Hal has been making a fishing trip to Canada’s Lac La Croix for, I think, 17 years with a year skipped for a quadruple bypass.

His first trips were in a canoe and camping after a couple of portages. He then started staying at Zup’s Resort which is something right down my alley.

We drove from Hernando , MS for 15 hours to Eveleth, MN and spent the night in preparation for an hour drive to our 8:30 pickup by boat. Going through Wisconsin we saw this bear on the side of the road and circled back for a photo. We got to within 50 yards or so before the bear noticed us and bolted back into the woods. The phone camera has it as a dot on the right of the road.

We reached the pickup point and got into a boat with a top and a rack with canoes on it and a big outboard. Jan our lady driver could really wheel that speeding boat down the winding river. I was in awe. We drove to the border where we stopped at another dock.  A Canadian customs officer came out and checked our passports, asked a few questions, and sent us on our way. A picture from inside the boat  and then a picture of one of the narrow spots we went through, albeit very slowly. We then came to a dock and all got out while the boat was driven onto a waiting trolley pulled by a cable.

   

The whole thing was then portaged about 300 yards to the river on the other side. We walked over on a rocky path where we boarded the boat for another stretch of river to another portage that put the boat into Lac La Croix where it took us to Zup’s Resort. Zup’s is owned and operated by the Zuponovitch (might be misspelled) family. The father, mother, and now a daughter are involved in its operation. I knew I was going to like it from the start. The dock boys were on the dock at out arrival and would not let us touch any of our gear. I was especially grateful for that as I really didn’t know what tackle to bring so I just brought it all and then some. My tackle was so heavy it made me resolve to go through every compartment when I returned home and take out everything that is unnecessary. They hauled it all to our comfortable cabin while we signed in. The cabin where we stayed had two bedrooms, a bath with a tub or shower, another large room with two small beds where we could sit and work on our fishing equipment. The cabin was only a few steps from both a boat dock and the lodge where we dined, and did we dine. Breakfast at 6:30 and dinner at 6:00. The food was good and so plentiful I couldn’t eat it all. Because when I was young I was encouraged to eat everything on my plate, I felt guilty leaving so much on my plate but my capacity is limited.

   

  The photos are a few of the main courses we had. The club sandwich was the only lunch we ate at the lodge, the rest being sandwiches, fruit and chips we took with us fishing so we wouldn’t have to stop fishing for lunch. Included in the photos are baked chicken over wild rice, barbecued ribs fried walleye (yum), peanut butter pie, and breakfast of eggs bacon and fruit. I was impressed by the soups each night at dinner. Each one was different and delicious. The employees at Zup’s were all just as nice as could be, always wanting to do something to help. The young ladies that served were excellent and most pleasant. One was from New Zealand and had come to work there as had her boyfriend.

After we signed in it was a race to get all of our rods and reels put together so we could fish that afternoon. Our boat was waiting at the dock. It was an almost brand new Lund 16 foot pointed prow boat with a 30 HP Yamaha 4 stroke motor. It had a Minkota 55 pound trolling motor with electric steering. Being used to a cable steering trolling motor, it took us a little time to figure out the electric steering. It ended up that the electric was easier for fishing there but I don’t think it would work here. The seats in the boat were very comfortable and the front one could be moved to the center for when you were running. I looked at boats of that style because I have a flat bottomed boat that will beat you to death in the waves. I wondered how a pointed prow boat would fish. It did well and took the waves like a champ. A couple of photos of the boat, one with the noble guide employing his binoculars looking for lily pads in a cove.

  

There were no days we could not fish because of the weather although one day we came in for dinner because it rained all morning but had quit by lunch. We just put on dry clothes and pressed on. The temperatures were terrific, 36 degrees the last morning we fished but we were back in our fishing shirts by 9:30.

Usually I have a good sense of directions, but for some reason, on this trip all that went out the window. Everything up there looks the same and there are hundreds of islands, most looking just like all the others. Good thing I had an experienced guide. Did I mention rocks? Everything is rock. The lake was made by glaciers and many of the huge rocks are are still laying where the  glaciers put them. Twenty feet in front of the rock face in the first photo it was 50 feet deep. In the second photo that thing that looks like a log sticking out to the side of the island is a rock.

 

The main fish we were trying to catch was the small mouth bass, or brownie as they are known . They are considered an undesirable fish as most people want to catch walleye or lake trout. They are also a fighter, I believe stronger than our largemouth and with more stamina. The water there had about 8 foot visibility and was around 70 degrees. We wanted to get as much top water fishing as we could but sometimes the wind would not allow it.  Our main baits were Ribbits, Whopper Ploppers, spinner baits, and swim jigs. I used a jerk bait a little but caught my biggest brownie on it. When a smallmouth bit a Ribbit, instead of making your line move like a largemouth , they would just sit there and chew on it. I tried to let them have it because their mouths are smaller but I would never see my line move. I finally would just set the hook sometimes on a fish, sometimes on air.

   

The first photo is of a fish I just held up in the sun so its beautiful colors could be seen. The second is of a 3 pound fish that I caught on a Ribbit. You can see the lily ads in the background. The third is of a 3 3/4 pound brownie caught on a jerk bait. The last is of Hal with the largest brownie of the trip that weighed 4 pounds. Overall I would have to say that spinner baits were the bait that caught the most fish. The smallmouth loved to hang around big rocks. If you could see a rock just under the water that was in water 6 to 8 feet deep, that was the spot.

And then there were the Northern Pike. The pike were the riffraff of the North somewhat like the gar down here but a little better. They have a bad temperament and are very aggressive biters. Many times rather than hit the bait directly they might jump over it and if they miss, just keep the bait moving they might hit it four more times eventually getting hooked. Once hooked they put up a good fight and are generally not through when they get to the boat. Did I mention they had teeth, and plenty of them. On my Whopper Plopper (a pricey bait) I used a small wire leader that saved my bait from loss but not from the effects of those sharp teeth.

   

As you can see they have plenty of teeth and are a hazard to your lures unless you have a leader. Hal said you would not lose many spinnerbaits usually. I took him at his word but still used some baits I never usually use. At first, if I thought it was a pike I pulled my bait out of the way. They were fun to catch so I got over that pretty quickly. The pike weeded out my old baits better than I would have and relieved me of a few ounces of spinnerbaits and a few hooks and Ribbit  frogs. The third picture is of a small pike just to show their pretty markings. It also shows where to grab one, holding them there is like the “sleeper hold” one of the TV wrestlers used to put on his opponent, except this one really works. The last one is of a pike Hal caught that I think weighed five pounds. The first one in the next to pictures is of one Hal caught that weighed 8 pounds and one I caught that weighed 10 pounds. After it got in the boat the 10 pounder opened its mouth and cut its way out of the landing net and got loose in the boat and had to be corralled with the Boca grip. After they get to the boat they are like John Paul Jones who when asked to surrender said “Sir, I have just begun to fight”.

 

Edward, upon hearing we were catching some pike, sent me this recipe for Vicorian pike from The Field magazine 1854:

Open your pike, rub him within with salt and claret wine; save the milt, a little of the blood and fat; cut him in two or three pieces and put him in when the water boils; put him in with sweet marjoram,savory, thyme or fennel, with a good handful of salt; let him boil for near half-an-hour. For sauce take sweet butter, anchovies, horse radish, claret wine, of each good quantity; a little blood ,shallot or garlic, some lemon sliced; beat them well together and serve him.

For me, throw out the pike, leave out the blood and eat the sauce.

We fished hard for 6 1/2 days, usually from about 7:30 a.m. to just before 6:00 p.m. . We caught 278 fish for an average of almost 43 per day. I consider that a very good fishing trip.