The water up here would put a 5$ bottle of smart water to shame. The filtered lake water is truly the best drinking water I’ve ever had, credit to an amazing ecosystem and testament towards the continuing advocacy for keeping it this way.  So, speaking of drinking- I’ve found the best. I call it Minnesotan mudd. Mix some whiskey with powdered Arnold Palmer iced tea mix and add some (glacial spring) water. The outcome: great campfire time. Oh and the fish, or should I say: fire baked fish topped with butter and lemon paired with coal-roasted potatoes with butter and shredded cheese topping. This meal after a lot of paddling and moving gear it was to die for, fried fish is a food I could eat every day for the rest of my life and die happy. 

There was no way I was going to wake up to the 5:30 alarm so I dismissed that sucker and woke up much later than originally planed as the sun started to bake the tent. We got at fishing right away and found a nice little spot not too far from our site that the fish were in. The portable fish finder worked, well seemed to be reading close enough, and sometimes would work better the harder you’d hit it. It was useful to know about how deep you were floating down the lake; back home we would call that trolling. Only fishing a couple hours, we pulled in three 18” smallies and were hook shook by a couple more. Seth caught a pig of a 20” male walleye and soon our stringer was full for the feast that was soon to be had. (Don’t worry, we kept two small largemouth to eat for the night – I love fresh largemouth and northern when prepared correctly and nobody will ever change my mind)

We got back to camp early and decided to set everything up for the long haul. We would make this campsite and this lake ours for the week. The cook shack ended up being plenty big to fit all the cooking gear comfortably and offer good headspace out of the elements while we made our food. As it turned out, I forgot an attachment for my Coleman two-burner stove so we ended up using a jetboil and campfire the rest of the trip. This was only inconvenient a couple times, not including packing the two burner stove and 5 gallons of propane all the way out here (and back) for nothing. The gravity water filter was working great and the water tasted absolutely amazing but the whiskey tasted even better tonight. I love it up here. The aforementioned meal of fish and potatoes we made over the fire mixed with some whisky after a lot of paddling and moving gear was to die for. No cook stove needed.