Thursday, August 20, 2026 We left from Ely fairly early Thursday morning after a decent night of hotel sleep and the necessary amount of pre-trip shenanigans. Steady rain gave way to fair skies as we pushed off. As the designated fishing guide on the trip, my stated goal was to help anyone who was interested get a fish on the line. For me, this happened on about my third cast, as a decent northern hammered my spinner not even 10 minutes off the launch. With the net packed away and in a tough position as a duffer, I lost him boat-side, but this obviously set high expectations for everyone.

We made our way through Lake One towards the portages. The water was considerably lower than normal, a theme that would come up again later. We managed to get the canoe stuck on a rock that would normally be clearable, and the rookies got a taste of backwoods problem-solving when I hopped off the boat to push it free. We got to the portages into Lake Two, and my father-in-law accomplished his goal for the trip by portaging a canoe for the first time in his life in his early 60s. We fought increasing wind and got to a decent west-shore site on Lake Three.

A big concern among the uninitiated was food. Luckily, our day-one burrito dinner with real frozen vegetables didn’t disappoint. Rain started coming down more seriously again and we called it a night.

While reading in the tent, my fiancée and I noticed some moisture coming in. She realized she actually had standing water forming at her feet, and we figured out our rain fly had failed along a seam. I got out of the tent, ran over to my soon-to-be in-laws’ tent where our packs were stashed, and retrieved the large extra tarp a coworker had loaned my fiancée. Then I got a towel from my brother-in-law and set to work. My fiancée cleaned up the inside of the tent while I got the tarp situated and we had a dry shelter once more.