Tom is a 25+ year resident of Germantown and the surrounding community. He currently lives in Hubertus with his wife and two small kids on a hobby farm near Bark Lake. Tom's blog will likely not save the world, but hopefully, you'll get some enjoyment from his ramblings.
This week, I’m heading up to Northern Wisconsin with my buddy Dave for a week of R&R, and to do some fishing and golfing in the Eagle River area. One thing I’m totally looking forward to is “that smell”. If you don’t know what smell I’m talking about, I’ll try and explain. It’s something of a cross between pine needles, cedar and fresh rain. That probably makes no sense to anyone that’s never been up there, but to those that have, it probably makes all the sense in the world.
So, every time I go up north and smell “that smell”, I’m immediately reminded of so many childhood memories of family trips to Northern Wisconsin. My family was not financially rich by any means, but Dad always found a way to finance an annual weeklong trip to the Minocqua or Hayward area for our family. Some of my earliest childhood memories come from these trips........
- The “dumpy” cabins we would stay in and the fact that they seemed like castles to us.
- “Camp breakfasts” at Paul Bunyan’s.
- Catching my first sunfish off the pier when no adults were around to supervise me.
- Filling an entire KFC bucket with frogs we caught at Lake Sharon.
- Dad firing up the grill every night and cooking us some sort of BBQ delicacy.
- All the cool stuff we would buy in the gift shops in town. Bow and arrow sets, Mexican jumping beans, “authentic” Indian tomahawks and drums, pocket knives, cap guns, Chinese finger locks, rock candy, boomerangs, jaw breakers and a whole bunch of other novelties that would probably never be sold today because they’re considered lethal to children or are politically incorrect. That’s sad.
- Evening drives to the garbage dump to see the bears and early evening walks to look for deer.
- Sitting in the lodge tavern all day on rainy days playing pinball, drinking soda and eating potato chips until I was ready to puke.
- Bats that would swoop down and hit you on the head at dusk.
- Feeding all the animals at Jim Peck’s Wildwood (which is still there!).
- Dad fishing for musky the entire week, and never catching one, year after year, after year. I also remember him buying me my first musky rig and teaching me how to musky fish. Is it coincidence that I’ve never actually caught a musky!?
But most of all, I remember what fun we would have as a family. I can’t tell you how much I’m looking forward to taking my kids on family trips to the north woods. So while this will be a good “testosterone week” for Dave and me, I’ll be scouting out some places to take the kids next year.
G’Night G’Town!
A vacation is having nothing to do and all day to do it in. ~Robert Orben
