Monsters on the Clearwater Loop

Me and the fellers got out to the beach yesterday, as it finally got above 70 and we all had the afternoon off. Great time. We met a few other fellow trail residents, including a couple with a big friendly black dog named Monster. All of us had a blast playing catch on the endless sandbar, and it felt like summer for the first time. 

Johnson Falls, cooking

A week earlier the majority of our Clearwater crew got the rare opportunity for a group camping trip in June, and with two nights on the table we set out on the Clearwater Loop - one of our most popular trips in the mountainous eastern boundary waters: Clearwater to Caribou, to Little Caribou to Pine (passing Johnson Falls) to McFarland, to John to Little John to the Royal River, to Royal Lake to South Fowl to North Fowl to Moose to Vaseux to Fan to Mountain and finally back into Clearwater. Although we paddled this route in June it had yet to feel like summertime in the northern wilds, with vicious winds peppering our faces as we looked across the water into Canada. But it was no longer springtime, either. The bugs were thick, the nights no longer cold. 
After work on Monday we set out on calmer waters, racing all the way to the middle of Pine, one of the biggest lakes in the region, finally securing a dynamite campsite on the north shore, which featured a huge granite slab on the shoreline. Once night fell, Martini led a fantastic craw-dad hunt amongst the rocks, and we managed to fill the kettle for a breakfast feast. 

I was feeling alive, like an animal, so I grabbed my sleeping bag and set up on the slab under the stars that night, the first time I've done that in a long time. Clear skies and the Milky Way running over my left shoulder, the sound of doomed craw-dads scratching at the pot to my right, I remember thinking, wondering, I guess, what the chances were that this was real... giggling...
In the morning the light was uncoordinated, probably because of the storm moving towards us.

We waited out the rain and ate tiny lobsters, then began a long day of paddling into the wind. For all of us, it was the first serious paddling of the year. By afternoon we had made our way out to the border lakes and into Moose, where turning back west, the waves worked with us.
Approaching a mild point, Erik proclaimed someone would catch a fish here, and sure enough, it was his trolling line that was soon crushed by a monster laker, which we later ate for dinner on Mountain.

 Tuesday night I was seduced into the art of hammockry, and I must say it was comfortable sleep-floating between two pines. Erik and Tori, also in hammocks, reported the sounds of a terrible attack on the Canadian side of the lake during the night.
They said it sounded like an animal had become a meal, screaming. 

The wind shifted back to the west on Wednesday, and we struggled home, sore and happy. Once unpacked we hit up Trail Center for Prime Rib Night and feasted ourselves, satisfied. Then it was back to work, and thoughts of new adventures...

Passport renewal portal

Planning a month-long trip into Canada's Quetico Provincial Park this October, I need to renew my passport so I can get my RIBC for extended paddling operations across the border... Which meant I needed to find my old passport and get new pictures taken. Luckily I packed my 1999 passport and the Grand Marais Postal Office has a 'specialized' 2x2 photo setup.

Thought it would be interesting to look at them side-by-side, and I wondered to both of them, who is that person? What are you thinking? What are you looking for?
Same as always, I guess: Adventure. But that doesn't say it all...
I think about everything that's happened since 1999 and it just baffls the mind. How far have you come in the last decade and change? Then naturally I think: Who will I be in another 13 years?
Today is tomorrow, though.
2011 finds me living amongst the capillaries of civilization, near the skin and nerve endings, but maybe this wild country is more civilized than the tikky-tak down south? At any rate, I get to sit in a canoe at 5 in the morning and look at things like this:

And this:

Remember, Friendo, Today is Tomorrow... I'm not sure whether to appreciate or laugh at the absurdity of time

:::

Here's a few more random pics from the last week:

Banjo Creek is full of tiny brookies!

Herb garden rabbit-proofed with stumps, shoots showing.

Magnetic Rock Trail, berry scouting. Magnetic Mystery Rock and debris field originated from impact crater in the Upper Peninsula, I'm told.

My spiritual, fitness and wardrobe guru, Doctor Kwas, with a nice false morel.

Lakers in the fridge

The first week of the Minnesota fishing season passed uneventfully here in the eastern Boundary Waters... Too cold, nothing doing. 

But we kept after them, day after day, paddling after work against the gusting winds. Crankbaits, spoons silvery blue and copper with pink, dead oily ciscos, tiny spinners and monstrous depthraiders. We hit 'em with the kitchen sink and the cast iron stove and a pile of buttermilk pancakes. We whistled at 'em, called out to them from the shoreline during the work-day.


Hey so yous get any down at the other end of the lake? Oh you don't say? Interesting, very interesting. Heard the folks in cabin six got a couple, too. Gotta get back out there after work tonight, storm is moving in, air feels right.


Yep yep. 


Finally amidst a mist Erik cracked the cork on Clearwater, right where we'd been expecting them, just before sunset. A real nice one, too, just over 23 inches, spotted and slippery. 

The clouds hung around the entire next day so we planned on hopping up to the border lake north of us after work and doing some trolling in a richer environment. We flew threw the portage and within 15 minutes of starting our run Erik popped another one on the same bait from the night before. Another nice one, just under 20. We circled the bay and the next time through I finally got my first laker of the season. May 24, ten days since the season opener. We got a few legit bites in other spots, but it turned out we had some kind of action every time we'd pass this one ordinary-looking stretch of shoreline. I got another one just before sunset, and on the next run, Erik got our fourth of the night, ensuring we got our limit for the day. Those lakers went in the fridge, and our first fish dinner of the summer is now on the menu for Saturday night, coinciding with the arrival of our final crew member and the completion of a productive month.


Tonight they've predicted lows in the 20s again and the herb garden has been covered. The window on lakers has just opened and in a few weeks the nights will warm and the mysterious predators of Clearwater Lake will retreat to freakish depths, taking canoe trolling out of play until autumn. 


And as the nights warm the mosquitos will rise up in great numbers, and the hum of traffic on the trail will similarily increase, and I will associate the difficulty and reward of lake trout pursuits with the quietness of May and the beginning of my active isolation. Funny how a month up here changes your definition of busy. 


:::

More photos at my Wild Almanac Logbook