Alwaki Lodge - July 13 to 20th - 2019

[Greg]

Alwaki Lodge - July 13 to July 20, 2019 - Trip Report

Another great trip has come to an end. This year’s trip required a little more planning and
logistics than previous trips, but it was all worth it!  I was the only one who was able to take the entire week so I was there all 7 days.

Saturday to Wednesday morning - Eric (my kipawa fishing buddy from Kitchener) drove straight to the main dock and my son Justin and our buddy Nick were with me in my truck (& towing my boat).

The plan was set for Wednesday morning, we arranged for a 9:30am meeting time at the dock with my buddy James and I would bring Eric, Nick and Justin back to the main dock - Eric would head home direct to Kitchener and Nick and Justin hopped into James’ truck and headed home to
Ottawa. James had left Ottawa around 4:30am to meet us!

Nick and James were newbies to Kipawa - they had only heard about it for years from me â€" I kept telling them how great it was and invited them along and they agreed! I wanted to make their first trip to Kipawa special so I made an extra effort to make it as awesome as possible. I planned the menu, arranged all the lake trout trolling rods, organization, extra rods for jigging and trolling, logistics and much of the tackle to make sure all of us had a great time.

The first 4 days, Nick and Justin rented a lodge boat and Eric was with me in my boat. We had planned to rotate around, but it soon became a little competition about which boat could catch more fish.  I have no idea who won by Tuesday night… but it didn’t matter… we all caught fish.

We only attempted to lake trout troll once the first 4 days and came up empty handed. We caught a couple pike, four bass and many walleye. We tried a few shores (trolling) which really worked for us last year, but did not produce as much as this year. We always seemed to head back to our favourite location - tried and true - Dead Bear bay. It really did not matter though where we went and how many fish were caught - we were all just having a great time.

For our adventure day, Justin has been to Kipawa several times but never to the old church at Hunters Point and Nick was interested in seeing the old church after I told him about it and showed him a few pictures. We had great weather on Monday morning, so we loaded up my boat and all four of us headed to Hunters Point - Nick’s first trip through the chute was exciting and he enjoyed it. The church visit was interesting… first - the church - I had not been there in 3 years and it has weathered significantly - the windows are stapled up plastic now (and some of those are ripped open). I remember the pews being clean and varnished - not anymore â€" they are now dried and grey. A little sad and disappointing actually - I do not think the church will be around much longer - another 10 maybe 20 years and Mother Nature is going to turn it into ruins. Second, we began walking the path back to the old building ruins (schoolhouse?) behind the church - it was a journey in itself - the bugs could pick you up and carry you away … wow, it was like a swarm of mosquitos, black flies and a variety of big flies (horse, dear, etc.). We saw the old ruins… yep… they are old buildings knocked down and rotting on the ground… now RUN…RUN FOREST RUN... RUN back to the boat to get out of these bugs as fast as you can.

We pushed off shore and got away from the bugs. Justin then launched his drone and took an awesome video of the church and schoolhouse ruins from a bird’s eye view - check it out here...  https://youtu.be/dzdqxtTT8is.

You Tube link here... https://youtu.be/dzdqxtTT8is

So… our plan for adventure day was over in about 2 hours… so we decided to extend adventure day to hit the other highlight we discussed with Nick… we headed back through the chute, right past Alwaki and headed up to canal bay. Again, Nick was blown away with the size of the lake, beauty and the incredible natural landscape Mother Nature has allowed us to explore. We went all the way into the back of Canal bay and swam, then headed back out, went to a beach on the way back to Alwaki and cooked up a quick shore lunch of hot dogs.

We continued to fish some mornings, and every evening and never came back skunked.  Last year, we had multiple fish over the slot size but this year, we did not get into any big fish in the first four days (some 19 and 20 inch) but nothing over 21 inch.

We ate like kings, enjoyed a few (many!) cold beverages and laughed a lot. It was a great four days!  We enjoyed a couple of fish fry’s late at night and had a couple of fresh fish cooked with garlic butter for breakfast after the early morning fish.

Nick, Justin and Eric packed up and we headed to the dock at 8:45am on Wednesday morning as per the plan.   We met up with James 15 minutes early and everyone went their own way (Eric made it home to Kitchener by 3pm and Justin and Nick were back in Ottawa around 2:30pm).

James and I headed back into Alwaki to unload his gear, get some lunch and rest up a bit.  We headed out to lake trout troll in the afternoon, and continued with walleye fishing during the evening.  Once again - we were always able to find some walleye - nothing huge but respectable.

I made my second run up to Canal Bay to show James - once again I hear the familiar observations - this place is huge, so much water, it is beautiful everywhere, it is so peaceful and tranquil. We also visited the municipal beach for a few minutes right outside of Canal bay - we walked around the island (it was a rough and windy ride so standing on solid ground a little was a good break before heading back to Alwaki).

James and I focused our afternoons on lake trout trolling; we were able to get two lake trout in the boat (one small and one medium size) and we had another near the boat but it threw the hook before we got it close enough to the net. We tried for lake trout in four different locations, including a tour all the way around Turtle Island. Oh well… some action is better than none.

On Friday, it ended up being a bit of Natural Geographic day… sitting in our cottage at the kitchen table in cabin 6 having breakfast, I saw a large eagle flying directly towards the cottage.  As it got closer, I said to James “check out the wing-span on that thing” â€" it got lower and closer and I actually thought it was going to land on my boat tied to the end of the dock!   About 3 feet above my boat, it did a dramatic turn and banked out over the end of the dock, swooped down to water level with claws out and picked up a small walleye right from under the water surface about 10 feet of the end of the dock.  It flapped its wings hard three times and it flew back to a treetop across from Alwaki and had breakfast.  James and I were speechless that we just witnessed something so cool.  Amazing to see that up close.  About an hour later, we headed through the chute to troll for Lakers in Lake Aubin and saw something moving in the water just around the corner from the beach (near the shore that heads up to the bridge and eventually the church).  We approached slowly (still a couple hundred meters away as to not spook or scare it) wondering what it was.   Eventually, we could see clearly that it was a small young black bear.  It swam to shore, got out of the water and then RAN straight up the rocky and steep hill side â€" the power in those limbs was evident (confirmation you can’t out-run a bear!!).  James got a good picture of the bear as it came out of the water.  Another neat sighting.

We finished our last night of fishing walleye trolling some shores up through the chute near Whispering Pines - and I got the trip’s only walleye over the slot - a nice 23 or 24-inch fish with a big thick heavy back. It was a great fight and great time and a James took a great picture.

Both newbies (Nick and James) loved the entire experience and definitely want to come back and will probably/hopefully end up being part of our regular crew.

Final observations:
- Great friends and great spending time with Justin (he moved to a different city 7 months ago) - lots of laughs all around

- Weather was overall great - only a little rain and once was a night - but like any other year, the wind on Kipawa can be strong and inconsistent (it changed directions completely three days in a row)

- Bugs - were glad the heat wave the previous couple of weeks cleaned up some of the mosquitos and black flies - and we generally did not see to many of those (unless we walked into a forest behind the church) - HOWEVER, the dear flies and horse flies are at your ankles in the boat and can drive you crazy.  Even in 80-degree heat, I wore long baggy pyjama pants just to keep the flies off the feet - I kept long socks on and shoes because they bite anyway. Spray Off, they still bite, spray Muskol, they still bite - if someone could make a spray to keep the horse flies away - they could be a millionaire.

- Alwaki cabin 6 is always great - well equipped and we enjoyed the cottage (again) - and Brian always had ice, and we purchased some leaches and worms also â€" the walleye always love a leach!

- Eric is a big fan of the gulp alive minnow’s plastic baits and he catches as many walleye as anybody jigging with those - not sure how he does it.

- Fishing was good - we mostly trolled but did jig some - and we caught fish both ways.

- I wanted to try some other fishing techniques and methods and we did try worm harness on a bottom bouncer but came up empty (we tried the shore that worked well last year but did not produce this year). I slip-bobbered a little, but wish I would have more - it is all about not enough time.

- Bass - I sound like a broken record, more and more bass are headed from the North to the central area of the lake, and they are getting larger also - Nick caught a bass in dead bear bay that was just under 3lbs. We caught 5 in total, 3 of them were small (less than a pound) but the other two were larger. In addition, we caught them fishing for walleye with crank baits (we were not targeting bass)!

- Swimming was great - with all the heat, the water was always refreshing - temperature of water was mid 70’s everywhere, and in shallow bays where we went to anchor to swim, it was high 70’s. The first 4 days, the temperature did go down at night which made it great for sleeping - however, the last 3 nights were very hot and humid - a late night swim of the dock really helped to cool down right before attempting to sleep.

My final comment - it was great having a couple of new guys and I was happy to show them the lake and some of the main attractions it offers.  Our travels included: Two trips to canal bay (which included the complete trip around Mackenzie Island), one trip to the church, another run into Hunter lake, several trips through the chute to fish (one completely around Turtle Island), and several trips to dead bear bay and other favourite fishing locations, plus the trip to the main dock Wednesday morning, and of course the trip in on Saturday and out on Saturday… I burnt a significant amount of gas and oil (my Evinrude is a 2 stroke)… over $600 worth of gas & oil (this is NOT including the boat rental for Justin and Nick). When I added it all up when I got back on Sunday, I surprised myself - the look of shock on my face must have been funny to look at! In addition, I never ran the boat at full speed either with the intention of saving some gas with better gas mileage doing 40mph instead of 50mph. Yikes… my commitment next year is to stay local, fish a little more, and do less touring… I have done our adventure day every year and been to most corners of the lake - I can take a year off the exploring to save some gas (...yaaa right, with Hodgey’s new google map, I am sure I am going to pick somewhere to go check out for the first time).

Until next year! I was hoping/planning another trip up for a 4-day long weekend in late August/early September with a fishing buddy in my neighbourhood but unfortunately, he has had to bow out… I still want to go, so I am going to continue looking for a fishing partner and it might be a last minute decision.

[smitty55]

What, no turtle chute video??? What's going on here? LOL just kidding Greg. Real good post, you covered everything well. I feel real sorry for the others who couldn't spend the whole week up there, for me I always wished I could stay for another week even.
So let's see here, Alwaki to Hunters point, back to Canal Bay, to Alwaki with some other wandering and that's a heck of a tour for one day. Were you keeping track of it with GPS? That's an expensive sightseeing/tour guide day but with a purpose to entice some new lads to the gang, if it works out it will be time well spent. That's a crazy overall fuel bill though so yea less touring means more time fishing, relaxing with buds, eating like kings, drinking lots the odd time and just letting the magic of Kipawa fill your day. Sounds good.
I'm surprised your trout fishing wasn't better, thermocline must be set up.  How was the sonar picture, like were you marking nice hooks in conjunction with bait clouds or off nice structure?

Cheers

[T-Bone]

Thanks for the report Greg...lots of fun and adventure there. And wow....sure was a lot of travel around that area of the lake, and clearly a big investment. Sounds like the catching via trolling was decent, though I'm fairly certain we're going to focus on jigging and related tactics...but a "good college try" on trolling. I'd be really surprised if a bottom bouncer or crawler harness makes it on to my line, but who knows...especially if all else is producing little. That wind can push the fish around...we've learned that factor, most of all, indicates where the fish will be. With jigging, what depth were you trying? In general, what locations (shore points, breaks, humps)? Thanks...we start our trip tomorrow morning.

P.S. What, no pics? I know you enjoy photography.

Thanks again...

1...

[Greg]

Smitty - ya no chute video this year - I have lots from last year so we didn't slow down to focus on any really.  And the tour around the lake (a couple of different times) was fun and enjoyable and relaxing in its own way.

T-bone - jigging the common locations you would expect - 25 feet up to 12 feet produced some fish - grandma's shoal , tu flat Rock in the back of dead bear was great jigging - we tried Sunnyside and the light house in Kelley's bay but that didn't produce on that day - trolling the back right corner of Kelly's bay produced one night with 5 quick ones in half an hour (wind was being blown directly in so definitely the fish were pushed there).  I do have some pics -maybe I will sit down on the weekend and try to add a few - some nice fish oics, some nice sunset / sunrise pics and some just fishing pics.

Cheers.  Enjoy your trip!!

[GregL]

Great report man! I think I need to go see the old church in September! Man $600 in gas OUCH! Well worth it though!

You should re-power your rig with a Yamaha, you could explorer the whole lake and probably spend 1/2 that. Just have to make more trips so the motor pays for it self

On our May long weekend (4 Days) I ran to Grindstone from Alwaki 2-3 times a day with 3 adults (including myself)  and 2 70+ dogs, plus the trip in and out on less than 50 gals in a 20' Tiller & 115 Yamaha SHO.

[Greg]

GregL.  The gas mileage on my old 90hp 4 stroke certainly was better - but that was on a 17 foot aluminium boat half the weight of my 18.5 foot fiberglass Stratos.  I love my 2 stroke evinrude - 150hp - I consider the difference to be like comparing an old station wagon family car to a sports car... And I love the sports car - go-fast in a hurry - gets my adrenaline pumping every time I hit the throttle.

Greg

[GregL]

GregL.  The gas mileage on my old 90hp 4 stroke certainly was better - but that was on a 17 foot aluminium boat half the weight of my 18.5 foot fiberglass Stratos.  I love my 2 stroke evinrude - 150hp - I consider the difference to be like comparing an old station wagon family car to a sports car... And I love the sports car - go-fast in a hurry - gets my adrenaline pumping every time I hit the throttle.

Greg

I hear ya!! If I could have gotten a 150 - 175 SHO rigged on my boat I would have for sure! Dealers here in Canada refused, It's common in the US tho! UGH! LOL!

[Greg]

Ya - I bought my boat at Orleans boat world just east of GregL - Ottawa and I asked about upgrading it just out of curiosity and they were reluctant to even discuss it - maybe because the 150 motor was already on the boat but it would have been cool to get more HP!

Where are u located?

[Oarin]

Wow, Greg, excellent report. That drone shot was really great. It's fun watching first timers' reaction to Kipawa. The Lac is just so special. Looking forward to the pictures.

[Ozzy30]

Good report Greg, Glad to hear everyone had a great trip

[GregL]

Ya - I bought my boat at Orleans boat world just east of GregL - Ottawa and I asked about upgrading it just out of curiosity and they were reluctant to even discuss it - maybe because the 150 motor was already on the boat but it would have been cool to get more HP!

Where are u located?

I'm in Richmond Hill. I told the finance department, the moment the dollar goes to par again we are going to the US and picking up either a Skeeter WX2200 with a 300hp or a Warrior V2090 with a 250hp LOL!.. she said NO! HAHA!

[NovarDave]

Great report Greg, really enjoyed the Hunter Point church video.  I will have to make a point of going to see it next year.

[Jay Thomas]

Your report is a great read/view. Thanks for sharing.

Jay

[Hodgey1]

Greg, great report! You had some really special wildlife experiences that not many folks could ever say they've had in an entire lifetime, let alone one vacation. Being chased by a bear would not ever be a good thing

All of us here on the forum keep bringing up the bass situation, It would be very interesting to know what the Ministry thoughts are on the invasion. My understanding is, it is not a native species to Kipawa. Does anyone truly know the potential harm or benefit to a large population of Small mouth bass in the Lake? My hope is that all would co-exist. 

Your adventure day has rubbed off on me. Ours was one of my favorite days! The footage of the church was very impressive, as if I don't already have enough expensive hobbies, that makes me want one! Wonder how my wife would like one 

[Rippinalip89]

you missed one part. you know, the thing.... the thing that happened on the first day. FIREBALL!