New Trip Report posted by cptrea

Trip Name: Quetico Trip #2: Seasick in a Canoe?.

Entry Point: Quetico

Click Here to View Trip Report

LOVED IT! Thoroughly enjoyed your report, looks like you two had a wonderful time and much better fishing than we had one week earlier. Wonderful pics too, in all these years I've never gotten such good moose pictures and I've done a fair amount of "Moose hunting" on the gravel roads and the trail myself.

I really enjoyed reading your trip report - very well done! You are lucky to share canoe trips with your daughter - great memories for you both. As for the fishing - it looked pretty good to me. We usually trip in August - fishing is much slower then. Thanks for sharing your journey!

GREAT report! It brought back memories of tripping with my dad (he snores too, so loud that I could hear him through the ground). Really liked your writing style.

The fishing may have been slow due to the heavy rains and the resulting wash off that carried food etc into the lakes.

loving the report and photos, can't wait to get back to it. Off to
work now;( We came out a few days before your entry...

That was a fun read. Thanks!

Awesome report and great pics! Looks like a trip is in order again for next year. =)

Thanks for the report! It's been some time since we've seen Silver Falls. Bet it was spectacular! Loved your comments about the TWO tents! lol

Real nice report and photos Ralph. Fishing wasn't the hottest we've ever had either for mid-June. I attribute that to the record early ice out and warm water temps. Last year with a more normal ice out we caught very few walleyes on main lake points, this year it was one of our best producers of eyes.

I like you daughters spunk of going in to get those coveted lures back:)

Looks like you had much better weather then we did.

Outstanding report, again. I'd like to see some pics of the Silver Falls outflow. If you do the 'Gons again I suggest a few extra days and head towards the east end. Better, bigger fish and more solitude.

Silver Falls outflow taken 6/21/12. Pictures don't really do it justice...lots of crazy currents and whirlpools that you have to go right over.

quote Wallidave: "Silver Falls outflow taken 6/21/12. Pictures don't really do it justice...lots of crazy currents and whirlpools that you have to go right over.


"

It looks pretty easy with a decent forward ferry technique but I can see how you'd get in trouble trying to power straight across. Shame on the outfitters if they aren't teaching the correct technique for this entry point.

Thanks for the nice trip report, sounds like you both had good fun.

quote Wallidave: "Real nice report and photos Ralph. Fishing wasn't the hottest we've ever had either for mid-June. I attribute that to the record early ice out and warm water temps. Last year with a more normal ice out we caught very few walleyes on main lake points, this year it was one of our best producers of eyes.


I like you daughters spunk of going in to get those coveted lures back:)


Looks like you had much better weather then we did."

Thanks for the kind words. We go to have fun, and the entire experience is good for us. We're still figuring out the fishing up there, and might be too quick to switch to our standby mode of casting shorelines when things are slow, but we seem to always catch at least a few.

Yes, I think our weather was better than yours, though it was pretty hot for us the last couple of days.

quote Bushwacker: "

quote Wallidave: "Silver Falls outflow taken 6/21/12. Pictures don't really do it justice...lots of crazy currents and whirlpools that you have to go right over.



"

It looks pretty easy with a decent forward ferry technique but I can see how you'd get in trouble trying to power straight across. Shame on the outfitters if they aren't teaching the correct technique for this entry point."

Wallidave: Thanks for the photos. I wasn't comfortable enough to put the paddle down and shoot photos going either direction. I think you're right about the photos not doing justice, I think you'd need a video to convey a real sense of it. When we were approaching the torrent, we could actually see a downhill gradient ahead of us on the water's surface.

Bushwacker: We didn't get into real trouble, but I can see how it would be possible. On our downstream passage we opted to stay to the right as we exited the protected bay which contains the portage landing because I thought that we could ease more into the current, rather than entering more to the left, which would have taken us more perpendicular across the flow. It worked for us, but there are probably better ways to do it. On the return trip when we were headed upstream there was no issue at all, we simply hugged the left side and paddled right on through to the landing.

Nce report and it sounds like you had a really nice trip with your daughter.

Nice trip with your daughter.

T

cptrea- loved your report! We were at the same campsite (the one with the chair) about 1 week before you- hope the firewood stash was still there for you!

Thanks for the trip report. I found it a great read. Nice pictures.

quote ripple: "cptrea- loved your report! We were at the same campsite (the one with the chair) about 1 week before you- hope the firewood stash was still there for you!"

Someone must have slipped into that spot between the end of your visit and the beginning of ours because there was no firewood stash when we arrived! We did find a fire grate leaning against the outside of the fire ring, though. It was out of sight on the side of the ring away from the seating and tent pads, so I suspect that the donors left it unknowingly.

Nice trip report cptrea. Looked like you caught some nice fish.

I was through that area the week before. Those photos do not do that silver falls outlet justice.

Really enjoyed reading your report. Like you, my son and I come a long way up there each year (from Houston). It is expensive but worth it. This year, we will be leaving in a few weeks to do our 2nd Man Chain trip, traveling through some of the same areas that you describe.

quote cptrea: "

quote ripple: "cptrea- loved your report! We were at the same campsite (the one with the chair) about 1 week before you- hope the firewood stash was still there for you!"

Someone must have slipped into that spot between the end of your visit and the beginning of ours because there was no firewood stash when we arrived! We did find a fire grate leaning against the outside of the fire ring, though. It was out of sight on the side of the ring away from the seating and tent pads, so I suspect that the donors left it unknowingly. "

We basecamped there from June 4th to June 16th. We headed out to Cache Bay Saturday morning and still were wind bound. Come to think of it there was a Dad and his 2 kids who arrived at the island site in the little bay that you look out at from the firepit- we were a bit annoyed thinking "Of all of the sites in all of Quetico- you guys had to be under our nose!" I told Ed that I thought they were lurking for the site we were on- I bet I was right! Sorry you didn't get the very nice wood pile we left!

quote ripple: "

quote cptrea: "

quote ripple: "cptrea- loved your report! We were at the same campsite (the one with the chair) about 1 week before you- hope the firewood stash was still there for you!"

Someone must have slipped into that spot between the end of your visit and the beginning of ours because there was no firewood stash when we arrived! We did find a fire grate leaning against the outside of the fire ring, though. It was out of sight on the side of the ring away from the seating and tent pads, so I suspect that the donors left it unknowingly. "

We basecamped there from June 4th to June 16th. We headed out to Cache Bay Saturday morning and still were wind bound. Come to think of it there was a Dad and his 2 kids who arrived at the island site in the little bay that you look out at from the firepit- we were a bit annoyed thinking "Of all of the sites in all of Quetico- you guys had to be under our nose!" I told Ed that I thought they were lurking for the site we were on- I bet I was right! Sorry you didn't get the very nice wood pile we left!"

Hi Ripple,
We came in on the 11th and your campsite was on our milkrun of sites to check out. Stayed there in '09 and '10. My son spotted your tent first and we moved on. My son and I wound up staying on the site we stayed at last year which is one of our favorites maybe a mile east of you. The first week the area seemed more crowded then we've experienced in the past. The big island was taken by another party from Illinois that I exchange emails with and another small island near us was taken.

I believe we also spoke with the dad and two kids you mentioned. We were having shorelunch at what would be a great site if it was clear of underbrush etc and they paddled over asking us if we were only having lunch and leaving soon...then they paddled back towards your island site. Seemed a little stressed like they had been looking for some time without luck. This was on the 13th and around 4pm according to the timestamp on my photos.

Planning on a trip report? Maybe I missed it...love reading ones from the area we enjoy...

quote Wallidave: "

quote ripple: "

quote cptrea: "

quote ripple: "cptrea- loved your report! We were at the same campsite (the one with the chair) about 1 week before you- hope the firewood stash was still there for you!"

Someone must have slipped into that spot between the end of your visit and the beginning of ours because there was no firewood stash when we arrived! We did find a fire grate leaning against the outside of the fire ring, though. It was out of sight on the side of the ring away from the seating and tent pads, so I suspect that the donors left it unknowingly. "

We basecamped there from June 4th to June 16th. We headed out to Cache Bay Saturday morning and still were wind bound. Come to think of it there was a Dad and his 2 kids who arrived at the island site in the little bay that you look out at from the firepit- we were a bit annoyed thinking "Of all of the sites in all of Quetico- you guys had to be under our nose!" I told Ed that I thought they were lurking for the site we were on- I bet I was right! Sorry you didn't get the very nice wood pile we left!"

Hi Ripple,
We came in on the 11th and your campsite was on our milkrun of sites to check out. Stayed there in '09 and '10. My son spotted your tent first and we moved on. My son and I wound up staying on the site we stayed at last year which is one of our favorites maybe a mile east of you. The first week the area seemed more crowded then we've experienced in the past. The big island was taken by another party from Illinois that I exchange emails with and another small island near us was taken.

I believe we also spoke with the dad and two kids you mentioned. We were having shorelunch at what would be a great site if it was clear of underbrush etc and they paddled over asking us if we were only having lunch and leaving soon...then they paddled back towards your island site. Seemed a little stressed like they had been looking for some time without luck. This was on the 13th and around 4pm according to the timestamp on my photos.

Planning on a trip report? Maybe I missed it...love reading ones from the area we enjoy..."

I thought that was you when I read the posts in the Quetico Forum!

No Trip report yet- maybe later this summer I will get time to get around it.

Hummm- The Dad and 2 kids we saw arrived a few days later Friday the 15th in the afternoon. We were a bit annoyed because it was pretty early in the day on a perfect paddling day- not like they couldn't find another place to be is what we were thinking. Silly but the area is so private and it just seemed a bit rude- I wouldn't have set up under someone elses nose if I could avoid it.

We headed out on Saturday the 16th- got caught in the heavy winds/rain and couldn't get into Cache Bay so camped at the site on the point coming out of the channel from the falls and then got an early pick up on Sunday. We actually decided to head out early (had planned a pick up at Hook for Tuesday the 19th) but were watching weather and the barometers on our watch and suspected the weather was headed for really bad in the next day or so. Turns out we got out just before the huge weather that came through there!

This is TrailHiker10's wife. Thank you for the advice of the Storm Thin Fin. After reading your report, I looked it up when we stopped at Cabela's and the nice gentleman in fishing dept. helped us find it. I used that one lure the entire trip, and caught lots of fish. It sure was a lot of fun! Thanks for sharing!!

Really, really enjoyed your report (especially the photos). Great to see your daughter taking to this kind of adventure - hope she gets a chance to pass it down to her kids one day...