#6 Rainy River, ON: My Own Big Fish Story

The most interesting job I've ever had was in Rainy River.  I was wondering what God had for me when I got a call from my friend Nancy.  Do you want to work as a commercial fisherman with my two uncles on Lake of the Woods?  I took the bait.  

It was just the kind of thing I loved.  Out on shining water every day, the anticipation of seeing what our nets might bring up, cleaning and icing our catch beside our island cabin.  Nancy and I made it a point of cooking up and sampling every kind of fish our nets dragged up - from miniature blood-sucking eels (not awesome) to now-rare sturgeon (awesome).

There was a big surprise in our net after the biggest storm of the fall.  There were very few fish but then, side by side in the net, were the biggest walleye and the biggest northern pike we had caught all year.  This might be a fishing tale, but I'd guess at 15 and 25 lbs respectively.  Not quite a Roseau River sturgeon but pretty cool nonetheless.

A couple of weeks ago in preparing for our around-Canada loop, I connected with Nancy again.  Did she know of somebody's yard where we could park our motorhome for the night?  We had decided to dip into Minnesota on our way east to get around the south side of Lake of the Woods and then back up at Rainy.  As a result of that conversation, we made some beautiful new friends who shared our vision and prayers for Canada.



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