My long-time friend and fishing buddy Dan Schlieffers retired and moved to Grand Coulee Dam, and since I was going to be in the area last Wednesday, I gave him a call. Turns out he and his partner Mary were going to be fishing off Crescent Beach and invited me to come down. They had fished there the day before and caught five big rainbow the day before in just a couple of hours. As I drove down the hill to the beach I saw that there were ice fishermen out on Crescent Lake, which is known for spiny rays. When I walked down the beach I could see that Dan had a rainbow on his stinger, that had to be 20 inches long. He and Mary were fishing with marshmallows and nightcrawlers or shrimp and were pleased to find this kind of quality trout fishing just minutes from their home. When I was at Coulee Playland there were people loading their sleds and heading out on the ice to fish for whitefish. When I passed through Coulee City I saw more ice fishing shelters off the island out there than I can remember ever seeing.