Friday, February 01, 2013

Woke up a little earlier this morning. Without Shawn to fire up his wood stove in the morning things were considerably cooler. So much so, that Mark had some issues with his feet being very cold. So, eventually he worked his way over and got the stove going. Needless to say we lingered in the shelter a bit longer this morning.

While it was quite cold upon our eventual emergence, there didn't seem to be any wind. So, it was decided on that we'd try and make it back to Mavis lake today to try some fishing. My Voyageur map doesn't even show a portage trail & neither did my old fisher maps or any online. Only McKenzie maps showed a portage that started as a fork of the Snipe lake portage. That didn't seem right to me. So I e-mailed Steve Persons (DNR fishery supervisor for the Grand Marais area) and he informed me that the forest service had moved the portage sometime prior to 2003, when the DNR last did their survey of the lake. He claimed the portage now started near the middle of the northeast shoreline of the northeast arm of Missing Link lake. And, actually gave me map coordinates.

So armed with this information, we were about to embark on our journey when someone called out from the lake. Here it was Greg (SevenofNine) and his buddy Scott. We welcomed them into to camp & showed them around a bit. Greg mentioned that his vehicle had said it was -21 F when they left. Both Mark & I firmly believed that it had been even colder than that earlier in the morning.

After getting everyone acquainted & some brief conversation, we told them to make themselves to home as we were headed for Mavis lake.

We decided to make a straight line towards the Mavis portage. So we wound up breaking trail for most of the distance. Once we were well into the NE arm we hooked up with an old path. It soon became clearly evident that someone else was just in the area and had been looking for the Mavis portage as well. I investigated some of their false trails before finally finding the true path. It looked as if they had camped at the start of the path, because there was still a decent pile of freshly cut firewood. Indeed, the campers had blazed a trail all the way back to Mavis.

The portage was quite overgrown and had blue tape marking the trail every 20 feet or so. (Upon closer inspection there was also some old orange tape that had faded to white along the path as well.) The trail twisted & turned tightly with a few quick drops. Then, at the bottom of the ravine was an incredibly steep uphill section. Not quite straight up but, just enough to get a few marginal footholds. Mercifully the trail leveled off after this section but was still a snaky trail. Finally, there is a long downhill section to the shores of Mavis.

We made our way out across the lake some and punched a handful of holes. I marked a couple of fish right off the bat. But, that would be as much action as we would get today.

A couple of unfortunate circumstances conspired to wear down our resolve. While it had warmed up considerably from this morning I believe it was still below zero, and once we got to Mavis the wind picked up. This made doing anything that required dexterity (changing lures etc.)really tough. It seemed anytime we pulled our hands out of our mittens or pockets that the countdown was on. It only took a minute or so and our fingers would numb right up. Also, there was just a little slush on the lake which, as Mark found out, presented problems too.

So, after maybe 2 hours of spending more time cleaning out our holes, boots & fishing line we threw in the towel and decide to make our way back to Missing link.

Once back on Missing Link it seemed like a whole different world. Figures. The wind had completely let up! It was actually a very nice, comfortable trek back across the lake. Ah well, it was still nice to have been able to get back to Mavis and see what it was all about. We both agreed that getting a toboggan across that trail was the easier mode of travel versus a canoe. But, IMHO, definitely a 2 person operation in both cases.

Shortly after getting their shelters up, Greg & Scott had wandered off down the Tuscarora portage exploring that trail to it's termination at Tuscarora lake. In the meantime John & Shawn had made it back to camp, so there was something of a mutual convergence all within the span of an hour back in camp. Everyone got better acquainted, then Mark got a late lunch of chicken noodle soup started.

During the BS session that ensued after lunch we learned that Shawn had won a covetous Boy Scout leadership award at the dinner he & John had left to attend. And, everyone pitched in and added to the firewood pile while being sure to take a little time to explore, contemplate & appreciate the wondrous beauty that surrounded us.

It seemed as soon as lunch was done, Mark was already starting on the chili for supper. Funny how the shortened daylight & longer preparation times make these tasks almost meld into one another.

Afterwards Shawn & I supplemented the wood for inside the tent. Needless to say the stove was a welcome luxury & made the cold mornings much more tolerable, as well as providing hot drinks & oatmeal to get us going.

Missing Link Lake, Mavis Lake