The first trip was with my wife, August 11 -14. Our entry point was Brule, the plan was to loop up to Winchell and back down through the Cone lakes. Our first night we camped at the Western most site in Echo bay (or North Bay) - a nice secluded bay. Our site was in the middle of a raspberry patch - great for pancakes. We saw a huge turkey vulture and caught a few smallmouth, enough for an appetizer. The next day we were starting to pack up when a big thunderstorm blew through for a couple of hours. Since it soaked everything and lasted till noon we decided to make it our base camp and day trip from there.

Later that day we went into Echo - a shallow, dead end lake with no campsites. The DNR site reported good walleye numbers. We caught a few and only one keeper.

The next day, Sunday we did a big loop up to Winchell and down through the Cone lakes. It was about 10 miles. We lunched and swam (without getting cramps! - my mother must have lied) on Winchell - a beautiful, long, thin, deep, very clear lake - I'll have to stay there sometime (and try for those deep Lakers). While on Winchell we got to within 15 feet of a huge loon, he dove and swam directly under our canoe - it is quite a site to see a loon swimming about 15 feet under your canoe.

We went back down through Cliff and the cone lakes. We were able to avoid the last three portages by paddling through connecting streams (while leaving behind some green fiberglass). We slept well that night.

The last day was uneventful - we paddled out (a nice short paddle out) and headed home. All in all we enjoyed this trip - Brule is a very pretty lake and a nice trip if you don't want a long haul in. The amount of people was about average and our bay didn't have anyone traveling through. The only problem was the trip wasn't long enough.

The second trip was with my dad, uncle and cousin. I can't share the entry point or destination - it's a secret walleye lake and I had to take a blood oath.
The first day was mostly travel - about 12 miles.
Luckily we got an early enough start that we had camp setup by about 4:30. We fished that afternoon and caught about 12 walleye, all in the 2 to 4lb range. Unfortunately my dad brought in fresh food for that night - we didn't keep any of the fish. (BTW - I hate brining in fresh food).

The rest of the trip was catching walleye -enough for about 2 meals a day (the biggest being about 7 lbs)napping, and swimming (while worrying about the huge snapping turtle we saw looking for a stringer full -
btw my uncle is very daring - he always skinny dips - does the phrase "dangling worm" come to mind).

One evening, while fishing, we watched and heard a thunderstorm for about an hour. It was heading our way. We got back to camp and my uncle and myself set the land speed record for walleye filleting - about 6 fish in 1.2 minutes (just kidding). As I was down the shore dumping the remains on a rock I heard and saw it - the always impressive STORM COMMING ACROSS THE LAKE. I later reflected that my run through the woods was much like that of Daniel Day Louis in "Last of the Mohicans" - (without the flowing hair or rock hard abbs). Luckily it was one of those short, just-enough-to-remind-you-where-you-are thunderstorms.

The last day we really lucked out - we had to meet a tow service at a certain time and my uncle - in his brilliance - timed it so that we had to be on the lake by 8 am - and we were heading West! Luckily we didn't have a head wind (just a cross wind for about half the distance). Either way it was a long haul out, we got to the landing as the boat pulled up.

Posted by Bill on October 10, 2000 at 10:48