Author: Billy Dougherty

Kip Zent called me this past winter. He told me about the time he had with his father thirty years ago on a houseboat trip on Rainy Lake. Kip wanted to have the same kind of experience with his son. We talked often and I assured Kip that we would do everything we could possible […]

We left port about 3:00 PM and headed east on a twenty-five mile cruise.  We had the Chairman II, Lady II, and Lady III along with twenty-one guests and. We arrived about 6:30 PM and secured the houseboats to shore tying them together so you can step from boat to boat. Chef Jim and Bernie […]

Norman John Westerhold has fished every year on the Chairman  II since 1987. Norm missed last year dealing with leukemia. Norm’s group is here for another Rainy Lake fishing trip. Unfortunately, Norm did not win his battle with cancer.  I will write about Norm on my Rainy lake Houseboat Blog. It has been tradition that […]

We left Rainy Lake Houseboats dock at 7:30 AM with the Art Kammer group with Brule Narrows as our chosen mooring site. Guides on this trip were Joey Dougherty, Jon Balaski and Bill Dougherty. The forecast was for westerly winds with a mixture of thunderstorms and rain. We were not out for long when we […]

Pete Ankeny, Phil Ankeny, Steve Wilson, and Dave Ryerse joined us for 3 and 1/2 days of smallmouth bass fishing. Joe Dougherty and Jon Balaski would be the guides. The technique we planned on using were popping bugs on a fly rod. Usually we are fishing bedded bass at this time of the year. This […]

Jim Ridling’s party arrived Thursday afternoon for their 26th annual Rainy Lake Houseboat fishing trip. Tony Casereto took them out on their first Rainy Lake Houseboat trip on one of our Kempton Cruisers. This year’s group had Jim, Phil Pyeatt, John Crawford, Doug Inman, Jim Wilson, and Ken Upchurch. Jim Ridling and Ken Upchurch live […]

June 4, 2012 We left the dock at 7:15 AM on the Chairman II with long time friend and customer John Kangas. John has been bringing his business associates to Rainy Lake Houseboats every year since 1978. We cruised to Brule Narrows having breakfast underway and tied up at Brule Narrows South. We were off […]

Smallmouth bass hit the beds big time on Friday. Joey Dougherty and his friend and mentor John Peterson from Northland Fishing Tackle fished smallies on Friday. The day before John and his brother Duane caught a large number of smallmouth in 5-10 feet of water just off spawning areas. We had a crazy week of […]

I guided George Cochran and his son Chase on Saturday May 26. George and Chase wanted to catch some walleyes for Saturday evenings dinner. It was pretty a chilly ride on Rainy Lake, I even put the gloves on.  The forecast was for a 50 % chance of rain 35-degree early morning temperature and easterly 10-15 mph […]

Every year for the past thirty years the Welsch party comes to Rainy Lake Houseboats for a week. I am lucky enough to guide for them a couple days each year. Todays pattern was similar to yesterday with one exception. We switched to a snap jigging technique. We cast back behind the boat about 50 […]