Welcome to the Port Elmsley Drive-In!!! Tonight’s feature, “MISSION FISHIN’ IMPOSSIBLE.” Starring Moosebunk, Agent Stevie Zebco, the Cheepas River and Momma Nature…
But first a preshow cartoon…
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GIRL’S RULE. (a story as told by my youngest daughter)
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My dad likes fish. My dad likes fish a lot. My dad likes fishing for fish. Dad woke me up early to go fishing with him and my sister. I like the boat and eating chicken nuggets and fries. I brush my teeth with a timer so I do it long enough. I’m four.
Dad’s taking us to the Bay on a big river. I sawd a seal there and goose and hunters shooting gooses. It’s warm outside. I’m sweaty.
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Dad says we’ll troll for trout from the sea. I don’t see any fish. I’m sweaty and hungry. I’m always hungry. “Daaaaad, can I have a snack?”
Dad let me take off my jacket and drive the boat with him. I’m a better driver than my sister who’s eight. There’s polar bears out here my sister told me. “Daaaaad, can I have another snack?”
I don’t see any fish. Dad says he “dropped” a fish, but I didn’t see a splash. The worms must be getting tired of waiting to be eaten. If I was a worm I’d be a pink worm cause I like pink. I like purple and burgundy too.
“Daaaaad, can I have a snack please? A purple snack?”
Fishing is boring, I’m happy we’re going home now. My sister is sleepy.
Where’s dad going now? This isn’t the way home. “Daaaaad, are we going home now?” Dad says he wants to check for a fish. Nice waterfall. Dad wants a picture…. again. He takes more pictures of fish than me. I like smiles.
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Dad likes fishing for fish. I like the boat and ice cream… the white ice cream, and Barbies, and Dora, and Toopy and Binou and Backyardigans.
“Daaaaad, can I have a snack when we get home?”
The End.
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MISSION FISHIN’ IMPOSSIBLE.
Great thing for my buddy Steve, for when I tele-mo-phoned the local yokel he was all over changing work shifts and making our 6:30am river departure a total rock solid plan.
The mission, which I had no choice to accept it was, to travel deep into the heart of the Cheepas River wilderness, totally anglinate every living aquatic thing swimming there, then capture a mob boss hostage and reveal his whereabouts to all interested online agencies. If I failed… I would self destruct.
Come morning we hopped aboard the WarCanoe and made haste for the Cheepas.
Arriving there it became evident that a rough road lay ahead. From the river’s mouth 37km up the Moose River, it would be another 88km to our target. The water had receeded quickly the previous weeks to levels that would now be classified as “most likely and almost certainly, dangerous.”
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Much time was spent traveling cautiously through rock garden mine fields that would blow any skeg to smithereens. The fish in these murky waters seemed scarce. One thing that there sure was plenty of though, were birds. Birds, birds and more birds lined the banks. Geese, ducks, cranes, whiskeyjacks, robins, ospreys and even an eagle. They all watched on as we passed by, inching closer towards our goal.
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Steve was a solid gunman and well trained at picking off the few walleye we found hiding in eddies and creekmouths. Every one taken put a smile on his face… the man evidently enjoying his duty. A true anglinator fo’sho’.
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After brief stops for fish we would blaze back onto the trail. Intel continued reaching us by many different channels. Weather, wildlife, waterway… yeah, we were totally tuned into the three “W’s” that would eventually see our mission a success….
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… OR SO WE THOUGHT!!!
A little too tuned in I guess, we didn’t happen to see a single landmine which lay undetected below the water’s surface. The rock smacked the skeg hard kicking the entire motor up off the transom. Immediately the boat stopped and I was in full on red-friggin-alert. Steve was shaking his head… “whaddafawkwasdat Bunk?”
“Sniper mine ‘err sumthin Stevie Zebco,” I replied.
We had to slow the pace. We were in a heavy danger zone. Up ahead too was the biggest obstacle of the mission, “The Falls.” Where plenty before and plenty to come will likely meet their match.
Negative thoughts began racing through my head. If I was Jason Bourne I’d be having a weee bit of an identity crisis at this point.
Tried to think what James Bond would do at a critical time like this… but soon concluded that even if I had a keg of apple martinis Steve’s manboobs just still wouldn’t attract me enough to bed his sweet white-ass down. A real pickle this all was.
We pressed on. But, we pressed on only momentarily because BANG!!! Another mine blew and knocked the motor back out again. Quickly I regained control of the WarCanoe but unfortunately the nerves didn’t come so easy.
We were at a crawl. The mission become obviously more impossible. I stopped to radio base for a progress report.
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We’d been at it a long time by this point. Our stop time to anglinate fish was really quite minimal, and our average moving speed was well below my target of 17km/hr. By calculation the Falls would only be about 6 to 7km ahead, and so I had to make a choice.
The river was becoming shallower with many more mines and snipers to impede our moving onward. At this point too, we were actually very shy of our goal of 88km, as the 74km given on the progress report included 37km of travel on the Moose. We were still 50km shy of the target. It was now about 2:00pm and while I did the math and exhausted the possibilities, Stevie Zebco aglinated another walleye.
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I opted to shoot up this little swift we were stopped at and ride carefully to the Falls. At that point we would stop for another progress report. After an hour more travelling we came about 300 meters short of this target. The Falls lay around a corner in the bend, we could not see it and we could not go on. A treacherous mine field rock garden “impossible” to pass stood in our way. We were defeated and had to begin a 40km descent back to a pre-established base camp at the mouth of the Abitibi River where it joins the Moose River.
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We had only just turned around when my old friend “Karma” showed up. We spotted him spying on us. My belief is he was sent to keep watch… maybe as Intel for another agency. All I know is, Steve and I were quick to exploit him and send him packing.
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The way back to camp I reflected upon what went wrong. Timing was off, that’s about all I could come up with. Many factors need to co-ordinate perfectly and in unison to make a Cheepas mission a success, and this day it wasn’t meant to be. Even the fish that we could reach on route were nowhere to be found. Couldn’t help but feel discouraged… defeated really. We reached base camp and settled into our quarters.
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As the sun was setting, my flask of Scapa flowed into big pools between my cheeks and then warmly past the throat, I had a clear scotch vision. In a dream state I relived our day of struggle to find good numbers of fish and a mob boss. But as the dream went on, through a haze of mystery, it was foretold that tomorrow we would fish on strong. We would break free of this past restraint and hold the faith that it only takes one fish to make a successful mission. From a dark day today there would be light come tomorrow… so Mob boss, look out.
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(Intermission – get a coffee or beer, take a whiz, kiss your wife, put the kids to bed, have a smoke and a pancake if ya like)
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Woke a little late and a lot dry. Coffee and Bailey’s, boat loaded, Honda fueled and oiled, Stevie Zebco and I were before too long taking off full throttle from the base. We had a score to settle.
The trip would take us up the Moose River about an hour. The skies were threatenting rain but that was about the only thing not in our favor for the day… Until, we reached our stop.
NIGHTLINES!!! Some Fawkers!!! Our stop found us at a small incoming creek. The area referred to as the Towers. Campers were set up right there, but no one was around. Still though, even when off doing other things, people in these parts leave their lines in the water. I won’t get into it any further than this other than to say, greedy bastards!
It wouldn’t stop us. In fact, it fueled our fire to complete our mission. Stevie Zebco would prove just how game he was to fish by anglinating this awesome pike from it’s lair. Dood takes no prisoners.
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At the creek we managed a few more fish too, mainly pike. Even with the rain starting off and on now, the way the few pike that bit did so, it indicated they were fiercely hungry. This was a plus.
After leaving the Towers we set off temporarily exploring. A nearby cabin which I have passed by a few times over the years could be barely seen off on the west shoreline. Stevie and I rode over there to gather some information about the region.
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Didn’t appear to be overly inhabited. Curious though, we climbed to the top and found an amazing site.
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Steve was blown away. We were like kids getting set loose in someone’s house. We peered around every corner, found trails, and three more cabins to accompany this unfinished grand lodge.
I was quickly bothered. The young poplar trees growing all around the site were ten or more feet high. It was obvious this beautiful project had been abandoned. I wondered who… why… then felt upset over the waste of it all. The view from here was spectacular, and someone ambitious must have extremely overestimated their potential.
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I was quick to presume this was a hunting or fishing camp gone bad. The area would actually be quite unsuitable for both except for small windows during the spring and fall.
Back home, I learned a few days later that this site was partially built for a youth treatment facility along the ONR railway. Over a million dollars was supplied to the local Band by the Governement to achieve this goal but about a decade ago the project was abandoned. As I am told, the actual area was later deemed too unsuitable to access in the warm months because of swampy terrain between it’s location and the railway that lay about a kilometer away. My thought would be… fill the swamp where needed to build a trail or make a longer one around. A million had already been spent!!! The whole idea of it, the wasted money, the idea lost, the rotting work just sitting in the bush… so sad! And to know that this same sort of site exists elsewhere at the Harricanaw River is enough to drive a man to really want to say something. Pure waste and irresponsibility if you ask me.
Anyone with extra money and a dream… contact Moose Cree Band and see what can be done with this site.
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Had to get my mind off the negative. When heading back down to the boat I spotted a patch of fiddleheads. These fern sprouts were enough to make me happy. Got married in Perth at Fiddleheads Bar and Grill. A beautiful spot owned in part by a good friend and excellent chef. A tonne of fond memories there.
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Back to the mission, I was optimistic about fishing this one back bay. Don’t often get to try this spot, only a couple times over the years, but have always thought it to hold good prospects.
Arriving there we found a gill net at it’s mouth stretching halfway across the bay. Behind that gill net about a third of the way down the bay was another gill net. I’d need about a page to type out all the expletive words that I roared at this point. My temper getting the better of me. Whoever said fishing in the north is easy?
The net at the river’s mouth looked old so Steve and I gave it a lift to check. We wouldn’t keep anything, but I would pull it out and cut it to shreds if I found rotting fish. The net was empty.
We set off to troll the un-netted side of the bay and also zig-zagged in and out of the pocket between the two nets. Steve and I weren’t at it very long before I felt the weight of a fish on the end of my line. “FISH ON!” I said excitedly, “small one!”
The hookset felt funny like three quick soft ticks but then a good weight slowed the boats forward momentum after I had killed the motor. Told Steve in short time that maybe it wasn’t so small. While battling the fish, from the distance another boat could be heard coming our way, but nothing was in view.
A great fight to the WarCanoe, our mission was complete when we were quick to scoop the Mob boss up. The hook just fell out of him in the net effortlessly, and then I hoisted the captive for it’s mug shots. I have to tell yas that this Mission Impossible sure as heck felt good to see end at this point. Mob boss had eluded Agent Medic Stevie Zebco and I for well over 140km’s of tough travel filled with karma and sniper mines. All it takes is one fish to make the entire effort perfect.
A new Moose River PB too that I quickly released before another boat showed up in the bay to remove it’s empty net. YES!!!
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The rest as they say, is history.
Mission complete. Roll credits, start the car and drive yer arses on home! It’s over.
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Bunk.
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