ON MILLE LACS LAKE, Minn. _ Kevin Westerlund was piloting the 18-foot Alumacraft out to one of this monster lake's famous mud flats, checking the giant GPS screen on occasion.
But he probably didn't need the electronic map at all.
"I remember when the only depth finder we had was an anchor on a rope," Westerlund said.
Somehow, back in the day, he and his brothers and buddies managed to find the best spots, dead-reckoning from distant landmarks on shore with no electronics. He still remembers all the mud flat and rock pile names, and locations, by heart.
"We had an old cedar-strip boat and a 9.9 Johnson and we'd go out and catch fish," he said as he throttled-up the 150-horsepower Mercury.
Yet despite all the talk of the "good old days," Westerlund said fishing on the lake has been as good or better in recent years, especially this summer, compared to when he grew up on the shores of Mille Lacs in the 1970s.
"We're definitely catching more big fish now, no doubt. If we caught a limit of 14-inchers back then, we'd be happy," said Westerlund, of Duluth. "Now we're having days when we catch multiple fish over 30 inches."
In May and June walleye fishing on Mille Lacs was phenomenal by any standards. Westerlund, a retired Duluth postal carrier, makes the 90-minute trip back home to Malmo as often as he can. Earlier this week he invited myself and his buddy, Rick Crowell of Duluth.
"He was my mailman," Crowell said of how the two met. Somehow, between handing off letters, they must have talked fishing. Now they are frequent fishing partners, with Crowell supplying the boat on this trip.
