Portage Adventure

I made my first trip to Caribou lake on a gorgeous day with the Professor and Gord this June. It was a true adventure with some great small mouth bass and pike fishing on Caribou lake. The only lures these fish see are the ones cast by Gord’s guests and a few fly-in trips.

Because lake levels are a bit low we took the first portage to Clearwater rather then navigate the 100+ turns and beaver dams on the river. We took the camp boat across Eagle to the bay where the portage begins. It was a bit mucky, but its less than a 20 minute portage compared to a 1-2 hour trip up Clearwater creek.

After reaching the other side of the portage, we took one of Gord’s two boats to get to the other side of Clearwater. Earlier in the week we devoted a full day to fish out of this boat for lake trout and pike, but on this day it was simply transportation to McGregor lake.

We took the short portage to McGregor Lake. The creek has low water levels and a beaver dam so we took a slightly longer portage that took us through some beautiful green moss. A short boat trip in one of Gord’s boats took us over to the creek coming from Otter Lake. This portage has some wild iris.

At the end of this short portage we arrived at a very small row boat with a weight limit of about half of what we were soon loading.

Here, Gord did his best imitation of a motor to get us across Otter Lake.

At the end of Otter Lake we had one last portage about the same length as the first but completely dry and relatively flat. This section of trail had several lady slipper orchids.

At the end of this portage we were greeted with our last boat and a motor that gratfully started!

We were not disapointed as the bass and pike fishing was excellent. We were hard pressed to find a lure that didn’t catch fish. Even the over-promoted banjo minnow was a killer!

Of course we then had to make the return trip! In actuality, these photos were taken in the reverse order. The good news? We had two coolers of nicely chilled beverages waiting us on the return trip. Gord was introduced to Capital Brewery’s (Middleton, Wisconsin) newest beer – Supper Club. Personally, I haven’t found a beer brewed by Capital that I didn’t enjoy.

 

6 thoughts on “Portage Adventure”

  1. Perchmaster
    Reply

    Well Andy you have now answered the BIG question for me I am not taking that trip with Gord or any other adventure with him… Way to much work for a cold beer.
    Great job on the bass now the burning question is did the pike have any size to them after all that?
    Think Gord mention something about 40-50" pike are common…….
    Looks like some great sites on the trip I will admit.

  2. Gord
    Reply

    50 inch pike are common? You must be referring to another website where 12 – 14 pound walleye are commonly caught here on Eagle Lake! No need to set off the "bullshit alert".

    Hey, what's with the picture of me standing by Otter Lake?

  3. Perchmaster
    Reply

    O-So sorry I got confused for a minute.
    Sling the BS if you want….
    12-14lb walleye man I have to go to the camp think they mean 12-14" walleye and catching 100-150 of them per trip burning up several dozen minnows. HAHA!!!!

  4. Perchmaster
    Reply

    Looking through the pictures I am going to post in part 2. and you know what?
    I am ready to go back. The pictures are nice to look at but it just wants me to go back sooner.

  5. Professor
    Reply

    Andy,,,Nice pics from our Caribou adventure. There is something very special abouit visiting a destination that few people value enough to go to. Real solitude–it's great.

  6. Andy
    Reply

    Perchmaster,

    I can honestly say that I have never caught a 50" pike. It's on my bucket list.

    We did catch a lot of pike on this lake and Gord put us right on the spot. These were all very healthy, beefy fish with none of the snakes. None however, exceeded 40". However, from what I saw, I can guarantee you that they are there. One of those pike is still wearing my nice shiney Mepps Lone Wolf spoon. You will have to ask Gord how that happened.

    All of this leads me to a recommendation on a new musky bait for Charles….a night crawler. The big fish for the trip was a musky I accidentally caught in the 42"-45" range on a crawler harness! In an effort to make a quick release, we did not measure. As I look at the one picture I snapped, it continues to grow. The head is enormous. Of course the professor is holding it.

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