Big Cliff

Thanks to Governator for the link I have now added it to the original post.

As many of you know I have been planning this trip for quite a while now. I want to thank Mike and so many of you in helping me research and organizing the trip. We chose Mattice Outfitters and in particular Vick Lake for many reasons, in reading their write up: “Vick Lake is one of the newest single cabin private lakes”, “At Vick Lake we have a new 2 bedroom cabin”, “New Lund boats, New Mercury motors”.” Hot and cold running water” “Hand crafted pine furnishings “ There were other reasons but some of these were key in helping us finalize our decision but we’ll get back to those later. So let’s get down to the trip: After months of thought, planning and advice I had created a detailed menu, planned all the food requirements, prepackaged everything in light weight disposable containers. I had created two boxes where I started assembling everything needed from my end and as I placed each item in one of the boxes I indicated on the list which box it was in so I could be sure nothing was forgotten. Actually it worked out very well. My son and I had reviewed and edited our list of who was going to bring what so that we didn’t have unnecessary duplication, we had it covered! The menu was all approved, “my son has ulcerative colitis so things like beans, spices, corn…. Aren’t the best things for him”, no problem, we planned around that. June 22 took forever to come, that morning I was up at 2:00, showered and dressed and started loading the car by 3:30. I reviewed the list and menu, checked all the weather reports, looked over the map….. anything to kill time. By 8:00 am I couldn’t wait any longer, kissed Sue and headed out the door. (I wasn’t picking my son up in French River until 4:30 that afternoon but I didn’t want to be late LOL) I had prepackaged, vac packed and frozen all our meats and they were packed in the cooler with a layer of ice surrounding them. All the dry goods were packed in plastic bins but I had left the purchase of the vegetables for just prior to picking my son up. We knew we had about 14 hours of driving ahead of us and planned on stopping for a nice dinner on the way so we figured we would be in Armstrong Station about 8 or 9 the morning of the 23. We weren’t scheduled to fly out until the 24, but I wanted some time for us to relax so I had rented a guest cabin for us for the night of the 23. The trip up was relatively uneventful, we hit rain (lots of rain) fog, saw countless wild life, moose, bears, foxes but we made good time and arrived pretty much as we had planned. We checked in at the air base, paid the balance owing on our trip and got directions to the guest cabin, (turned out it was down the highway a bit and the directions to it were somewhat confusing) it took us about ½ an hour to find it after trying a few side roads but we eventually did. Now if you have never been to Armstrong Station it’s a beautiful but rather basic place, there is one gas station, two restaurants, and not much else. We had asked at the air base about the best place to eat and were told both were about the same but that some people seemed to prefer the one on the back street. We were hungry, by now it was getting close to lunch time so we headed into town. Gayle’s was the first place we saw, it was right on the main street so we decided to get some lunch. I should have known when we walked in it was a bad choice but after being up for almost 30 hours apart from napping in the car…. The cook came out wearing a dirty shirt with a not so clean bandana on his head, they had about three choices of pop, and there was no one else in the place. Two burgers and fries cost almost $30.00 and they weren’t very good. Oh well! We ate and headed back to the guest cabin, it was quite nice, small and basic but clean, by now we were both exhausted so we decided to get some sleep. Naps over, a quick shower, and feeling somewhat refreshed we headed back into town for some supper. This time we decided to try to find the “other” restaurant; much better choice! Food was great, service fantastic, nice clean and prices were reasonable. The morning of the 24th, we had been told to be at the air base at 9:00 am, up early, everything ready, we headed back into town for breakfast then off to the air base. We had been told our flight was booked for 9:00 am. We got there about 15 minutes early and were told they were behind schedule by about two hours so have a coffee and wait. Finally about 12:00 we loaded up the plane and headed out. Our pilot, Oliver was wonderful, a nice young man about 20, this was his first year with Mattice but he had spent a year doing similar work in Kenora the previous year. The scenery was beautiful, nothing but lakes and trees for as far as you could see in any direction. It was about an hour flying time and Oliver kept us at about 2500’ so we could see plenty of detail. For about the first half hour we would see the odd logging road but after that we didn’t even see an ATV trail. Remote is what we wanted, remote is what we got! It was a little after 1:00 when we got to the camp, there was a couple there with their two grandsons. As we were unloading our gear I had a chance to have a quick chat with them, he kindly indicated on our lake map where there were some rocks that didn’t show up on the map and a few spots where they had caught fish. They also mentioned that the cabin was infested with mice, they had caught 15 of them in two days (note to self, add mouse traps to the next list of things to bring). Our gear unloaded, theirs loaded, a very quick tour of the cabin and Oliver was off. We hauled our gear up to the cabin, grabbed our rods and we were off. I’ll start with the good stuff: The fishing was nuts, I’ve never seen anything like it in my life, as we were pulling away from the dock I flipped my jig into the water and almost instantly it was fish on! For the 4 ½ days we were there that didn’t change, double headed after double header, I don’t think there was a span of more than 5 minutes that one of us didn’t have a hit or a fish and it didn’t seem to matter what we put in the water although those jigs I got from Bruce tipped with a white or yellow twister tail seemed to be the best choice. By the end of the second day both of us had sore arms from fighting fish, what an incredible feeling! Most of the walleye were in the 2 to 4 lb range and fought like fish twice their size, they were nice solid fat fish and very clean looking. The pike were all over the place too and they seemed to range in size from 2-5 lbs although we did have one monster grab a 3 lb walleye right off our stringer at the dock. We didn’t get to measure him but he wouldn’t even come close to fitting in our net. After we got back to the cabin on our first day I got the brochure out, I was wondering if I had read it wrong or something or had I confused it with another facility: “one of the newest single cabin private lakes”? “At Vick Lake we have a new 2 bedroom cabin” it was obvious that this was anything but new, in fact I found out later that Don had bought this from another outfitter about 16 years ago. “New Lund boats, New Mercury motors” well actually the folding seats looked fairly new and there were three Mercury motors there, a 2003, a 2004, and a 2005. I guess they were new once but that isn’t quite what the brochure said. The boats were pulled up on shore not on ramps as shown in the pictures, I’m 71 and it was quite a struggle for my son and I to get the boat into the water and once we did we found out that the motor ran but not well. My son is a marine mechanic and diagnosed the problem within a couple of minutes “mid range lean cough” solution pull the carb and clean it but without tools we just had to live with it. When I mentioned it to the handy man during our camp check he changed the fuel line from one of the other boats and told us to try that. “Hot and cold running water”: Ok my fault here, I ASSUMED that meant indoor plumbing, it didn’t! Not that we mind using an outhouse but it isn’t what we were expecting. The brochure did say shower and didn’t say toilet or bathroom so my bad. “Fish fryer”, carboned up and coated everything with thick oily soot that transferred to everything it touched. When I mentioned it to the handy man during our camp check he told me they knew it was a problem but they thought it was the propane causing it. BBQ; a wreck, heat shields all rotted burners in bad shape…. They replaced it the day we flew out. Shower: leaked from between the walls and it was evident it had been for quite some time, the wood at the base of the wall was black from water damage. The handy man did pull the tap assy. Apart but that wasn’t where the leak was. We ended up taking the carpet out because it was better to step out of the shower onto a wet wood floor instead of a wet carpet. Hand crafted pine furnishings: Well, the chairs closely resembled plastic lawn chairs, two of which buckled when I sat on them dumping me onto the floor (mind you I do weigh 230 lbs). I can assure you though there was no wood in them LOL. When we got back to the air base on our return I was going to try to sit down with Don and discuss some of the above but he seemed “pre occupied”, and in fact I ended up going looking for him to say good by. I got the feeling he was almost trying to avoid me and at that point I just wanted to get going, we still had a long drive ahead of us. In summary, I wouldn’t trade the time spent with my son for anything, the fishing was fantastic and we ate like kings. In spite of all the issues we had a wonderful time (we always do when we are together). Would I do it all over again? Yes but probably not with Mattice, I honestly thought I was booking and paying for a “deluxe trip” based on their brochure and the cost, I feel like that was very misleading. I did learn a lot of other things: Don’t program your GPS for shortest route, we ended up going in Black Sturgeon Lake road for 50 km before we found out it was washed out and we had to turn around and back track adding almost 2 hours to our trip and almost leaving us stuck in a huge mud hole 12 km from the nearest road! Plan on two meals a day plus snacks, not 3 meals a day plus snacks. Breakfast/brunch and supper. 1 bag of ice can yield about 3 liters of water Many areas of the Trans Canada Highway do not have cell coverage and a lot of gas stations close up at night so plan your fuel stops carefully, don’t let yourself run short (we were ok and I had an extra 20L of gas in a can just in case). Don’t believe everything you read in a brochure or the reviews on a website, talk to people that have actually been there! Tipping the pilot is VERY much appreciated! Thanks to Governator for the link I have added some photos from our trip, I hope it works. http://imgur.com/a/bfwRD

Wonderful report and great pictures!

What a beautiful read, thanks for sharing it!

X 2 I use to buy the $1500.00 to $2000.00 jobs they all ended up going the same route eventually.

Clear plastic, wrap is worth more than steel for scrap. We haul skid loads of it to a waste management company

The City of Kawartha Mistakes can't get it right with the garbage???? No kidding! They were offered a comprehensive recycling program for free and they declined. A lot of what gets sent in for recycling ends up going into landfill just because they don't have the resources to sort it. I talked to a waste management consultant who told me the number of tons of recyclable material that CKL diverts to land fill is staggering! They claim that the Lindsay Landfill has "state of the art" liners and there is no way that anything can leak into the Scugog River (the land fill site is right on the shore) strange how the phosphate levels in the river down stream of the land fill are much higher than up stream. The weed growth in Sturgeon lake has accelerated at a ridiculous rate since the land fill was put there but "oh no, can't be from the landfill site". My solution is simple, I recycle everything I can, I compost all of our compostable materials and use that compost in my gardens. Lastly, I tip our garbage man $20.00 at Christmas and thank him for his service (sometimes in the summer I slip him another $20.00 and tell him to buy a cold one on me). I bet I could put a car full of garbage out at the curb and he'd pick it up for me.

Sorry i can't help you with the "re programing" but I bought one from Amazon fully loaded for about $70.00. You could try down loading Kodi to a memory stick and installing it your self.

Well I don't know about it affecting the fish bite but I do know that after almost 50 years of marriage there are certain times of the month it's better to go fishing than stay home

Anytime Sue is in the hospital I always take the nurses a box of Tim's muffins

Thanks for the replies (and the laughs) guys, appreciate both!

Ok, so we are soon to depart on our first ever fly-in fishing trip and I have a question for you pros. Do you tip the pilot, if so on arrival at your destination or at the end of the trip when you are back at the base. What would be a reasonable tip and what sorts of things would you consider in coming up with that amount.

PM Pikeslayer his wife works for Desjardins and she took care of our boat, atv, house,cars, even our golf cart and she saved us a lot of money!

Good for you! When you do leave don't burn any bridges behind you, give proper notice, don't bad mouth the company, keep your head held high. It is amazing how often down the road the past comes back to play a role in your future! If you are asked why you are leaving simply explain that while you loved your job and the company you wanted full time and they just didn't have that opportunity available for you right now. Lastly; it sounds like one of your best qualities could be working against you. In your OP you mentioned that you went overboard in stepping up every time they asked. Learn to say NO sometimes, coming home in the middle of a shopping trip because they needed you for a part time position..... how did that work out for you? Keep us posted, I bet things are just going to get bigger and brighter for you from here on in.

I have been in the same sort of position a couple of times in my 55 years of working and I feel your pain. My suggestion is ; follow the lead of your full time supervisor and get the heck out of there, go find a place to work where your dedication and loyalty will be appreciated!

I got mine from Stoll Metal Sales in Cameron and used one of their installers, I did get a bit of a deal for cash.

We did metal on our Snug Harbour house. When I figured in the cost of stripping the old shingles, new ice and water shield......... the metal roof (strapping over existing shingles) ended up costing me $500.00 more than if I had replaced the shingles. We also found the house cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter, I think it was because of the air barrier created between the metal and old shingles. If I was doing it again I would definitely go with the metal.

Good idea, that's one I haven't found on any lists so far! Thanks!

You can't make French fries out of canned potatoes, how you going to have fish and chips?

Wow, guy tries to clear some weeds in front of his dock so his kids can swim and he gets fined for it? Ridiculous! When we bought our place on Sturgeon there were a few weeds off our dock, 10 years later the weeds were so bad you had a hard time getting a boat through them. We finally had to pay almost $700.00 to get one of those weed harvester things in just to thin the weeds out. After that I bought a weed mill thing ($1650.00) that did a pretty good job of keeping the floating weeds out. If I found out that someone had reported me for clearing some weeds in front of my dock so my kids/grand kids could swim I'd be pretty pissed!

Yup, checked with Don, bring your own!!!

There are walleye and (I am told) pike. 3/8 oz jig and a white grub should, do put some fish in the boat for you

Thanks, good video!

A small cast iron pan works great. One trick I learned ed if you are doing a wet brine, put the fish in a zip lock bag, pour I your brine, squeeze the air out and seal the bag, that way all your fish gets exposed.

Thanks, I appreciate your in put!