I've only been ice fishing once in my life, when I was very young. I don't think I was in school yet, so I was probably four or five, and it must have been unusually cold - at that time, we were living in southern Ohio, and winters there are not as terribly harsh as they are in more northern places. My dad took me. I remember being mesmerized by the hole in the ice and the black water beneath, and after a while being bundled up in the bottom of a sleeping bag against the bitter weather. My dad had bought me gummy bears as a special treat, and he would drop them down to me in the sleeping bag, and they were incredibly chewy because they were nearly frozen. I don't remember if we caught anything, but I loved sitting on the ice, and knowing that there was a different world moving and living underneath all that stillness.
I can see the allure of an ice shanty. For now, I may have to settle for these.
