Skillys Big Chip Lodge

Skillys Big Chip Lodge Skillys Lodge is large enough for 2 families or groups of 14 or so. If you like Chetek, Minocqua, Spooner or Rice Lake you'll love it! Seasonal rates apply.

Fishing, hunting, snowmobiling, trail riding,deer, duck, goose, grouse and turkey hunting, hiking and canoeing are here. Rates For Rent Weekly –Skillys Big Chip Lodge Summer 25% nonrefundable deposit to reserve. See VRBO.com//499909 5.5% WI Sales Tax
Hayward WI right on the Chippewa Flowage
Cabins available nearby. Reserve the pontoon or fishing boat. Owners
Gary W Skillestad 309-712-4767


To check availability, get a quote and reserve a date you may also go to http://www.vrbo.com/499909
Brett G Skillestad 309-712-5480

Before you rent, ask these questions. Do you have a lake view? Skilly’s – Yes, INCREDIBLE LAKE VIEW! How close is your dock? Skilly’s – 50 feet! Do you have electricity to the dock? Skilly’s Yes. Historic lakefront Skillys Big Chip Lodge on famous Moore’s Bay of the Chippewa Flowage(Home of the World Record Musky) is now for rent weekly. Waves lap the shore while the smell of brats fills the air. Cook out on the huge deck and chill with a cool drink or local Leinenkugel beer inside at an “old days” photo filled 15 seat bar with stereo system overlooking Big Chip.50 inch Satellite TV, air conditioning and WIFI. Float around and just relax in the summer. Plenty of space for guests with 2 half baths downstairs and one full bath with shower tub upstairs. 3 bedrooms(with 6 beds) upstairs and one (2 beds) downstairs. Rustic rooms(with some unlevel floors) are knotty pine with a huge kitchen with 2 refrigerators, electric oven, and a full size horizontal freezer. Legendary fishing is here for musky, northern, smallmouth, largemouth, walleye, crappie and bluegill, some right from the dock. I caught a 50" musky in 2020 off the dock in October!!! If you like Chetek, Rice Lake, Spooner or Minocqua you’ll love the Hayward Lakes area. Excellent ice fishing and snowmobiling nearby, just ask Skilly or Jenk’s Bait Shop(internet site). The fish cleaning house is next door. Drive the go cart track or clean up at the LCO Casino. Explore breathtaking wilderness as this lake is not cabin to cabin like many others. With friends around a campfire, the silence is broken only with a loons cry. Millions of stars light up the Northwoods sky and watch them shoot across the universe. Much of the shoreline is Chequemagon National Forest and will always remain uninhabited and public for canoeing, hiking/hunting. Take your swim floats to an island beach. Find the rope swing. There are spots where you’ll think you are in Canada. Hunt for trophy deer, bear, turkey, ducks and grouse that abound here. Leashed pets cleaned up after are no problem. This is a truly beautiful Northwoods destination with Hayward restaurants, golfing and shops nearby to be discovered. Give us a call now before your dates fill to set up your trip to God’s Country! The Skillestad’s thank you and will give you every tip we can to make your stay an incredibly fun time. Lodge weekly rate is seasonal. 25% down nonrefundable is required to secure dates. Upstairs MBR 1 queen 1 cot, BR2 1 double 2 twin, BR 3 1 twin below single top, downstairs curtain divided living room 2 couches and 1 queen bed & 1 twin surrounded by a curtain divider. Thank you, Gary W. Skillestad

Gary W Skillestad home
9070 W Moore's Bay Trail
Hayward WI 54843

RENT- Skillys Lodge
9068 W Moore’s Bay Trail
Hayward WI 54843

https://www.facebook.com/share/1EiiUDiv8i/
08/20/2026

https://www.facebook.com/share/1EiiUDiv8i/

This beast was caught on Monday night. That beautiful smile says it all...this was Jena's 3rd musky catch of her life. We're so proud to see young women breaking the barriers to what was traditionally a man's sport. She has Gage as her guide and net man...another couple that fishes and hunts together!
You go girl!

08/17/2026

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08/17/2026

Sturgeon Swimming in the Apostle Islands May Be Older Than Wisconsin Itself.

The lake sturgeon cruising the bottom of Lake Superior and Chequamegon Bay have always looked prehistoric. New research says some of them come close.

A study published in the Journal of Fish Biology by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Michigan State University finds that lake sturgeon can live 200 years or more, with some individuals approaching 300. That places them among the oldest freshwater fish in North America, in the same conversation as the Greenland shark.

The old method for aging a sturgeon was counting growth rings in a fin spine, the way you would read a tree stump. It works fine on a young fish. On an ancient one the rings crowd together until they blur, and researchers suspected they had been badly undercounting the oldest animals. So Scott Colborne and his team went at it differently. They pulled one of the largest long term datasets ever assembled for the species, growth records from tagged fish measured again and again over years, and ran the same mathematical models used to estimate the age of Greenland sharks.

The numbers came back much bigger than expected.

A sturgeon at the far end of that range would have been alive when the Boston Tea Party happened. It would have been swimming when Lewis and Clark headed west, when Wisconsin became a state, and when the Edmund Fitzgerald went down. Indigenous communities have long held that sturgeon live as long as 400 years. Modern statistics were catching up to knowledge that was already here.

The conservation math matters more than the trivia. Sturgeon mature slowly and spawn infrequently. A population knocked down by overharvest and dam building does not bounce back in a season or a decade. If the fish live twice as long as anyone assumed, then every survival estimate, every harvest model, and every habitat restoration scorecard needs a second look.

Give them the chance, Colborne said, and they will figure it out. They have been doing it for millions of years.

Getting a few walleyes trolling crankbaits.
08/14/2026

Getting a few walleyes trolling crankbaits.

Jumping Jack Flash was the best Stones song the Southbound Freight band did back at grade school dances in the late 60s....
08/13/2026

Jumping Jack Flash was the best Stones song the Southbound Freight band did back at grade school dances in the late 60s. Here's my attempt at an acoustic version of it. I was never the lead vocal on this one. Maybe you can tell... Fun song that takes me way back...

South Bound Freight played this Stones song late 60's

Here's a clip from November 2025. We played a little while catching 6...that's right...6 muskies that day on suckers. Wh...
08/13/2026

Here's a clip from November 2025. We played a little while catching 6...that's right...6 muskies that day on suckers. What a day!

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

08/11/2026

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Hayward, WI

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