Friday, June 04, 2004

Robinson Lake, Tuck River, Moose Bay, Basswood River, Through Upper and Lower Basswood Falls, Basswood Lake to Canadian Point.

Day 7 started off without a glitch. The weather was already wonderful with a slight breeze and a sunny sky, which continued throughout the day. As breakfast was made and camp was broke we had a rather curious visitor in camp in the form of a bird. Being that I’m also into birds, I kept a vivid picture of the bird in my memory for later identification. It was the yellow bellied sapsucker…. Really!

As we got onto the water we agreed that we would fish our way down through the Tuck River into Moose Bay and meet up at the pictograph site on Basswood River. I didn’t fish to hard on Robinson Lake and headed directly toward the river. As we winded down the river fishing was slow and the river was shallow but the scenery was nice enough to keep it entertaining. We managed to creep up on two different deer as we made our way to the two sets of rapids we had to portage. As soon as we landed at the portage around the rapids/falls we grabbed our fishing poles and walked down to the middle section of rapids. It wasn’t long before the Cookie had a fish on. After about 15 minutes we had landed about 5 smallmouth, which we put back in the water. He was using a floating rapala and I was using a jig with a power leech. By now the others had caught up to us so we grabbed our stuff and made the portage to the bottom of the rapids/falls. At the base of the rapids we fished a little more. I only caught snags but the others managed to land a couple smallmouth.

The paddle through Moose bay was fairly uneventful due to no moose being in the bay… Oh well. As we passed through the narrows before Basswood River we did manage to see a pair of mergansers chasing each other or fish, I couldn’t really tell what they were doing but, non-the less, they were entertaining to watch. As we made our way down the Basswood River we saw our first canoe of the day, but there would be many more after that. 

   The pictograph site was one of the highlights of the trip. There were several panels of drawings. Some of them were much higher than I expected and can only speculate how and why they were up so high. Some of the drawings I distinctly remember were a canoe with several passengers and flags, some pelican looking birds, the great lynx Missipeshu, a fish in a net?, a moose with a calf, and my favorite, a moose smoking a pipe. Unfortunately we had some miles to cover so we didn’t stick around all that long. If I ever pass by the area again I will definitely go out of my way to visit this site again.

We paddled down to the base of the lower Basswood Falls and did a little fishing in the fast water. The Cookie managed to catch a walleye right off the bat but that was the only walleye caught there so fish were not had for lunch. Just about the time all the canoes were landed at the base of the falls, one of the others landed a nice pike but that was also released after pictures were taken. We ended up making lunch there at the campsite/portage. The lunch consisted of dried fruit, the remainder of our snack food, and my soon to be famous potato pancakes… which still require a little tweeking… but they were an improvement over my past attempts which turned out to be my famous hot energy paste. The occupant of the campsite also joined us for a little lunch. A pine squirrel that has no fear buddied up to us for a little bite. We had to keep an eye on our food bag or I think he would have just packed himself inside.

The paddle through the Basswood falls was almost grueling. They are definitely nice to see but the fishing was slow unfortunately, although it was high-noon, and just about every time we put the canoes back into the water we had to take them out and do another portage. There are some shortcuts we could have or should have taken but we didn’t. Oh well, live and learn. We managed to make it through anyway.

At this point we were on Basswood Lake. We had arranged a tow the next day from the narrows between Lincoln and Washington islands so we wanted to get fairly close to them to ensure we didn’t have any issues getting there the next day. We paddled and fished through Basswood Lake to the tip of American point occasionally checking for campsites on the Canadian side to no avail. On one of the islands we checked my map had a marking on it with a square and a dot. When we checked out the island, I found what that indicated. There was metal spike in the rock with the same number punched in it as a reference marker. The water was calm so the paddle wasn’t difficult. I didn’t fish to hard on the lake but others had picked up a couple of walleye. Had I known that they were picking up fish I might of tried a little harder. 

   Another late day paddling put us on the rush to find another unmarked campsite along Canadian Point before the sun went down. When we were about to give up and make a site, the spot we chose had a fire ring. As we settled down for our last night in Quetico we enjoyed a hearty bowl of spicy Basswood Lake soup and then the platys were passed to finish them off. I struggled to stay awake and enjoy the time as long as I could but soon the exhaustion of a long day’s paddle set in and I was off to bed.