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The end of the season is drawing down, everyone is getting ready for the soft water season, but before we packed away the ice gear for another year, I promised my buddy and his lady friend I would get them out. She had never been and wanted to experience ice fishing. They don't have a lot of money so I told them if they got their fishing licences I would set all of us up on Cooks with one of the new popup tents that I traded Brian for. Saturday night I show up at my buddies place and the two of them are hammered. I figure 'We aren't going ice fishing tomorrow'. So I tell them 'Call me when you wake up tomorrow and we'll go.' Sunday I get up around 8 or 9. No news. My buddy gets up around 11:30 and she still isn't awake. I figure this isn't happening. Around 1PM I get a text from her 'ICE FISHING!!!'. So I guess we are still on. We get out on the ice, full gear around 2:30. Still gives us a lot of the day before dark. I must not have been paying attention because I tried setting the pop up tent inside out. I figure its going to be one of those days. (seriously, I'll try putting the videos on youtube or something. They're pretty hilarious to look at now. I wasn't amused at the time.) So we get the huts set up, holes drilled and everyone comfy. Now, the thing about Cook's bay and myself is, I know people catch eater perch there. I've seen the videos and seen people catch them, but I seriously don't think I have ever had one over 5 inches. I just always get the dinks. So I'm expecting a day of a decent number of fish but no size. Then something strange happens. My buddies lady friend pulls an eater size perch out of the hole. Then some small ones and some perch stealing our minnow. Then my buddy pulls an eater through the hole. Then I end up getting two. Then it was on. We were all competing for most fish, biggest fish. Most eaters. Anything we could challenge each other to. Around 7pm we had 11 keepers on the ice, which was incredible. We hooked into so many perch we had lost count and everyone is having a good time. The sun is starting to go down so I say to everyone, last minnow before we head in. My buddies lady friend's rod bends over, we can actually hear the drag working on this one. She fights it for a little bit and pulls this monster of a perch out of the hole. Easily biggest one of the night. My buddy and I both pull up our lines and start packing and she says 'Can't we fish just a little more'. To which we explained 'last cast' karma and why it was imperative we ended on a high note and stopped fishing right then. Now, yet another friend is hooked on fishing. You know, I know a lot of people who say 'fishing' just isn't their thing. But I can't think of anyone that has ever said that after a successful day of catching fish. I think everyone likes catching. Two more parting shots. One last look at cooks for the winter. and our favorite contest "Try to make the little fish look as big as possible. One more good shot for the season.