What are the opening hours?

Tuesday 4pm - 10pm Wednesday 4pm - 10pm Thursday 4pm - 10pm Friday 4pm - 10pm Saturday 12pm - 10pm

http://www.islandviewlodgemercer.com/

Island View Lodge, 720W Fisher Lake Road, Mercer, WI (2026)

10/09/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(Piers come out Sunday 9AM, join us! Please.)

October 9

The Blessed Extinction of Friday Fish Fry: Tonight marks the final Fish Fry of the 2026 season. Subjects are invited to descend upon da Lodge from 4:00PM to 8:00 PM to eat anything and everything. All species of fish, chicken and shrimp remain, though not in quantities Management feels comfortable promoting as “All You Can Eat” without the lingering fear of someone going out of their way to prove this statement false. Oh well.
The Boofay will boast some unique changes this evening, such as baked potatoes in place of traditionally deep-fried potato batons. Perhaps an empty metal trough once the potato pancakes run dry. Buns? Ample amounts. Are you keto? Tito’s and water.

Termination of Weekly Resource Anxiety: For the past five months, Management has devoted a massive amount of time every single week to calculating quantities, ordering supplies, travelling to Walmart for odds and ends that were not delivered, preparing food, having Julie waitress, cooking and cleaning up, all while attempting the Sisyphean task of predicting the appetites of a population who may or may not materialize. Some Fridays, preparations were made for a small army only to discover that the small army had eaten in town. Nevertheless, Management continued to maintain the full spread, week after week, just in case. That ends tonight. We got what we got, Julie has been laid off and for the first time since May, running out of food will not be considered a travesty.

[Management wishes to acknowledge our traysured Fish Fry regulars, whose unwavering loyalty is largely responsible for the continued existence of an operation Management would otherwise have terminated years ago. Your patronage means everything to us and is the reason we continue to sentence ourselves to this weekly suffering].

Clearance pricing will be in effect. Supplies will, lord willing, dwindle to crippling amounts. No offense, but we are hoping that those who arrive late are forced to starve. We realize this is a unique if idiotic way to operate a restaurant, but everyone has their own spin on things.

Recognition of an Exceptionally Productive Civilian: Management (and all Boofayites) wish to extend their sincere appreciation to Louise, who has faithfully prepared and delivered homemade desserts every single Friday for the past three (3) years without fail. The one week she was out of town she made them ahead of time and made her husband Dave drop them off. She grows many of her own ingredients, never repeats a recipe, and has somehow maintained this extraordinary level of productivity all in exchange for the occasional cod. She is a one-woman agricultural and culinary institution, and we are incredibly fortunate to have her. Thank you, Louise! Although it is mildly insulting to da cook that the desserts are the most complimented feature of the Boofay, drowning my own sorrows in rhubarb pie is ok by me.

10/08/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(Oma Township)

October 8

Operational Difficulties Preclude Meaningful Reporting: In light of today being what scientists commonly refer to as "one of those days," this brief will be brief*. What began as a routine expedition into civilization rapidly deteriorated into a logistical nightmare, further complicated by Management's inadvertent immersion in the annual migration of approximately 40 billion side-by-sides.
In an encouraging development, not all of today's errands were resort-related, a tentative indication that Management may someday resume having a life of its own. Today's itinerary included the dentist, the bank, the grocery store and the library, whereupon approximately 700 quires of instructional materials were printed to commence Small Companion's formal education. Her mathematical abilities are already rather advanced following two (2) summers of independently managing ice sales, but preliminary assessments reveal alarming deficiencies in Small Engine Repair and Electrical Engineering. Management intends to address these shortcomings before her third birthday, at which point she will be expected to assume responsibility for routine property maintenance.

Operations: Bar opens at 4:00 Thursday and Friday. Noon on Saturday.

Cessation of Organized Number Calling: The final Bingo of the season begins at 6:00. Management would like to extend a sincere thank you to everyone who has attended. Bingo has become the favorite weekly event here, thanks entirely to the participants and especially Pickleball Keith. His dedication to recreational ball handling has been instrumental in the program's success, and Management looks forward to exploiting his talents again next season. Additional recognition is due to Tad, who remains confined to the kitchen cell, Taco Tina, the confusingly named Bingo waitress and Alex, the keeper of fun. Only so much can be had at a time. Kidding, kind of. Thank you all!

Fig. 1: Pickleball Keith and Taco Tina displaying their traditional Tuesday plumage. Management acknowledges that today is Thursday, but this is the best photographic evidence available at this late hour.

*guess not

10/07/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(7,209 miles or one call to Brightspeed to New Delhi)

October 7

Final Island Time: Tonight marks the final Island Time of the 2026 season, although many of the program’s usual tropical participants have already migrated south and are now safely nested in their desert habitats. Those specimens remaining in northern Wisconsin are encouraged to put on something festive yet hideous and report to the bar beginning at 4:00. Free drink with proper attire.

Collapse of the Regional Communications Network: Management is cautiously pleased to announce what appears to be the end of our abusive relationship with Brightspeed, the unfathomably horrible telephone company that has been wreaking havoc upon the area since taking over for CenturyLink, whom also sucked.

Historical Evidence Supporting Eradication: Over the winter, the only reason Management wanted internet service at the Lodge was to occasionally check the camera facing the lake and post updates on Facebook. This is primarily done to taunt the snowmobilers who remain furious that we are not open, although watching ice-out is also interesting to fishermen and Management, who really does not want to come home until that process is well underway. The camera, a $25 rip-off-brand nanny cam purchased more than a decade ago, never worked once last winter. Management naturally assumed the low-tech relic had finally crapped out. But it had not.
Brightspeed had apparently conducted some sort of “upgrade” in the area that required customers to obtain “upgraded” equipment. Management was never notified of this and, being 1,500 miles away, did not receive the mystery-solving neighborhood chatter until returning in May. We had therefore been paying one hundred eighty-six dollars ($186) per month since October 2025 for literally nothing. Zero internet. Not one internet. Not even a small internet. A refund was quite rudely denied.

Management has only gone truly “ape sh*t” once in her life. This was that day.

[It should be noted that after thirteen years of working at a computer and hating every single second of it, FMoDL has LESS THAN ZERO TOLERANCE for technology. Have you seen the website? Wifi reaching the cabins, taking credit cards in the bar, online booking, anything making life here better or easier? NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. Even a landline is pushing the edge of what technology she is capable of dealing with. (She would gladly pay for someone else to make these enhancements, but someone else does not seem to exist).]

After more than five hours spent being on hold and being transferred among various useless representatives, something snapped deep within Management. The fear of losing the phone number Island View has had since approximately the 1600s was the only thing preventing Management from doing what she actually wanted to do: travel to Brightspeed headquarters and personally demonstrate the meaning of an outage.
Finally, the already non-functioning internet was canceled. Starlink was obtained (not a small or inexpensive feat). But the landline lingered. Would people who have been coming here since before they were fetuses accept a new phone number? What if the kindly old man down the road, who has had the Island View number carved into his kitchen wall near where the telephone used to be before his great grandson got him that flip phone, suddenly wants a cheeseburger to go only to discover that the number no longer rings here? These were serious concerns.
As the summer progressed, however, Management’s fear of forcing the public to accept change steadily diminished until it not only vanished but became exciting. You see, the phone almost never worked all summer anyway. Brightspeed had inadvertently conducted an extremely successful trial run in which our customers were gradually trained to understand that calling Island View Lodge was futile.
The ATM in the bar also uses the phone line. Consequently, it was a PITA virtually every day of the entire summer, frequently forcing Management to accept credit cards through the extremely inconvenient and somewhat shady procedure of taking the customer’s credit card home and henpecking the numbers into the desktop computer because we do not have a card reader. Nothing inspires consumer confidence quite like watching the proprietor disappear out the back door of the bar carrying your Visa.

Against All Odds, the Phone May Ring: Pickleball Keith, our new IT guy, mentioned something about Ooma, some way of receiving phone calls out of the blue (?). FModL refused to even listen let alone participate in the new strategy. Alex was forced into action. Today, it seems to be working as several threatening emails from Brightspeed demanding we mail back various unspecified pieces of equipment or we will be billed automatically have come through.

None of this, none of this was what we had envisioned while looking at the Craigslist ad for some resort in Wisconsin! We thought we would be fishing. Cutting grass. Maybe painting if it’s nice out.

Management’s Vision for the Future: We do not want a card reader. We do not want a desktop. Hell, we do not want a phone! Ideally, Island View Lodge would operate entirely on cash, verbal agreements and the honor system. We insist on forcing customers who claim to “want to get away from it all” to actually get away from it all. You cannot have it both ways, people. You cannot flee civilization and then come here and complain because you can’t stream the big game or pay by rat a tat tapping. And I will never forget the idiot who called at 6pm on the Fourth of July in 2020 to complain that he couldn’t order food online. (The phone worked back then).

Final Island Time tonight. Come get away from it all. Whether you like it or not.

P.S. Phone should work now. Same number as always.

10/06/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(778 million kilometers to Jupiter)

October 6

Abundance Immediately Precedes Collapse: Today marks the final Taco Tuesday and Trivia Night of the 2026 season. Current “Mexican” inventories remain unusually robust. Management can state with a high degree of confidence that individuals arriving tonight may order what they actually want rather than selecting from whatever species remain extant. This abundance is temporary.
Beginning tomorrow, Island View Lodge enters a semi-controlled resource depletion period in which normal restaurant operations will be attempted using progressively smaller quantities of increasingly unrelated ingredients. Substitutions, localized extinctions and abrupt menu collapse should be expected as Management attempts to achieve absolute zero inventory by Saturday night.

Final tacos begin at 4 PM. Final Trivia begins at 6 PM. Come hungry and intellectually overconfident.

Cabin Raffle Remains Statistically Attractive: Management reminds the public that the annual Cabin Raffle does exist. Odds of winning are exceptionally favorable this year due to low ticket sales, a phenomenon researchers have traced primarily to Alex’s refusal to be bothered to sell things.
For those unfamiliar with the program, the winner receives a totally FREE week in any cabin with any boat. Sales tax and a tank of gas are included. Tickets remain available for $10 or 6 for $50 or 13 for $100, assuming you can successfully convince someone on the premises to accept your money.

10/03/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(720W Fisher Lake Rd, Mercer, Wisconsin 54547)

October 3

Nothing Survives October 10: Today marks the commencement of Da Great Freezer Cleanout: Phase I. The Team’s objective is to have absolutely nothing left by end of day next Saturday, October 10. Therefore, clearance pricing is now in effect. This is no time for restraint, dieting or concerns regarding gall bladder health. If you are a cheapskate, this is your time to shine.
Initial eradication efforts will focus on fish and chicken, populations which remain alarmingly robust despite months of sustained harvest. Cod and chicken strips, in particular, have demonstrated an unacceptable ability to persist. Management possesses copious amounts of both species and will begin releasing them into the human food chain dirt cheap at high noon. The objective is absolute: nothing survives October 10.

Premature Disposal of Bulk Resources: In years past, Management has waited until the final day of operations to sell off the remainder of its unopened bulk foodstuffs. This year, scientists have determined there is no compelling reason to wait. Bulk liquidation begins TODAY. Will your spawn drink a gallon of ranch if you let them? LET THEM. One gallon $10. Free straw and six (6) napkins will be provided for the ride home. Perch lover in the fam? Get out your crochet hook because a ten-pound box of frozen filets will not fit in a conventional Christmas stocking. Management recommends crafting something approximately the size of a body bag and hanging it from the mantle with a lag bolt.
Additional industrial quantities of food will emerge as Management continues excavating the basement. The public is advised not to ask why Island View possesses so much of anything. Eight years in and we still cannot fathom how or why we came to operate a restaurant. At no point did anyone teach us inventory control, par levels (a term Management just learned by [finally] googling “how to operate a restaurant”), forecasting or proper ordering procedures. The evidence is now available for purchase.

Initial Findings: Management has not yet completed a full survey of the food supply, but the following bargains have been confirmed for today. These do not include a side. You may certainly purchase a side, but Management is not currently trying to eradicate fries. Please stay focused.

Chicken Strip Snacky Snack: $5
Crispy Chicken Sammich: $6
Cod Sammich: $6
Perch: Yes
Walleye: $10

Failure of the Advance Pricing Model: This is proving extremely difficult. When FMoDL was da greeter slash waitress slash cook slash onsite wheeler and dealer and had immediate access to both the customer and the freezer, liquidation was simple. She could determine what a person wanted, assess how badly she wanted it gone and pull a price directly out of thin air. Everybody won. Preparing these offers in advance while no longer entering the bar has proven substantially more complicated.

Further details will be released as the liquidation progresses. FModL has numerous cabins to clean this morning and cannot devote additional resources to the preparation of this report.

Fig. 1: Four unpaid actors enjoying their $1 prophecies from The Loon Oracle. No refunds were requested, primarily because none were available.

10/02/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(3,971 miles to Stonehenge)

October 2

Penultimate Fish Fry: For the past twenty (20) consecutive Fridays, excluding one brief interruption during which the research station was abandoned, Management has spent the daylight hours performing the same series of repetitive tasks required to produce the evening meal. None are intellectually demanding. Collectively, however, they consume an astonishing portion of one poor sap's lifespan.
At some point every Friday, Management contemplates obtaining a monkey to train and take over fish fry preparations. Previous field observations complicate this, as Management once visited a primate sanctuary riddled with monkeys formerly kept as pets by humans who had begun with similar ambitions and later discovered that primates possess tremendous strength, complicated social needs, scary teeth and a disappointing reluctance to devote their lives to repetitive food-service labor. Not to mention the cost of diapers. Never one to listen to common sense, Management’s wishful pondering continues.

Scientific Warning: Under no circumstances should the reader Google “monkey at deep fryer.” Management has just made a critical error. DO NOT DO IT. Evidently there are things occurring in the global primate/deep-fryer community that Management was not aware of few minutes ago and would give anything to become unaware of again. The monkey hypothesis is suspended pending psychological recovery. This concludes the literature review.

Regardless of Simiiform assistance, the Fish Fry Boofay runs 4:00 to 8:00 PM. This information has now appeared in the scientific record for approximately twenty (20) weeks. Readers experiencing fatigue from repeated exposure are encouraged to consider the condition of the Researcher, who must not only perform Fish Fry preparation and the actual frying of fish every Friday but also manufacture an innovative literary framework through which to announce that Fish Fry is, once again, occurring on Friday.
Only two trials remain. After tonight, one more. One more.

Evidence of Severe Undervaluation: Now through October 9 is the last chance for obtaining a two bedroom cabin for $150 per night. Management challenges you to look around at motel pricing. Here, there, anywhere. Select a random municipality and investigate what it presently costs to sleep indoors. Chances are a tiny and very possibly crackhead-infested room costs more and it likely does not come with a kitchen, screened-in porch, private pier, AN ENTIRE LAKE…come on!
Management has kept pricing for lakefront lodging below the prevailing market rate for Room 214 behind da Circle K. Those not encumbered by work, school, sports, or other similarly devastating pastimes are encouraged to come up ASAP.

10/01/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(3 to 5 flights to Tasmania)

October 1

Extension of the Experimental Season: During Management’s early reign, operations continued into mid-October. Eventually, Management determined that time was better spent completing the approximately 13,000 projects awaiting attention than sitting in an empty bar hoping someone might wander in. This resulted in progressively earlier closures during the middle years of the regime. This year, Management has elected to reverse course and graciously remain open an extra couple of weeks, just to see if it is worth it. The experiment is now underway.
Early data are mixed. Cabins are fully booked for our final weekend, while the calendar between now and then contains enough vacancies to accommodate nearly anyone who suddenly develops an urgent need to go for one last boat ride.

The bar lights shall remain aglow through October 10. Tonight, Bingo at 6 PM.

Heartbreak and Rage [as usual]: It appears that yesterday FMoDL was the only known individual to conduct a formal photoshoot on the premises, taking advantage of what can only be described as a spectacular fall-colored background. Unfortunately, all photographs produced during the study turned out ever so slightly bad. This is particularly disappointing considering Management invested a small fortune in a camera, failing yet again to solve a problem or develop a skill by throwing money at it. Seething continues.
Additional subjects are invited to conduct their own fall photoshoots on the premises while suitable foliage remains. Results may vary considerably depending upon talent.

09/30/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(1,497 Miles to The Villages, Florida)

September 30

Annual Vegetation Collapse: Spectacular. Fall colors on the premises have reached approximately as good as they get, which is to say excellent. Management recommends viewing them immediately, as the entire display could be stripped from the trees by one hearty gust of wind and placed directly into the parking lot to be dealt with in a panic during the annual May tradition of discovering that winter has destroyed everything Management owns and the first guests will be here Thursday. Narcissists are welcome to come over and take photos of themselves on the premises provided they do not disturb cabin people during the operation.

Grandma TT’s Cookie Decorating Class: Learning and blood sugar spikage will take place as scheduled this evening. Previously registered subjects will assemble to decorate cookies under the talented guidance of Grandma TT. If you have not already registered, sadly, it is too late. Supplies were prepared last night according to the known population, and the cookie ship has sailed.

Island Time Slash Christmas Card Opportunity: Imagine it: the family dressed in Hawaiian shirts like it’s the annual trip to visit Grandma in The Villages. But the background…..glorious fall foliage with a bonus stunning lake. Peak Wisconsin autumn. But why? Why are they dressed like that in the fall? Not only why but also why is this on a Christmas card? Imagine the confusion on Uncle Gretel’s face as he studies the card in December before slowly placing it into the receptacle.
Everyone dresses like fall and heads to an expensive pumpkin patch. Wouldn’t it be more fun to dress for the tropics, go to Island View and get a FREE cocktail (or melk)? Bring the family, wear Hawaiian shirts, every single one of you gets a free drink. And cross Christmas off your list before October even begins.

This opportunity exists tonight. Bar opens at 4:00. Photo shoots welcome any time. Keep dogs on a leash, please. Dammit.

09/29/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(5 hours, 57 minutes from nearest current traffic jam)

September 29

Continued Taco Activity: Tacos will yet again be served this evening starting at 4:00 PM. Subjects may select All You Can Eat Tacos for $15 or exercise a modicum of restraint and obtain four tacos for $10.
Researchers will once again prepare a quantity of seasoned beef, arrange the associated vegetation, and stand ready to observe how many tacos a human being can consume before the original $15 investment becomes financially devastating to the research station.
There are exactly two (2) more chances to partake in Tacos & Trivia this season, and tonight is one of them. Trivia starts at 6:00.

Remaining Observations: Nothing requiring publication has been identified.

09/26/2026

Field Notes from Island View Lodge
(46.24734956981331, -89.96848328740691)

September 26

Muskellunge Tournament: Final Report
Conditions for today’s tournament were overwhelmingly pleasant. Fall colors were poppin’, the sun was shining, and 21 registered subjects dispersed across Fisher, Catherine and Cedar Lakes in pursuit of Esox masquinongy.
Unwilling to rely upon eyewitness accounts for an update of this magnitude, Management personally attended the award ceremony to secure da scoop.
At approximately 1300 hours, Luke Schoville of Hurley, Wisconsin successfully boated a 47” behemoth from the depths of Cedar Lake using a sucker. His net man, Cole Koski, possibly of Cable, Wisconsin, not only proved useful during the extraction but managed to secure second place himself with a 38.0002” hawg. What a day for that boat.

While Cole appeared quietly pleased with his trophy, Luke was openly thrilled, announcing that it "will probably go in the garage somewhere.”

Additional Muskellunge Activity: Noah Kohler reported the only other musky of the tournament, measuring 35.25”.

Final Findings: Today’s experiment confirmed that sufficient numbers of human subjects remain willing to voluntarily spend an entire Saturday attempting to encounter Esox masquinongy. Management is extremely grateful to everyone who participated, as organized events become considerably less impressive when no one comes.
Additional gratitude is extended to members of the general public who later arrived to observe the successful specimens, purchase raffle tickets, inspect the trophies and otherwise provide independent verification that something had indeed happened.

The 2026 Musky Tournament is hereby entered into the scientific record. Musky hunters are advised to reserve this same weekend next year in their Blackberries, PalmPilots or other calendrical devices.

Island View Lodge

10/09/2026

10/08/2026

10/07/2026

10/06/2026

10/03/2026

10/02/2026

10/01/2026

09/30/2026

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09/26/2026

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Tuesday	4pm - 10pm
Wednesday	4pm - 10pm
Thursday	4pm - 10pm
Friday	4pm - 10pm
Saturday	12pm - 10pm