My Road Trip

Bill and I just finished a bitchin week of work. It’s 1:46 saturday morning. This was the kind of week that really makes you wish you were on the trip. The weather here was real nice this week up until today, crappy with some snow coming tonight.

This also motivated us to talk a lot about the route we want to do. I think we have a plan. We really want to see Argo and Darky Lakes. These are two of the most unique lakes in the park. Argo is said to have some of the clearest lake water you will ever see. One guy said you could read a newspaper sitting on the bottom of the lake from your boat.

Argo is supposed to have good fishing as well. It should be really cool to sight fish. If the water is as clear as they say it is, we should be able to spot fish from the canoe and pick out the ones we want. It might be like bone fishing in the Caribbean where you see the fish and cast to it.

Darky is said to be just beautiful with some of the best indian pictographs in the park. This fishing in this lake is also supposed to be great with big northerns, bass and lake trout. I’m not sure about the walleye, but I’m guessing they are in there too.

I see two options. The first one is to start on Lac La Croix, then up the Maligne river to Poo-bah lake and down through Commnee over to Williams lake, then to Darky.

Basically it will take the first day to get to Poo-bah. We’ll want to stay there a day or two, then another travel day to get to Argo, two days there, then two on Darky, then a day back out. If we did that we are looking at an 11 day trip (when you figure in the two car travel days).

This sounds awesome to me. However, a couple of these travel days will be tough. The Poo-bah to Commnee portage is said to be one of the hardest in the park. Couple that with a lot of canoeing and that will be a tough day. Also, if the water is high, canoeing up the Maligne might be rough. Last year the water wasn’t too high, and it was a bit challenging in spots.

We took the Maligne to Poo-bah last year. Poo-bah is a big lake and there are some big northern in it. Good walleye too. It’s an interesting lake with a big sandy swim area. Last year we took a day trip to neighboring Bernice lake for the best large mouth bass fishing I’ve ever seen.

The second option is to go up the Maligne, stopping the first night at Tanner falls and then down the Darky river to Darky lake the next day. The Tanner camp site is pretty good with good fishing right there. This would give us an easy first travel day with few if any portages.

This would allow us to be pretty relaxed and explore the area. We could take our time on Darky and Argo.

I think we should all talk it over and take a vote.

Last year we found an outfitter about an hour and a half from the La Croix entry point. We stayed in one of their cabins the night before coming home. I think it’s a good idea to stay there both the night before we start and the night after we get out. It’s really cheap and pretty comfortable.

We’ll be able to get a great pizza in Atikoken (about 20 minutes from the cabin) and chill out before starting our adventure.

From the cabin we’ll drive 1 1/2 hours down a gravel road to an Indian reservation. This reservation is a little scary, but interesting to see. Lot’s of broken windows and empty houses. Sad, but it reminds you that your really out there. They will let us lock the van up in an old tennis court with high fences. Again, not exactly Disney.

The first leg of the trip is down Lac La Croix. This is a huge lake, and it will take us a couple of hours of paddling to get to the river.

Last year we had no wind. On the way back it was about 90 degrees and the lake was glass. It’s hard to describe being on a lake that big, out in the middle with not a ripple on the water. Pretty cool.

I’m really looking forward to seeing the new guys react to the Maligne river. To me, it’s one of the most primal places I’ve ever seen. Last year it was overcast and misty going in. There are huge pine trees on the banks. For the most part it is a lazy river. I love seeing the rocks on the bottom through the crystal clear water.

At one point we thought we saw a moose or bear jump in the river. Something made a huge splash way ahead of us. We approached as quietly as we could, but whatever it was had disappeared by the time we got there.