Boundary Waters, Trip Reports, BWCA, Stories

Flirting with Wabakimi
by FOG51

Trip Type: Paddling Canoe
Entry Date: 09/16/2014
Entry & Exit Point: Other
Number of Days: 4
Group Size: 1
Day 3 of 4
Thursday, September 18, 2014

Wind blowing very hard with light rain all day which made the fishing tough and boat control even worse. Trolled most of the day and caught walleyes and northerns nearly all day. Most of the wall eyes were 16 to 20 inches long with only a couple of small ones and the northerns ran from 24 to 30 inches. Green flicker shad slayed them all, finally hooked a good fish but my line broke about halfway down to the bait. I retied several times a day but didn't check the line 20 feet up from the plug. I tied on a new leader and a new flicker shad and was back to catching fish in short order. It was almost dead ringer weather-wise as yesterday. Strong cold wind from the northwest, cloudy, light rain and on and off all day. Fishing slowed down but I still caught fish, not as much jigging but did ok trolling except by the time I hooked, played, landed and released a fish, I had drifted nearly 100 yards from where I hooked said fish. The shoreline in the southern part of the lake reminded me of WCPP, except the trees here on Wapi are considerably taller and larger around. Had two pair of loons and chicks that hung around the area I fished every day. Saw two adult Eagles but no offspring and saw a single Golden Eagle. Quit fishing early to pack up to leave Wapi in the morning. My plan was to camp at the head of the Harmon Rapids and fish them Friday afternoon and Saturday morning and be to the truck early afternoon.