Many years ago, in the early 60′s, my dad, brother and I went on a fishing trip to Obabikon Bay Camp on Lake of the Woods, Ontario, Canada. We two brothers were married and had promised our wives huge quantities of filets in return for a week away from home and work.
At that time the camp was owned by the Traver family. I think that is how their name was spelled. My dad and brother had been to that camp several times before and this was my second trip. At that time, once you got a few miles from camp it was easy to fish all day long without seeing another boat. This was wilderness indeed, occasionally we would pass an island and see a bear, deer or moose and not be surprised.
Mr. Traver was a great host and always went out of his way for his guests. Mrs. Traver was in charge of cooking, cleaning and the money. She was so busy we hardly ever had an opportunity to visit with her but boy could she cook! He did everything else.
One evening after dinner, dad and I wanted to go over to Obabikon Lake and catch Northern Pike but my brother wanted to fish Walleye close to camp. So we split up and the two of use took the boat and made the 20 minute ride to the Lake. Dad loved that area and especially “The Narrows” a two boat wide narrow gap between the bay and the lake. Years later my brother and I took dads ashes there and scattered them in the water.
We had fished until nearly dark and caught a number of fish and finally, reluctantly, headed back to “the Narrows” and camp. As I was driving the boat between two islands I hit a sunken rock and broke the sheer pin on the motor. That stopped us dead in the water because without a sheer pin the propeller could not turn. We paddled the boat to the closest island and looked for a spare sheer pin but there were none in the emergency kit that came with the boat.
So we figured we were going to have a long cold night ahead of us if we did not get organized. I went and gathered up a big pile of dry wood from the island and dad took a tiny amount of gas from boat and soaked some tissues and paper scraps he found. We selected a nice sandy open area and combined the wood with the gas soaked paper and in seconds dad had a great fire going. We then set about to try and get ourselves comfortable for the night. By this time it was pitch black and with no lantern or flashlight we stayed close to the fire and told stories for several hours.
Meanwhile back at camp my brother and Mr. Traver were starting to get worried and around midnight they decided to come looking for us. Mr. Traver later told us he had made similar rescue trips for other of his guests over the years and could easily find his way in the dark. To me everything looks the same after dark.
It was about 45 minutes later when they saw our fire from the distance. It did not take them long to hail us and the teasing commenced and has not ceased to this day. My brother still likes to remind me of the time I made a “bonfire” at Obabikon Lake. Now when I go over there I avoid the dark and always have someone in the front of the boat to look for rocks.
Also
Here is more about Lake of the Woods.
