CANADA ‘09

The brown trout story

There were just four of us headed north this year, my older brother Bill, Jim Teusch, Boyd Tarney and myself. Canada has become a pleasant routine for us; Teusch does the grocery shopping, brother Bill takes care of the boat, and pulls it with his Yukon, Boyd takes care of the beverages and I usually cook a ham for sandwiches. The boat also serves as extra storage for all our gear. We got an early start this year and made the border without incident. The weather had just turned warm and the black flies were not a serious problem. In fact it was just about as perfect weather as you could ask for. The fishing was not as great as it usually is but we managed to land a number of smallmouth and had plenty to eat.

We haven’t always gone to Canada on our annual fishing adventure. We used to go to a different lake every year. Someone would hear of a hot spot for fishing and we would call ahead to make reservations and then try to figure out the lake within the short time over Memorial Day weekend. Our group originally consisted of; Gemp, Doc, Dick Cahoon, Boyd and brother Bill. Dick passed away quite a while ago but we still remember him on each of our trips.

I remember one trip in particular. Someone had heard about a place up in Michigan. We called ahead and made our reservations, but since this was pre-internet time we had no idea what to expect. We arrived and found it to be a beautiful lake with accommodations much better than we were expecting. We were used to finding remote areas with few luxuries. This place was deluxe and it was on an upbeat lake, on the order of Wawasee or maybe Oliver Lake. There were a lot of high-dollar mansions and ours looked to be one of the few rentals on the lakefront.

Thank you to our community news sponsors!

Boyd and I geared up our boat and headed for the marina to pick up some new bait and our fishing licenses.

“May as well troll over,” Boyd suggested, so we snapped on a couple of Raps and I pointed her towards the marina at a slow troll. We had only been trolling for a few minutes when Boyd noticed a DNR boat quite a ways off. “DNR,” he said and we both sneakily reeled in our lines and dropped our poles to the bottom of the boat. Boyd leaned over and unsnapped both lures; broke down the poles and tossed the lures in his tackle box.

Sure enough, here they came. They blasted right up to our little boat in their big DNR boat, nearly washing water over the side.

“You boys doing any good?” the officer in front asked.

Boyd said, “We just got here, we’re on our way to the marina to get our licenses.”

I sat quietly at the back. We have been in these situations before and I have learned from past experience to let Boyd do the talking. He is the kind of guy that likes almost everyone and that genuine warmth has gotten us out of more than one scrape.

The officer in the front of the boat wasn’t buying it. He was standing up, leaning towards our boat, posturing. He had one foot up on the gunnels and one hand on his gun, as if he were ready to board us and rip through our possessions. The officer in the back of the DNR boat actually seemed embarrassed by his partner’s rudeness. I was keeping my face as expressionless as possible.

Boyd said, “We’re renting that dark brown place over in the bay,” as he pointed back across the lake.

“We know where you’re staying,” said the pistol man, like we were some kind of criminals or like we were trespassing on his water.

Then followed a pregnant pause where everyone just sat still. There didn’t seem to be anything they could charge us with so the pistol man waved us off towards the marina and we were on our way.

Gemp and Doc had gotten a head start on Boyd and I. They had already been to the marina and purchased their licenses. They like trolling and had worked their way across the lake. It was turning out to be a very hot day and about the time they had gotten as far away from the cabin as possible, Gemp said, “Doc, I gotta take a dump.”

They both looked around but there were cottages everywhere.

“Doc, I really got to go,” Gemp repeated.

Doc said, “Just hang your butt over the side and go.”

Gemp unbuckled his pants but he just couldn’t do it. Every time he would try to hang over the side he would see someone moving on shore and he couldn’t complete the mission. Doc was chuckling, but Gemp was in great distress.

Doc said, “There are only a couple of pops in the cooler.” He reached over and emptied it and slid it up to Gemp. It was embarrassing for Gemp but it was also a great relief. “Shut the lid quick, my eyes are starting to water,” said Doc.

They trolled about a mile and were slowly working their way back towards the cabin when they noticed the light brown cruiser marked DNR racing towards them. It was headed on a collision course directly at their bow. At the last moment the driver of the DNR boat let off the throttle and the bow of the big rig splashed down spraying Doc and Gemp with water. It coasted forward placing pistol man right next to Gemp. The officer got his left foot up on top of the transom, placed his right hand on his gun and began the interrogation. “You boys got a license?”

Doc already had his out; handed it to Gemp and Gemp handed the officer both permits. After a brief inspection the officer handed them back. “You guys doing any good?” pistol man asked.

“Nope,” said Gemp, “haven’t had a strike.”

“You have anything in the cooler?” asked pistol man.

“Nope.”

“Mind if I take a look?”

Doc spoke up from the back of the boat, trying to warn off the officer of the impending cooler inspection, “You don’t want to look in that cooler.”

The officer was now sure he was on to fowl play.

“Well, if there’s nothing in there, then you won’t mind me taking a look.”

“OK,” said Gemp, as he opened the lid. The hot day and the rocking of the boat had only aided in the fermentation inside the enclosed compartment and as the lid opened, pistol man, who had leaned menacing close to get a good look, blanched away as if he had been slapped. Even the officer at the back of the boat couldn’t help but identify the odoriferous compound.

It was indeed another pregnant pause as the pistol man silently ran through the scenarios whereby he might make an arrest, but there were evidently no laws broken so pistol man said to the driver, ”Get the hell out of here!”

Gemp and Doc got such a big kick out of the whole ordeal that they just had to run us down. They came up along side Boyd and said, “You guys do any good?”

Gemp said, “We got a nice trout.”

I guess we should have suspected something, as there weren’t supposed to be any trout in that lake, but Gemp was fishing and Boyd and I were biting.

“Take a look,” said Gemp, as he opened the lid of the old red cooler.

It only took a glance; just a fraction of a second and Boyd quickly looked away.

“It’s a brown wrinkle-neck trout,” said Gemp, unable to contain his laughter.

Boyd said, “You have a sick mind Gemp”…and to this day Boyd won’t drink a beer out of that old red cooler.

Canada seems a lot more suited to our style of fishing, and we never made it back to that northern Michigan lake, but we kept the memory.