We had an early start this morning – the fish bite best in the morning, right? We had close to an hour’s drive down to Maligne Lake, where our rented rowboat awaited us. It was a lovely 5C this morning with mist coming up off the water. As we were unloaded our gear on the docks, we met two gentlemen who were headed to the very far side of the lake (it’s a HUGE lake) for a wedding – one to get married, one as an attendee. Very cool – I’m guessing that it was not a black-tie affair given that it’s full day’s trip by boat (no gas motors, only electric), and one must carry ALL their supplies with them to the primitive campsite at the end of the lake. The gentlemen wished us well and told us that we’d certainly catch a fish today. We were sure hoping that was true!!!
We trolled very slowly so as to conserve battery life (the sport shop where we rented our gear had us quite worried about getting stranded) up one side of the lake, casting near the shoreline, especially in places where the lake dropped off precipitously and/or where creeks fed into the lake. We spotted what looked be more experienced fishermen and decided to follow them, because it wouldn’t take much to have more of a clue than we had when it came to where to fish the lake. About 3.5 hours later, we had our first success – a sizable Brook Trout (aka “Brookie)!
After the thrill of actually catching something and the necessary pictures, the oh sh!# moment of how to unhook the fish. I had never caught something that large – I couldn’t even wrap my hands around it! Not only that, but it was soft and not spiny and firm like the little Sunnies I’m used to releasing. After several failed attempts with a really sorry pair of pliers, we decided to enlist the help of the other fishing canoe we had been stalking – their english wasn’t great, so at first they didn’t realize we were calling out to them. Thankfully, they came to Mr. Brookie’s rescue – and by “rescue”, I mean they unhooked him and kept him (as a tourist, what the heck was I going to do with it? Gut it and clean it in the B&B bathroom?). Actually, my biggest concern was how to keep the fish cool (we didn’t have a cooler), then I realized that the lake temp probably wasn’t much above 40F, so just trailing him in the water would have sufficed. Oh well. I think I had traumatized the poor guy too much to release him anyway.
The luck continued after a brief power nap on the “2Fast 2Furious” (as JD dubbed our boat, given its pathetic trolling motor), with Audrey landing a fish that appeared to be at least double the size of the previous one. Alas, the line snapped just as he was boatside (we forgot we had a landing net – oops), so no pictures exist. We promise – it’s not a tall tale, but rather a testament to the less than ideal fishing line that came with our rentals.
We then crossed the lake in what felt like an hour (the lake is that big and our boat that slow), trying to avoid the tourboats that go whizzing by leaving us poor dopes in tiny boats to endure some scary wakes (considering the aforementioned lake temps). The lake was truly quiet and uncrowded, save for those tour boats =/ At least we had been warned that they will mow you over.
JD’s big bit of the day came on the other side of the lake, where he landed a large brook trout that was really red in color (it looked like a Salmon according to the fish ID card we were given, but we were told that Brook Trout can get to be that color). We landed it in the net (so it actually counts as a catch) and idiot Audrey was waiting to take JD’s picture as he lifted it up of of the net for presentation…when…surprise! the line snapped again and Brookie #3 was on his way for the day. I feel terrible that we don’t have photographic evidence of that one =(
We realized then that it was 3:30 pm and we were still quite far away from the dock. Trolling at what seemed like 0.1 mph had us worried if we’d make it back before dark…luckily, some improvised garbage bag sails and running the motor at full blast (they told us it would drain the battery – it didn’t – plus, we had a spare) got us back by 7:30 pm.
On the drive out, we saw a mamma black bear with two cubs eating berries by the side of the road (we stayed in the car for those shots), as well as mountain sheep (rams), which had us feeling much better about seeing wildlife on our trip!
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