Gone Fishing

A few of you wanted to see pictures from our spring fishing trip at Kiosk, one of the northernmost parts of Ontario's famed Algonquin Park. Well I got pictures! Pop yourself some corn, pour yourself a fresh cup of joe and settle in. If you want to see a bigger version, click on the photo. We were gone for four days and all but one day (when this photo was taken) were terrible, weather-wise. This is Lake Kioskokwi in all its spring splendour.

It's been such a late spring in this neck of the woods, one of the latest in recent memory. Dave and I fretted that there would still be ice on the lake but we had convinced ourselves that last week's warm temps and high winds would have gotten rid of the last of the ice. Apparently not. We were greeted with this shore ice upon our arrival.

While the ice had left the lakes in our area of Muskoka, Kiosk is about three hours north of us. That three hours makes a huge difference in temperature. Here you can see the ice has broken up but washed in towards the bays.

Dave holds a couple chunks of the remaining ice. They remind me of small icicles, all stuck together. You can break it apart, one "icicle" at a time. This is perfect ice for cocktail making.

The pretty view from the park office. Even with the ice.

Take a good look at this picture. That "wave" is a wave of slushy ice. As it hit the shore, it made the loudest, most unusual noise – like a heavy downpour of rain. 

There were moments of sunshine on Thursday. This was one. The cabin is an original ranger's cabin dating back a century or so. It has been restored and is a popular rental for campers who want a taste of what it was like for forest rangers back in the day. After this brief spate of sunshine, the rain and wind returned. The wind was ferocious and we weren't set up for more than 20 minutes when a microburst hit and tore the awning off our virtually new trailer. One minute Dave was saying, "It's sunny." And I said, "Don't trust it." But the words were barely out of my mouth when the sky went pitch dark and the wind hit. Oh well. It can be fixed. At least we didn't wind up like Toto and Dorothy.

Thursday was terrible. So terrible, we went to bed and had a nap, crying ourselves to sleep about the awning. Friday morning, we woke up to falling snow. Ack.

Because Friday morning was crappy, we went for a drive to explore the road to Brent, a sister camping area to Kiosk and also part of Algonquin Park. We thought it wasn't much of a drive but it was. We travelled down a dirt road for 18 km before we came to this spot on the road, completely flooded. So we turned around and headed back. It was a nice drive.

Ooooo .... check this out. Kiosk has a brand new state of the art composting outhouse. Solar-powered, this beauty is made of cedar and smells heavenly. Our travelling companions, Tom and Sue, didn't like it as much as we do. Frankly, I'm in love with this outhouse. I wish we had one at our house.

Friday afternoon the weather cleared enough to head out for some fishing. It wasn't the best, though, with intermittent rain and some steady wind. I was bundled up for a reason – it was cold! And no fish. Sigh.

Saturday was glorious! Beautiful calm water. Sunshine! We got up early, gorged ourselves on bacon and eggs, and spent the day out on the water. 

We stopped at a vacant campsite for a shore lunch. This is our dog, Misty, looking adorable in her pink raincoat. She loves camping, loves the boat, loves pepperettes.

Dave's brother, Tom, and his wife, Sue, were our camping buddies. In this picture they are suffering from a common camp ailment known as "moke-eye."

The campfire and gorgeous lake view. We had cheese sandwiches roasted over the fire on sticks. They were delish. No, no fish, because we didn't catch any. None. Nada. Not even a bite. We figure the fish were still dormant, seeing as how the ice just went out. And the lake trout, which are skittish, get all freaked out during bad storms. Either way, no fish.

The water was really high during this trip, at least four feet higher than the last time we were there. Normally we boat underneath this old railroad bridge to gain access to the rest of the lake. We sure couldn't this time!

We fished all day Saturday, until we headed back to the camp about 8 o'clock or so. (Sunday morning we packed up and headed home.) This photo was taken about six Saturday afternoon. The sun was still warm, the sky was blue and the water was sparkling like a field of diamonds. We may not have caught any fish but we couldn't deny the spectacular scenery and its restorative power over our souls.