Canada July 2002
Phil and Audrey and friends
Here is my writeup in a format you can read. :-) By Sherry
Watts.
Oh Canada Glorious and Free… July 2002
Yes, it was another great trip to Canada in a
special part of God’s country. It is always so nice to cross the border and see
beautiful landscapes in every direction for roughly 1000 miles. The Watts’,
Gums’, and Schelhaas’s went on this adventure this year. The Schelhaas' had to
leave us after a week as we moved north for another two weeks. I have put some
pictures on the internet at the following address if you would like to check
out some of the things I share with you.
http://community.webshots.com/album/46612814CymwuJ
We stayed at 12 different lakes. Ten of these sites had no one else there. It
was just lovely campsites, beautiful lakes, and us. My kind of camping. Here
are some highlights about our trip and the lakes we visited:
1. We
met at Missezula Lake the first evening after work which is about 4 hours north
of Omak. We didn’t fish at this lake because we had a long ways to go the next
day. On our way there a small bull moose ran out in front of the Gum’s rig and
started running down the road ahead of them. His skinny legs were flopping
around and he wasn’t sure what to do. He finally went off the side of the road
and took one look at us and headed into the bushes. The Schelhaas’s had reached
this lake the day before and were waiting for us with a lovely tamale pie dinner
heated up over the campfire. It was yummy. I found myself finally winding down
from work and ready to take our three week trip.
2. We
ventured north about 500 more miles the next day and settled on a pretty Lake
called Batnuni. This is west of the town of Quesnel. Our camp was right next to
the water. The fishing was a little slow. Jim caught a small trout and the
next day Gary caught a 3 lb. Char which we enjoyed for dinner one night. There
are wildflowers every where…lots of white daisies, Indian Paint brushes,
Culinbine (spell?), and wild roses. We took a small hike around the area. We
don’t venture very far away from camp alone because of moose and bear at all of
these remote lakes.
3. After
two days at Batnuni we ventured on to a small lake called Kevin. It was a little
rough getting into this lake and not a road you want to run back and forth on a
whole lot. Fishing was fun …they were small trout but lots of them. On a fly
rod they feel big and they really fight. On this lake it was a challenge to see
who could catch the most fish…I think I won…at least that is what I recall in
our boat…tee hee. The lily pad picture I took was on this lake. The
Schelhaas’s saw a big bull moose the first evening there at the end of the
lake. The sunset was beautiful. As you will see (viewing my pictures) there
are a lot of lovely sunsets. I was able to capture many of these because the
sun doesn’t go down until around 10:30 so many nights we were out on the lakes
fishing and enjoying the awesome sunsets around us.
The Schelhaas’s have discovered that they picked up a mouse on the trip
somewhere. They are a bit frustrated on how to catch this mouse with no mouse
trap!
4. On
July 7th
we moved on to a large lake called Tatuk. It is a beautiful lake with lots of
islands. It is a lake that you do not want to get way down the lake in a small
boat because waves can come up quite fast and you can get caught. We caught a
lot of trout around 12 to 14 inches long, and a couple Kokanee. The “star”
sunset was on this lake.
It was time to catch the mouse for Helen so she could enjoy the rest of
her trip. You should have seen six adults trying to rig up mouse traps to catch
this mouse. Bets were flying and I ALMOST had to kiss Phil Gum’s ass at high
noon after he caught one in his famous mouse trap….oh my! I was looking for
some nice dark lipstick to use but fortunately a second mouse was caught in my
trap so I was off the hook… whew! I do not understand why he was so ecstatic to
win this bet??? Was it because in working with him for roughly 15 years he
never won a bet with me? He was jumping up on picnic tables and carrying on
so… It was hilarious.
5. July 10th,
the Schelhaas’s headed home and we moved on further north towards the Fraser
Lake area. We settled on Boreal Lake for a couple of days… You know a good lake
when you hear the Loons and see eagles. The really pretty red sunset was on
this lake. It was right after we watched a bull moose swim across the lake. I
tried to get pictures but it was too dark. He looked a little disgusted with us
being out on the lake disturbing his swim. The Gum’s about the same time
were watching a cow moose swimming the lake further down. This was another
pretty lake. We caught a lot of small trout on this lake. One night sitting
around the campfire and enjoying some hot tea about midnight we were listening
to the Loons and talking about safety measures we all need to do to avoid any
confrontations with the bears. It was pretty quiet then I heard a sound off in
the distance and then Patches (the Gum’s dog) growled….you have never seen 4
adults scattered that fast in your life… it wasn’t anything and we laughed at
all of us afterwards as we said good night.
6. On July 12th
we headed for Knapp Lake and stayed for 3 days. This lake is a bit tough to get
in to. We drove in with one rig first to check it out and then ventured in. It
wasn’t bad as long as you went slow and watched both sides for stobs. The boat
ramp was a little steep and iffy for backing down to with our load so we rigged
up Phil’s portable trailer that he carries along all folded up. It worked slick
to walk the boats down. Our camp was tucked back in the trees with no site of
the lake. It was a real quiet site and nice. There was a nice trail down to
the lake. This lake is about 6 miles long. Shoot! You could fish in the nude on
these lakes and not worry about it…although the mosquito’s might have a hay day
to and from the boat. Repellant just became a part of the perfume you wore.
All of the fish we caught here started at a pound in size and go up a little in
size.
7. July 14th
it was time to truck on and see more country. When we reached Francois Lake and
the town of South Bank the country took your breath away. It reminded me of The
Sound of Music scene where Julie sings…the Hills are Alive. The alpine meadows
and valleys are beautiful. I should have stopped to take one picture of a
meadow that was just solid wildflowers but I didn’t….We stayed at Andrews Bay
just overnight on Ootsa Lake. Ootsa Lake is 400 miles long…it looks like an
ocean. WOW!
8. July 15th
we pulled into Nadina Lake. We had a spectacular view of the lake but it was a
little cloudy and light rain off and on so I was never able to get a sunshiny
view of the snow covered mountains in the background. This is supposed to be a
“really big fish” lake but we had no luck on this lake. We are not sure
why…maybe it is the turn in weather or??? So we moved on to the next lake on
the 16th. We were getting really good at
putting up and tearing down camp in a very short timeframe.
9. We looked at
several lakes and traveled a bit further than we had planned because we started
running into people or campsites that looked more like Conconully State Park
which wasn’t what we had in mind. We were on a big loop and still moving
north. We came into the town of Houston and Burns Lake. We refueled up and
bought fresh veggies and fruit and ice and headed to Maxam Lake. Maxim was fun.
Fishing was pretty good although there were a lot of squaw fish in this lake.
Supposedly there are some Burbett (link cod) here too but we didn’t catch any.
We had fun killing squawfish and throwing them out to feed the Eagles. I caught
a pretty good picture of one swooping down to get one. We saw a cow moose and
her baby at the end of the lake and while I was getting all excited about taking
a picture I turned to the right and there was also a big bull moose standing
there. Of course the pictures never turn out close up like I wanted but you
don’t dare get too close especially to the cow and her baby.
10. July 19th
we headed for the smallest lake we have been on - Co-op Lake. We wanted to fish
this one because it has Eastern Brook. We renamed this lake Gary’s Pond. He
caught a 4 lb. And a 3 ½ lb.Eastern Brook ! He said they are the largest
Eastern Brook he has ever caught. I got one 2 lbs. And Audrey got a 3 lb.
Brookie. We enjoyed a lovely rainbow one evening over this lake. The brookies
are a really dark red meat and good eating. We definitely do not starve on
these trips and anything cooked over an open fire or a grill outside just seems
to taste better…especially when Phil does the cooking.
11. July 21 we
moved on and we had planned to move to some lakes that have good char and
burbett fishing (Talpatin) but at each lake there were lots of people. The
weather was awesome and it was wall to wall on these lakes. We visited with
some local Canadians who showed us pictures of some BIG Char they had
caught..about 25 lbs. WOW. They told us about a lake called Helene that isn’t
even on our map that is great fishing if you can get in to it…Yes, you guessed
it that is where we headed to.
12. Helene Lake…
The fishing was incredible! The smallest fish caught was 2 lbs and we would
average around 40 fish for two of us in roughly a three hour period!!! You get
a 3 or 4 lb fish on a fly rod and you have your hands full…what a kick. We
would catch and release unless we needed some fish for dinner. That Gary has
the record of the trip so far on this lake with a 4.3 lb lovely trout. This
fish tasted like baked salmon …good. There are only a couple of spots at this
site to camp and a little tougher to get backed into and set up but lovely. It
looks like a popular hunting camp for moose. We saw some bear prints on the
road when we were taking a walk but saw no bear.
13. July 23 and 24th
we started to move south again and decided to go back to Pelican Lake. We had
drove by this one going north and liked it but didn’t stay so decided we wanted
to try it. This was one of my favorite lakes as far as the wildlife and scenery
goes. Fishing wasn’t that great but we have been told there are some big ones
to be had here. I was scanning the far lake side with binoculars and saw some
type of big bird swimming on the other side…I thought they were swans at first
but looking closer I realized they were indeed pelicans. I have never seen
pelicans inland at a lake like this. Gary and I took a hike out on a point one
day where we knew there was an eagle’s nest being guarded by two eagles. As we
got closer they spotted us and really started creating havoc so we turned back.
One evening we enjoyed a sunset heading into camp. I tried to capture the
awesome gold, purple, pinks and blues of the waves behind the boat but the
picture doesn’t do them justice. After we got in we used a lantern to guide in
the Gum’s who came in later. What we missed was an incredible full moon shot
that they stayed out and enjoyed. I can hardly wait to see their pictures of
it. As I was trying to get pictures of the pelicans one morning I scanned to
the right of them and there was a cow moose standing there! We saw another 5
moose way back in the marshy areas across the lake too far to get any good
pictures. There is an old fly in resort on this lake that is no longer open
that we walked up to. What a beautiful place to have stayed at. I couldn’t
believe people aren’t at these sites.
14. Am I windy?
Probably but wanted to share a lovely trip with my friends. We headed south on
7/25 and got home on 7/26 and back to work on Monday We have talked about
taking a trip all the way across Canada someday…I could do this. We would need
to stop in a town now and then to take a hot shower and take a break for a day
or two and then head out again. I did sit down when I got home and scanned all
the newspapers to catch up on the news and it was kind of depressing to read all
the negative stuff that was happening all at once…I didn’t miss that.
Well I hope you enjoy my story cause I’m sticking to it. Enjoy the pictures.