An old joke goes something along these lines…two old fisherman are chewing the fat, and one asks the other, so where's the best place on earth to take a vacation, the one old cane poler sez, why its Iowa for sure, and the other relic bobber flipper asks, Iowa, why on earth Iowa, the first geezer responds, that a day in Iowa, always feels like it lasts a week. The flip side to that, is a four day stint in the Superior National Forest, sails past, in the blink of an eye. It's the b-dubz, but she's just not all dressed up for summer yet so trees don't look right with one trying to bud out over there, while the rest of the forest knew better. They weren't going green until the real heat was gonna stay around. Oh and the water is cold. I mean all the water is cold, cold, and take your breath away cold. One woodpecker started rap tap tapping, and across a bay he got a rapid answer. Whiskey jacks, never ones to be bashful, ate any little scrap we tossed and chirped for more. At night my nose froze in the cold tented air. Twice we woke to snow and you can't possibly imagine how long it takes to get a fire going and the flames of heat into my perma- frosted flesh. I wore wool, 24 hours a day. From chin up to sundown, and I mean every moment in between. If you ever forget what coffee is supposed to smell like, taste like, and how warm it can make you feel, take a spring fling in the dubz. There wasn't anybody else around; there wasn't a hint of a winged pest, and the most active bird we saw during our entire visit was male mallards. I think because we were early enough this year we saw the arrival of loons. I never had worst crappie fishing. It was awful. We didn't have a fish fry we had a frost off. A lake that normally allows for some real slabs, was the Dead Sea, but that's fishing in northern Minnesota in the spring, or any day of the year in Iowa. The trout whisperer