Algonquin Park May 2006 Photo Essay

[passthepitonspete]

This is Page 5 of a five-part post, and is the end of my essay.

 

If you have somehow arrived at this point without quite knowing how, please click here to return to the beginning.

 

 

 

Back at the ranch after a successful morning of hunting for historical artefacts, we packed up all our stuff and headed back towards civilization, taking the long way and making another stop in our circle tour.

 

 

Some people look like their pets, and some look like their fish, but not this time - clearly my belly is fatter and whiter than that of the fish. This feisty guy gave me quite a tussle just before we reached our first and only portage. We had been across this path once years before, but had forgotten how steep it was climbing up and over, and especially down the height of land over which it crossed. As per usual, I ran back for a rescue – good thing as the muddy path was very slippery and embedded with unsympathetic wet boulders.

 

 

We fished the rest of the day and evening in our familiar hotspots, but for whatever reason the fish weren’t very co-operative in this lake. The woody bay where my dad caught his biggest ever speckle of 3-5/8 pounds x 20½” didn’t produce a single fish, and the shorelines where we hoped to entice other brookies out of the wood only coughed up a couple mini-lakers.

 

It wasn’t until right at dark when we were heading back for camp trolling J-11’s across the middle of the lake that we tied into a couple decent lakers like this guy above.

 

 

We had camped in this area before, but something didn’t seem right. I was convinced that the campsite we had used had been dismantled, and walked over to where I thought it used to be, but there was no sign of it. The hemlock forest looked completely virgin. Still not satisfied, I walked back a few hours later and poked around some more under the deeply shaded canopy. Sure enough, I found a blackened fireplace rock and a splinter of the old bench. Aha! I knew it! This was the place where the owl had flown right through our campsite, and where we had enjoyed some of our best fishing ever.

 

We lounged though a leisurely brunch, and decided to bail. We were pretty disappointed in this perhaps our favourite lake, especially considering we were drinking our coffee [our regular coffee, OK? It was not yet Changeover Time] less than a long cast from where I had caught my big laker.

 

 

We knew we had made the correct decision to leave the lake when we trolled and cast this great looking shoreline, and didn’t catch a single fish. They just didn’t want to bite for us.

 

 

This penultimate series of portages gave us quite the spanking. We’d done it before a few times, but always in a team of three. This was our first time as a team of two, and it’s a good thing we had eaten most of the bacon. Long portages between tiny lakes add up to plenty of discomfort as you never get long enough to rest while paddling before the next slog clobbers you.

 

 

We finished up here on our last night of the trip, one of our best Algonquin springs ever. We ended up catching 45 trout over the week – 19 specks and 26 lakers. We ate four brookies and one lake trout, and released the other 40 fish. We are particularly pleased with our net C.U.E. over the entire week of 0.58, nearly double the 1999-2004 census average of 0.31.

 

 

We’re heading back up to Algonquin for this year’s trip around the last of April, and this time we’re bringing along my friend Ian to help with the carries. Three in a canoe is certainly the most efficient way to make it over the long portages, and I’m hoping my dad won’t have to “Carry His Age” this year, at least not too far….

 

Anyway, I hope y’all enjoyed the show! Thanks for stickin’ it out for all five portages, er, pages. My “canoe” [i.e. email] always has space, so if you need a bit more information or wanna trade a few secrets {wink} then drop me a line.

 

So like, have a beauty day, eh? Please do not reply here, but instead if you liked the show, please leave your comments and messages HERE. If I get enough positive feedback, then maybe I’ll make you up a few more photo essays, however the converse is also true. But when it comes to fishing pix, it’s not like I’ve got any shortage... Sheesh.

 

Cheers and beers [or Algonquin Coffee!]

 

"Pass the Pitons" Pete Zabrok [and Ron Zabrok]

 

P.S. If you want to see a cool photo essay of a recent two-week big wall climb I did, then please click the link in my signature.

Edited April 22, 2007 by passthepitonspete