A thank you to the forum and quick report from Cabonga Reservoir

[Jigs]

Hey guys,

 

A few weeks ago I posted about solar chargers and generators and everyone here was really helpful so I thought I'd share a quick report about how the trip went.

 

First off, why I went there. When I was a kid I saw a fishing show about Cabonga Reservoir and it's always been on the bucket list since. This year I made the trip happen.

 

The place we stayed in was Barrage Cabonga. The Sepaq calls it "rustic camping" and I'd say it's as rustic as it's got for me so far other than camping on the French River. It's up a 48km dirt road (which I call a driveway) off the 117 about half way between Maniwaki and Val d'Or. A two hour driveway as I call it lol. We stayed in tents for 8 nights. Set up camp as well as well as we could (not exactly real experienced with camping so that was all new to me). Also new to me was the lake Trout fishing. I kind of expected to catch walleyes easily up there, seeing as my past experiences up North always had easy walleye fishing in comparison to where I live. Mind you that wasn't the case. Though we did find walleye, we had to fight to catch them a bit too much for my liking. So seeing as everyone there was fishing lake trout, I figured when in Rome...

 

We loaded up the truck and boat with everything we could think of but with trying to not overpack. I'd say we did quite well. We ended up with plenty of food and ate fresh fish every day. Lake trout is absolutely delicious, never had it before, and they fillet like a walleye just have that extra set of bones that are easily removed. We brought enough water for 2 days and boiled some for the rest of the days.

 

We had trouble catching fish early on, but once I figured them out we ended up jigging up some beauty lake trout. I had never fished for Lakers in my life so figuring them out was a bit of a challenge. I also have no water deeper than 80-90 feet where I normally fish so jigging structure that is 75 feet deep next to a 200-300 foot main lake basin was certainly different. Anyway, we ended up catching a few beauties and of course as any fishing story goes, I missed a really big one. We were over 100 feet of water and something grabbed my jig as I was letting it down at about 40 feet. I set the hook and it bolted for the bottom and the hook didn't stick so I ended up with a couple scales as a souvenir. But there was a lot of power in that fish. One guy up there got a 26 pound one while we were there and apparently he's seen a 52 pound fish come out of there. Mind you that might have been the rum adding a few pounds . Our biggest fish was 12 pounds. We were the only guys jigging up there. Mind you there were only 3 other groups. It's very very isolated. And I'd say we did as well, if not better than guys who have fished it for years. Let's just say when I saw a bunch of crawfish legs in my livewell it helped narrow down how to catch them. We did pretty good numbers wise.

 

Anyway, we had an absolute blast. Here are the pics and a couple videos (which I couldn't figure out how to embed at the moment) at the end if you're interested. Thanks again for everyone who helped me out with the solar panel/generator conversation very appreciated. If you're curious we ended up renting one and it did its job perfectly. We had plenty of battery power for the bowmount which ended up being vital for keeping the boat on that structure.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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<iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/G44L3bHtBWM?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

Tight lines everyone! Jigger.

 

 

[solopaddler]

Very cool report, thanks for taking the time! For your first time jigging lakers you guys did great.

[fishindevil]

Wow !!!! Now that's rustic ...!!!!! That's a long way off the beaten path and the fishing is that way because of it !!! Some real beauties you guys got for sure !!!!! Thanks for sharing

[Jds63]

looks like a great trip, cool videos too

that looks like some big water and no one around, you gotta like that

jigging for lakers is huge fun !!! and that's a pig of a laker in that picture , good job

[Rich Clemens]

Awesome report and some great looking catches too. Glad to see ya got one thing checked off your bucket list

[Tomcat]

Thanks for your report and pics. I particularly liked the sunset pic. I looked up the Sepaq map for the Barrage Cabonga area - you guys were on some big water. It would take a while to learn that much water. Regardless, you caught some beauties.

[aplumma]

Well done a great trip with a nice report.

 

 

Art

[Jigs]

Thanks guys. Tomcat, you're right the place is huge. Something like 500 square kms. Hundreds if not thousands of Islands and you can go the entire day without seeing another soul. We took a day and went up to the Northern part up the Cabonga River. We found a nice place for shore lunch up there and spent a couple hours there. Moose tracks everywhere you look. You could spend a lifetime exploring it. Just beautiful. One thing though, when that wind picked up, I was happy to have borrowed my buddy's kicker just in case we ran into engine problems. It would have been a tough paddle back to camp. There is no calling for help on a cell phone up there or waving down another boat. It could be days before they find you. So I packed extra gas, extra batteries, spare tires for the trailer etc...Two of everything vital basically.

 

If you guys don't have it and have an Iphone I suggest downloading the Navionics app....Wouldn't have been able to travel so much on that reservoir without it. Even though it wasn't entirely accurate in some places it definitely helped a lot. Came back without a ding in the prop (and my entire lower unit intact lol).

 

I'd like to go back for sure. Now that I have a good starting point I can get to catching right away.

[mercman]

WTG Andre !!!! Looks like a trip of a life time. Thanks for shareing bud. Great pics and great fish. !!!

[Roy]

Very nice report indeed. Thanks for sharing!

[Joeytier]

Awesome stuff. You sure dialed in a bunch of beauty for your first time on such a big piece of water.

[Toad Hunter]

I'd say you guys did alright in both the fishing and camping department. Great report.

[Jigs]

Thanks guys.

 

Mercman! Long time no talk. Hope you're doing well!

[chris.brock]

great report, looks like you guys had a blast

[can u fish]

Great report Jigs you guys did quite well for the first time fishing the Cabonga it defenitly is a huge body of water as i have fished it many times from a very young age as i spent many summers in Maniwaki at our family cottage, there are a lot of lakes on the Parc de la Verandrye that have great walleye and northern pike fishing so if you ever wanted any info on other lakes to fish on the parc just send me a pm.

 

Thanks for sharing Cheers Mitch...

[RickOnt]

Jigs

 

Great report, You guys did very well!!

 

That area is beautiful

 

We are headed into Parc Verendrye to fish on the Dozois first of August.

 

No Lakers in there but good Walleye and mid size Pike.

 

Cheers

Rick

[Jigs]

Thanks Mitch. Very nice of you. There's a good chance I'll be back up there next summer.

 

Rick, I might hit Dozois next time. I was thinking about trying it out and we opted for Cabonga because I wanted to catch my first laker. Would be interested to know how you did up there. Good luck!