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Chapter 18 – Snotty Moose
Ely Memorial High School celebrated their 100th Anniversary All-Class Reunion over the 4th of July weekend. They had many events scheduled and the first one I attended was the Athletic Hall of Fame Banquet. As I entered, I spotted former student (and new inductee) Billy Groom hurrying across the room to reach me. “Hoops”, he said. “I went to Crooked in April to fish the last open weekend of border water!” That trip most years can’t take place. Ice out in this part of the world doesn’t happen until later in April or early May. He described a couple of magical days up there catching huge northern pike and watching immense schools of walleyes. In one of the currents, several eagles claimed the treetops along the shoreline and took turns, sometimes fighting for chunky walleyes as they cruised along the surface. It was Crooked Lake. That place is always magical.
This past week I caught a Facebook posting by Jim Christensen. He had put up a picture of himself holding a huge pike. For text he wrote, “Pike, October 1980’s. Recognize this spot?” Sometimes I’ll play along with these posts, and I commented, “Looks like Crooked”. His reply came back “crooked. You been there...you had it mounted for me!” Oh, my! My mind must have slipped a notch! He is my buddy Tom Deering’s cousin and had gone on one of our fall trips years ago! When my head got straightened back, a crisp fall day came to mind when four of us paddled up to Crooked for the long MEA weekend. Three of us being teachers, we joked that our union meetings were being held in the Boundary Waters that year. Memories came flooding back of blue skies, temps in the low forties, pancakes frying on the rocky shoreline as we tossed our fare into the water hoping for some piscatorial action. And action we had! Many northerns topped ten pounds and Jim landed this behemoth nearing 25 pounds after a fight lasting many minutes from shore and having to hop with Tom into a canoe to follow it through the current. It seems like every trip to Crooked Lake provided experiences matching that.
Many times, while guiding I would have clients ask, “If you had your choice, where would you go in the BWCA?” My answer was always Crooked Lake. My first trip as a professional guide was to Crooked. I made dozens of trips there as a guide, and almost as many personal trips to this paradise. Each journey had its own special memories. Having a huge buck in velvet swim past our camp and following it in a canoe, taking photos all the way, until it disappeared quickly into the underbrush a half mile down the shoreline. Surviving a major windstorm in 1982 which spared us but put down two large jackpines barely missing each end of a tent only two campsites down. Catching six walleyes all over four pounds in less than ten minutes. Watching smallmouth bass chase schools of minnows out of the water into a rock face at third current. The minnows knocked themselves silly and the bass slurped up dozens as they lay stunned at the water’s surface. Having left a stringer of walleyes out overnight to have fresh fish for breakfast, and pulling it in with an eight-pound northern having swallowed one and unable to disgorge itself as we pulled it in. Had the superintendent from the Mora School District on that trip and he looked at me and said “I’ll never not believe a fish story you tell me. Up here the fish put themselves on the stringer!”
Having a client catch his biggest bass of the trip while he was digging through his tackle box – his lure dangling six inches above the water over the side of the canoe. The satisfaction of bringing a client to a particular spot, telling them “This is where the big ones hang out” and catching an eight-poundplus walleye on my first cast. Almost getting a ticket from the USFS when I had left my permit sitting on the front seat of my pickup at the Chainsaw Sisters, and then getting checked when camping just below Lower Basswood Falls. During the question and answer, we discovered that the couple were from Grand Rapids, and we had all gone to the same high school. His family owned Salmala Jewelers. They allowed that when it came time for them to return to the ranger cabin below the falls, they would radio in to see if I had gotten a permit. I was to swing by the following afternoon to meet my fate. My permit confirmed, we enjoyed a great dinner of roast chicken, mashed potatoes and a chocolate cake for dessert!
I can’t put a finger on what it was that made this body of water the way it was. Maybe it had something to do with the indigenous history of the area. It was land and water disputed and fought over by the Sioux, Cree and Anishinaabe. Hunting territory and ricing camps – along with water being an easy mode of travel - made the border area prime real estate for the early inhabitants. All the portages have been in place for over a thousand years, and more than fifty percent of the campsites in the area were established by the earliest travelers. It is said that Table Rock was a neutral spot where inter-tribal meetings could be held. The pictographs just below Lower Basswood Falls are still in good shape today. Legend has it that a small band of Sioux were being chased by some Ojibwe had stopped to shoot arrows into the cracks in the rock above the red ochre drawings to show their expertise with the bow and discourage those following them. Just to the west on Lac laCroix is “Warrior Hill”, a bald, rock island that is said to have been a place of contest to prove speed and endurance. Further down, a Native American settlement near where Zup’s Resort is now had a resident herd of ponies, some of which roamed the forest until relatively recently. And the watershed continues west ending on the shores of Lake of the Woods at the community of Warroad – aptly named because of the war parties that traveled back and forth through there.
Any time of year is a good time to visit Crooked Lake. However, fall will forever be my favorite. Autumn holds a special place in my heart and to combine what that has to offer with the magic of Crooked is precious to me. Cool mornings and warm afternoons excite me. The earthy smells of ground litter, and the bright colors enrich all the senses. Fishing is great, and for a long time it seemed like we had it all to ourselves. Recently it has become more well-known and popular. There are two ways from the Ely end to get there. One is by traveling to the west end of Basswood and running the Basswood River to Lower Basswood Falls. The other is to put in at Mudro and travel through a series of lakes and the Horse River to reach the same entry point. Both have advantages and disadvantages. Water levels play a big role in which route to take.
Weather is a factor this time of year. It can be as pleasant as you can find. Or, you might have to fight a blizzard or break ice to get to open water from camp. Bugs are not a problem, but hungry bears getting ready for a long sleep can be. The paddle, portaging and backwoods camping will always have its challenges. But the rewards are great!
The trip in the 80’s with Jim Christensen was a special one for me. In many ways it was just another wonderful journey to that part of the park. But it held a few surprises we didn’t always have.
Our trip in was uneventful and we set up camp on what we call the “Dragon’s Tail”. Being in October, we were ready for fishing both walleyes and northerns, but also had single shot 20-gauge shotguns along for grouse and ducks. With short days this time of year, we would bring a Coleman lantern along to fish until dark and make supper after the sun had set. We would make up a big kettle of instant mashed potatoes or sometimes mac and cheese, and supplement it with rotating pan after pan of fried walleye, grouse fingers and duck to eat as finger food. No finer meal can be had in the backcountry! Our days were broken up by canoe fishing or finding suitable shorelines to throw spoons or ciscos into the narrows that provided moving water. We would take turns walking along the ridges and alder swamps looking for grouse and would always check the bays and rice paddies for mallards and the occasional goose.
This trip had a few extras. One sojourn by a member of our party found a bear den – complete with a bear! The sleepy bruin posed for pictures in his hole and fortunately decided being cozy was better than chasing any miscreant campers. We stayed but a few minutes and left him for his winter’s nap!
Tom is always the earliest riser. He typically has a fire going and coffee made before anyone else stirs. One morning he peeked into the tent about 4:30-ish and said, “Ken. You gotta come out and see this!”
The sky was ablaze with northern lights like I’ve seldom seen. They were bright red and radiated to the horizon in all directions, starting with a corona directly above us! They stayed until dawn, and we had many cups of coffee, ooohing and aaahing for hours.
We dilly-dallied on our way out. Hop-scotching with one in each canoe solo paddling while the other would walk the shoreline for a quarter
mile or so looking for grouse. As we approached the point where Table Rock is located, Tom and I had our turn to get out and walk.
As we approached a large alder swamp, Tom went left, and I went right along the edges. After five minutes Tom calls out “Hey, a big bull moose was bedded in here and he got up and is walking your way!” Sure enough, not long after came one of the biggest bulls I have ever seen. He walked up to withing thirty feet of me and stopped, looking in my direction. He knew I was there but couldn’t quite figure out what to do about it. He swung his head back and forth – a sign of aggression – and I knew I was toast. Nothing but alder brush between us and me with a single shot 20-guage and birdshot. A few seconds of that and he stopped, turned away and walked until he disappeared into the alders. Besides the cold sweat on my forehead and neck, the other thing that struck me was that on this chilly morning, he had a severe runny nose. After my heart rate subsided, I decided right then and there that if I ever had a business, it would be named “Snotty Moose”. The rest is history.
It’s been a few years since I’ve made the fall trek into Crooked Lake. I miss it dearly. I’ve made shorter trips into the backcountry in recent years, but another trip down the Horse River, past Lower Basswood Falls, the pictographs, Table Rock and the currents haunt me every year when the leaves start to turn. Big fish and bull moose fill my mind. Orange sunrises and grouse flushes along portages still make my heart pound. Maybe this will be the year I make just one more trip.
