Breakaway Adventures: Fellowship of the Fly
Breakaway Adventures: Fellowship of the Fly
A Narrated Adventure of a Quest in the Canadian Wilderness
The sheer definition of an adventure is that it is predictably unpredictable. Otherwise it wouldn’t be called an adventure, rather simply a plan - now how dull is that!
This adventure that I’m about to narrate had its quest to travel deep into the wilderness of Canada and search of the holy grail of trout, the Mighty Nipigon River Brook Trout, commonly referred to in Ontario as a speckled trout. Like any good adventure it started off with a plan that quickly ran into adversity, got scrapped, thrown under the bus, out the window, rewritten so many times that we ended up flying by the seat of our pants! In the end, like any good story, our adventure ended with our quest being achieved!
As in the Lord of the Rings, our quest included the crossing of numerous borders, actually just one but several times (four to be exact), traversing large bodies of waters, the Niagara (twice), the straits of Tobermory and Sault Saint Marie and the Blue Water of Sarnia. The countless beautiful and inviting lesser rivers, creeks and streams that we encountered along our route included the Jack Pine, the White, the Aquasabon Falls and the Old Woman River that called out to us like the Sirens in The Odyssey to abandon our quest, stop, rest, and fish.
Our Fellowship consisted of three carefully selected seasoned fly fishermen, individuals with unique sets of skills, abilities and personalities that would ensure that we achieved our goal. There was the Chef, adventurers can’t travel on hungry stomachs, but to his disdain we were forced to frequent road side fast food and beverage merchants like Subway, Tim Hortons and even Denny’s along the way. It wasn’t until we neared our final destinations and set up our camp that his prowess was on full display. He was able to turn simple white rice into French Rice Pilaf and pasta into Rigatoni al Segreto. I, acting as the sous-chef was put in charge of dicing onions and grilling meats, seasoning them with his secret herbs and spices! Our chef was a retired culinary professor and I never seemed to satisfy the school master, never earning more than an F- for my efforts.
The third person in our troop was an engineer by trade, a leader of Boy Scouts, and even serving a stint in the US Coast Guard. Needless to say, our group benefited from a rigorous schedule, precisely calculated rest stops and dead reckoning navigation. When I wasn’t the sous-chef, my duties were at the helm on the road and on the water. Fortunately, my skills in these departments earned me a passing grade.
Our route took us over the International Peace Bridge and the first ominous omen reared its nasty head, not that we were superstitious, it’s just that border crossings either go well or not so well - and in this case, it went too well! The guard frowning, I think because my diesel truck was too loud, took our IDs in silence and proceeded in shutting the door of his guard house for several minutes. While we sweated, not from heat, without a single word or question he handed back our documents and waved us on our way! Upon that curious experience we decided not to risk lady luck and opted out of plan A, which was to cut through southern Ontario to Michigan, Instead, we decided to cross with the ferry at the end of the Bruce Peninsula at Tobermory. Of course, that in hindsight, was not such a great move.
I had called ahead to make reservations for the ferry crossing of the North Shore Channel between Georgian Bay and Lake Huron, unbeknownst to us, not explained while making the reservations, traveling with a truck and trailer, there were certain rules that we were about to infract that almost ended our trip! They had conveniently collected the passage fees and then abruptly denied us boarding rights. Apparently, we had too many auxiliary gas canisters aboard our trailered vessel. One would have to realize, which none of these not so kind boarding agents did, that traveling into remote regions of the Canadian wilderness, the access to fuel is limited to what you can carry in with you. They didn’t seem to care and simply demanded us to leave them behind or stay behind (ironically even if they were empty). Fortunately for us we found some very kind good Samaritans who generously for no fee offered to transport our full fuel Jerry Cans while on board and return them to us after the crossing. Our faith in human nature was restored!
Our ferry travel took us past the Cove Island Light House, Flower Pot Island and unto Manitoulin Island, the largest lake island in the world! Once on the Trans-Canada Highway 17 ,we traveled west through Sault Ste. Marie, Wawa (where we spent the night in a quaint little motel called the High Falls Cabins), Marathon and Terrace Bay before arriving at the Nipigon River some 1,000 miles after leaving home. Along the way we were amazed by the beautiful and colorful fauna, Lupine and Rock Harlequin that lined the roadway and wildlife that included Moose, Black Bear, Bald Eagles and Ruffed Grouse. Traveling along the Lake Superior North Shore the vistas were out of this world, very much on par with what Tolkien imagined for his Middle Earth!
Once the road journey was complete, we took to the waters of the Upper Nipigon River launching our boat at Pine Portage, with our final destination bring Virgin Falls. The World Record Brook Trout, a whopping 14.5 pounds, was landed there! To get to Virgin Falls we had to cross Forgan Lake! Both Poseidon and Neptune had other plans for us and joined forces, summoning up wind and wave to thwart our plans. We were once again forced to abandon our plans and ended up marooned just 30 minutes into the cruise. Our normally dependable motor failed (Murphy’s Law number one) and we were at Mother Nature’s mercy. We drifted upon a suitable camping spot we quickly named Gilligan’s Island, a hunk of rock in a sheltered bay that we had to call home for the rest of the week (Murphy’s Law number two, you can’t stake a tent peg into solid rock)!
Thankfully our quest was finally achieved, after some quick outboard engine repairs, on our very first day of fly fishing at Virgin Falls! In quick suggestion one of our fellowship landed several wonderful and large Brook Trout, the largest topping an impressive 24 inches and several pounds in weight - not a world record but it did make our eyes bugle!
The ordeal of the winds that we experienced all week long, playing havoc to boating and casting, had a silver lining though. The hordes of black flies and mosquitoes, bugs that we had dreaded and had prepared for with every conceivable insect repellent, never materialized, thank goodness! We deemed our trip a huge success even though those infamous winds of the Nipigon collapsed one of our tents one night we arrived safely home with no further adieu, till next time!
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Indrek Kongats is an artist, traveler, outdoorsman, and business owner residing in Ellicottville. He operates River Dog Art Gallery in Houghton, NY, and his Breakaway Classic Adventures specializes in adventure travel destinations. Learn more about him at breakawayclassicadventures.com.