Unfortunately, my daughter had to return home to begin
getting ready for her second year in college and that leaves me to begin doing
the Blogs from here on out. I cannot
promise I am able to write as well as she does, but I will make sure you see
and hear what happens at Wine Lake.
The number one question I get is: “how high is the water?”. I am here to tell you this year it is about 14 inches below last year this time. We have not been able to run the falls and do not see that happening any time soon. We just have not had the rain to raise the water level. Since I have arrived on May 2nd, the water has only gone up 2-3 inches, that is it. With no real substantial rain in the forecast I do not see that changing.
The week of July 1st was a great group. We had Pat Moss and his group who were very
adventurous. Pat and his son decided to
go up to Little Trout. Their journey took
them through the bush, a swim across an unknown lake to look for our boat which
was on another lake and ended with them being waist deep in the muskeg. But even through all of that they managed to
find the right lake and spend some time recovering on Little Trout before
heading back.
We had several father son groups as Chris Foat brought his
father and Jake brought his father. They
all seemed to enjoy the time together as they logged many hours on the water.
We had not one but two birthdays in camp this week. Pat
McLaughlin and Katie Elwood both celebrated their birthday in style wearing
cute tiaras.
Katie Elwood jigged up a 35 ½ in Lake Trout in 70 feet of water as well as 2 really nice Burbots. Katie and her Mom also came away with the tournament win on Wednesday. Her brothers seemed to have a good time even with a tough bite that week due to Mayflies, no wind, and high sun. 
John Hartman, a second-generation Wine Lake regular brought
his wife, daughter and grandson to represent 2nd, 3rd and
4th generations to Our family.
It always amazes me how deep the lake runs in many families and how they
care for this place and the fishery like they do. It is what sets Wine Lake apart from many
other places in this vast beautiful country.
I have said it before and will say it again, it is all of
you who make Wine Lake what it is. We
have by far the best people coming here that I have ever encountered.
The week of July 8th was an interesting one. It started off when I woke up on Saturday
morning to get everyone loaded up and went down to the dock. The first thing I notice was that the plate
boat, that was fine Friday afternoon, was about 2 inches from being completely
filled with water. If a wave of any size been present, the boat would have been
sitting on the bottom of the lake.
Luckily for me it was early and a calm day so we were able to put 6
bilges in the boat and have it ready to leave at 6 am to head back to the
landing. Later in the day I inspected
the boat and found some water again had gotten in. I took out the plug and
replaced it with a new one and we kept an eye on it all day. It never got another drop of water in
it. How the plug started leaking one day
on its own I will never know. Life on a
lake!
In came the Barbera group.
I had talked to the leader of their group many times last year and they
were interested in renting the entire camp out for a week. I happened to have a week with no bookings yet
so we went ahead and set it up. Wow what
a week. 24 guys and sons (mostly older
boys) in camp with no females to keep them in check (except poor Jody who works
with us). They made great use of the basketball
net, the Moose cabin (which is where they all would get together to play cards
and to have their communal meals) and of course the recycling bins… never short
on empties.
Nick, the feisty one of the group, decided he needed to
wrestle so he began with one of the boys.
Lewis (Nick’s Uncle) seeing his son struggling with Nick did what any
good father would and stepped in to back his son up. Though it appeared fairly even matched Nick
had the stamina and they called it a draw.
Finally, Nick had to face Mitch for his third match. Both made a strong
showing. Nick proved he had what it took
as he withstood all three and never got pushed around.
One evening Max (a son) treated us to some guitar
playing. Not just any guitar playing but
guitar with musical and vocal accompaniment via a machine he brought with
him. He would begin by laying down the
vocal back-ups he needed in the song he was going to sing, as well as the
musical back up he would play with or sing too as the song progressed. He was then able to hit foot controls as he
played and sang which made the entire song sound as if it was recorded with
other people playing guitar with him and back-up vocals. All of that taking
place around a fire pit at Wine Lake! I cannot imagine the time and effort that
has to go into learning just one song as well as learning how and when to bring
the back grounds in at exactly the right times.
It was impressive to say the least and we all enjoyed and evening listening
to Max. It was so good, that you forgot
you were miles away from anything in the bush being eaten by mosquitos.
Mitch one day saw our water skis and decided he wanted to
try to ski behind the boat with the 25hp motor.
I told him it would never work and headed up to grab lunch. About 30 minutes later I heard all of the
guys cheer and looked out the window to see Mitch up and skiing behind the 25hp
camp boat. Then he took it even further
and dropped one of his skis and did a loop on just one. It was very impressive.
The group decided to move the tournament and ice cream up to
Tuesday as a couple of the guys had to leave earlier in the week for work or
family engagements. Unfortunately, it
was the most rain we had received in one day all year, one-inch total! It rained almost non-stop from dawn to dark
that day. Several teams made a good
showing even in the wind and rain and made it through. Jim and Keith were the big
winners that day and became the first tournament champions out of the Barbera group.
As this was the group’s first time at Wine Lake, I was
hoping the fishing was going to be good and they would enjoy themselves and
come to love Wine Lake Camp like so many of us have. In the end, I was getting quotes from the
guys saying “This is an awesome camp”, “Best camp ever in 25 years of coming to
Canada”, “Epic trip!”. Hearing those
kinds of remarks really made myself and the crew feel great about the effort we
put in here, and know we are working hard to make sure everyone has a great
trip to Wine and want to come back in the future.
Fishing the last week was really good for July. Groups are catching really nice Walleyes in
the weeds with some Northerns mixed in. I
am guessing they will begin moving out into a little deeper water over the next
couple of weeks. We are expected to have
a bunch of sunny and 78-82 degree days.
This will continue to warm the water and push the fish deeper. I am guessing they will begin hanging in the
12-15 foot of water range and be schooled a little more than they have
been. Perch fishing has still been
pretty good. Some people are continuing
to pull up some really nice fish in 7 feet of water in the weeds. Trout fishing has been ok if you can find
them and get down to them. On Friday,
the Barbera group all had to be heading home so I took the camp workers out for
their first time Trout fishing. Colin
caught a massive 38-inch trout and Brenden caught a 33-inch trout. We also managed to land an 11-inch trout
which makes the future look bright.
