Saturday, August 22, 2026 I always tell new campers that your first night of sleep might be tough, but your second night will be incredible. That was certainly the case for me, as I slept like the dead. In a complete break from character, my father-in-law suggested we limit breakfast to granola bars and coffee so as to make better time out of camp. My fiancée and I looked at the time and thought it a great idea, so we got to breaking camp.

Our folly was soon exposed as we realized that packing a canoe is an art learned with experience, and this group was still gaining necessary experience. We got out of camp and battled wind across Lake Three and back up Lake Two.

Morale was flagging and we had a quick snack after our portages. The wind was even worse on Lake One. Disaster struck as the wind took my brother-in-law’s bucket hat off his head. Despite our desperate attempts to rescue it, the hat — a treasure from the US Open — was lost. As my good-spirited brother-in-law said, “the lake giveth and the lake taketh, just like the golf course.”

Low water made reading the terrain and map difficult. We finally made camp on a peninsula north of the main section of Lake One. We struggled to find the site since our maps disagreed with each other, but some passing kayakers offered the clarity we needed. After a mid-morning departure and an early afternoon arrival at camp, the entire party was famished. We enjoyed a hearty lunch of pancakes, hot chocolate, and summer sausage, and our spirits recovered greatly.

With camp established, my brother-in-law and I turned our attention to more pressing business. His mom hadn’t caught a fish since she was a young girl, and she thought it was high time to catch another. We gave her a quick casting lesson and paddled to the rapids at Lock and Dam 1.

A smallmouth crushed my reliable Mepps #5 right off the bat, but nothing else came together at the rapids. Moving upstream to a quiet lily-padded inlet, we tried everything in the tackle box. We longed for our lost spinners — my brother-in-law lost his to a tough snag on Day 1 — and tied on lure after lure. After a few fish barely missed his lucky frog, I somehow caught a northern on the Mepps. Just two fish on the stringer and nothing was coming together.

All this time, my mother-in-law was diligently casting and reeling. We fixed her snags and offered pointers on where to cast, but nothing was taking the bait. To her credit, she realized quickly what took years for some to learn: it’s about the journey and the experience, and it’s called “fishing,” not “catching.” Our “head back” time came, and my brother-in-law talked strategy. The flicker minnow was two for two, should we try that again?

Just minutes into our paddle home and lightning struck a third time, and we had a fish on the line. Although she was taken aback at first, we coached her to keep her rod tip up, tension on the line, and reel it in.

For the first time in decades, my mother-in-law proudly held her catch aloft: a pencil of a northern, but a catch to be proud of. Her son worked the lure free and we released the fish, and she was glad to see it swim off strong.

Back at camp, the lake tooketh from my brother-in-law once again. Just as he was pulling a nice northern into shore, it spit the hook and escaped. Between this, the hat, and having me marrying his sister, this guy couldn’t catch a break!

Aside from fishing and losing fantasy football leagues, I spend the fall hunting whenever my schedule allows. My very patient fiancée encourages the hobby as a way to put fresh meat on our table, but loves even more to tease me when I come home with no birds in the bag or no venison for the freezer. As I used the latrine at camp that night, I counted five grouse in an aspen tree watching me. A full limit of birds, and they literally caught me with my pants down, unarmed and out of season! The woods giveth, the woods taketh. I’m confident that for all the miles I tread this fall, shotgun in hand, I won’t see that many birds at once again.

I was the last one out of bed that night. I took in the moon and the calm waters, the same that had offered such a hearty chop just hours before. I always love being in the woods, and I was glad for the time bonding with my soon-to-be in-laws. With a wide range of outdoor aptitudes and enthusiasm for camping, everyone had brought a good attitude and tried their hardest, even when things didn’t go to plan or we hit road bumps. My fiancée is a great woman with a good head on her shoulders, and this trip reaffirmed for me that she comes from good stock. Standing there in the moonlight, I thought about how I’m lucky to have these woods and someone to spend my life enjoying them with.