Monday, August 15, 2016 Peter fished early morning again while I slept in. We then had another pancake breakfast overlooking Jordan lake while deciding what to do for the day. We decided on day trip to Ashigan for smallies. Backtracking through Cattyman and Gibson, we found the portage to Ashigan to be fairly flat, but long at 105 rods. We started working the shoreline east of the portage and started catching smallies right away. These fish fought much harder than the three inch perch we hauled in the day before. As we moved along the east side I finally caught a keeper – fish fry was on! Unfortunately, as I was trying to put the Smallie on the stringer, my line was in the water and a smaller fish grabbed the twister tail and hook. As my rod started for the water, I lost my keeper and ended up trading a keeper for a throwback. We wouldn’t be eating fish today. We eventually worked our way to the small island and stopped for lunch. It appears there used to be a campsite here, but the firegrate was removed. It did appear that this site was still getting some day use. After eating our apples and some trail mix we headed to the west end of the lake chasing bigger Smallies. We caught a few as we worked back to the portage, but nothing big enough to eat. We decided to head back to Jordan and give the eyes another opportunity that evening. On the way back to Cattyman, we again stopped at the waterfall, and this time Peter waded in for a picture. This is a really nice place to take a break. Eventually we got back to Jordan in time for the evening fish try. We started in the narrows on the west end of the lake and worked along the shoreline. About a half hour before sunset, Peter finally got some action, telling me he had good news and bad news. He had a fish on, but it was too big to eat. He eventually got the Northern Pike to the boat, estimating it to be about twenty pounds and really thick backed. It broke off his lure and got away, but he was right, that was too big to eat. I didn’t get my camera out, so no evidence on this one. As we kept working the shoreline, we began to see fish eating at the surface, but they were not interested in joining us for dinner, so we kept working along the shore in twenty foot water. About thirty minutes after the first fish, Peter said, “you’ll never believe this, but I got another that’s too big to eat. This time I got the camera out in time to take several pictures of the Monster pike. However, the story does not end there! After I took the last picture of Peter holding the big fish, I hear a commotion. As I was sitting in the front of the canoe, the picture had been taken over my shoulder without seeing what was going on. Apparently the fish got free and I had no place to hide. Peter still doesn’t talk about what happened, but we managed to keep the boat upright, the fish got released, and Peter still has all his fingers. At this point, we headed back to camp and turned in for the night, after a quick mountain house meal, fire, and some stargazing. It sure is beautiful in the BWCA on a clear night.