water!

Grindstone is pretty big but there's a huge bar that runs 6-15ft under the surface (the rest of the lake is like 40ft deep IIRC) so we just fished off the bar.  I had one follow there.  Teal was fairly easy to fish, I caught one small musky there and had a nice follow at a classic spot (wind blown rock reef between two points).  

The Chip is huge but I'd just hit certain spots, a little at a time I guess.  I love using jerkbaits and topwaters but I have bucktails and crankbaits too.  I"ll post a pic of my lure buckets later tonight sometime.   Topwater lures are a rush, you see those bad boys come cruising after them just under the surface and it gets you all shook up.  I've pulled lures away from muskies at least 5 times.

Jason