This was another great year at the Barakel’s men retreat. After the relaxing day of fishing, I checked in and discovered my group would be staying in one of the brand new lodges. We headed over, unpacked, and settled in.
Out speaker for the weekend was Tom Harmon, you can check out his web site here. Friday night we found out the Tom would be preaching on the topic of prayer over the course of the weekend, and I was excited about the topic.
After breakfast the next morning, I got to take a ride on the newly installed zip-line. It was awesome.
First you gear up with some heavy duty equipment that looks like climbing gear.
Then basically, you climb to the top of a large wooden tower that is 3 or 4-stories tall.
At the top, your gear is attached to metal cable strung across a valley.
Then you count to 3 and jump off.
After the zip line we we headed back to the chapel for more teaching on prayer. Tom has recently written a new book. I purchased a copy, and he personalized my copy with his signature and a written statement in the front of the book. Tom’s preaching style is fast, full of wit, and he tends to hit a lot of different points as he examines the Word. He talked about the importance of prayer during that first chapel, gave some good quotes I jotted down:
From Charles Spurgeon: I’d rather teach 1 man to pray than 10 to preach.
Prayer is coming to God and believing he is there.
Prayer is the escape route for temptation.
After chapel, we grabbed some lunch and then stopped at the archery range before heading over to do some frisbee golf.
After an attempt at fishing on the lake (with lots of rowing in circles), we headed back to shore for some dinner. On Saturday, there is usually a special dinner and we waited while the kitchen staff put together a great meal.
I did a lot of walking up at camp. Our dorm was on the opposite side of the lake from our chapel, so I chose to walk most of the time. The buses ran past us transporting those who did not walk.
Probably my favorite chapel time for the weekend was when Tom presented us with four prayers we could pray on a daily basis:
1. Lord, teach me to pray.
2. Lord, please give me wisdom. (James 1:5)
3. Lord, please give me grace. (2 Cor 9:8)
4. Lord, keep me from evil. (John 17:15)
My favorite quote from the remaining chapel services talked about stepping out side your comfort zone and went something like this:
Do things that force you to do what you should be doing anyways.
Also one of the chapel services focused on the idea of prayer should be coupled with waiting. One of the concepts that I took away from these messages is that waiting can be equated to trusting. If you do not wait, then you are not trusting that you will get an answer.
I definitely had a lot to ponder as I walked out of the chapel Saturday night, and headed back to the dorm.
Sunday morning breakfast means sticky buns up at camp. Probably the only food better than a camp sticky bun, is the camp hot chocolate.
It was another great year at Barakel, and I am so glad I was able to go. I walk away this year with a renewed interest in improving my prayer life as well as a weekend full of memories.
The autumn season in Michigan is unbelievably beautiful, and is probably my favorite time of the year. You can look forward to apple cider, orange leaves, chilly mornings, and even maybe some trout on the fly.
We ate breakfast in Mio at the Au Sable River Restaurant, and several of my friends headed to the golf course, while one buddy headed up to the Holy Water section of the mainstream with me. We headed to a familiar access point, where we rigged up some streamers and geared up. It was definitely chilly, but not cold enough to keep me from fishing. I headed up stream and my buddy headed downstream.
After wading several access points, we were unable to move any fish. We decided to head into Grayling for a gourmet lunch at the Taco Bell drive-through window. We hit the Burton’s Landing picnic area to finish a few tacos and gorditas, before we stopped in at Gates Lodge to pick up some flies. Based on some advice in the shop, and the fact that I wanted to head there anyways, we went up to the North Branch of the Au Sable. The water looked good when we got there.
What was interesting, was that for the first time, I saw spawning redds up and down the stream like the one below.
After no luck on a small streamer, I decided to switch over to a dry fly with a nymph dropper. I had a BWO paired up with a copper john. After many many casts, I finally found a brookie willing to participate.
The nymph seemed to work well, so I pulled off the dry fly, and put a bead head nymph on that I had tied up earlier this year. My buddy got first cast into all the waters, but I saw a place that was difficult to cast into and decided to give it a shot. Across a few logs and some thick underwater weeds, I dropped my nymph up against the side of a log, and a small brown trout decided it was time for lunch.
We fished until just before the sun started to set. My friend had one more brookie come to hand in the range of 10 inches, but was to far upstream for me to get there in time to take a picture. So, I have visited the Au Sable system for the last three years in mid-october and this was the firrst year I got into a few fish.
My favorite picture from the trip was just as I was leaveing one of the mainstream access points, I took the shot below. It makes me want to drive back up.
I typically tape every episode of Michigan Out-of-doors off of my local PBS station. I wait eagerly for the occasional fly fishing related segments they run. Well, when they announced that they would be on the AuSable chasing the hex hatch, I was excited for the episode to air.
However, it never showed up on my Tivo. I don’t know if the Detroit PBS station did not air it, or I just missed it. When I was up at the AuSable this past month, the worker at the Old AuSable factory happened to mention their visit in the shop. So, I decided to do some searching and found out, that because the show has recently separated from MUCC, it seems to havea revamped web site.
The best part is the web site has episodes available to view online, including the hex fishing episode at the AuSable River. If anyone has the recipe for the Kennys Golden Eagle hex pattern listed in the show, let me know. It looks pretty nifty. Here’s a link to that episode:
We were able to rent the same cabin we rented last year on the banks of the North Branch of the AuSable river. I was nervous about traveling with the canoe on top the minivan, but the trip up went quick and uneventful. We even stopped briefly at Cracker Barrel for dinner.
When we got to the cabin, we unpacked and took a few pictures. My little girl was as happy as I was to be there:
The river was calling my name and I had my waders on as quickly as possible. I finally ended up catching a few small brookies as it was beginning to get dark…
There was a nice trout feeding lane that several little brookies were holding throughout the weekend. It looked something like this:
Day3 – Bad day fishing is better than a good day working
Every morning after I had at least one cup of coffee, I would go out and either work the banks or throw on my waders and fish alone. It is very peaceful and serene fishing a river in the morning by yourself (and sometimes cold). I caught a bunch of brookies over the course of the weekend. Most of the fish were in the 6″ to 8″ range.
Pretty soon Clara will be able to fish with me. For now, no baby waders, rather she just gets to see her daddy in waders.
My original plan was to float the big water that is between Mio and Comins flats. This is the float trip I took last year, and as an inexperienced canoeist I began to worry about attempting to float and fish this section. I was excited to hit the tail end of the white-fly hatch, and I had heard that they were having the annual river clean-up on Saturday which meant that there would be a ton of people on the river on Saturday. Instead of the “trophy waters,” I talked to my father-in-law about floating the North Branch which I thought would be a much safer bet. While it was a much better decision to go this route, I definitely had a rough day ahead. With the canoe loaded on the “fish car” (I’m now borrowing Voelker’s car title), we headed off to a canoe access point on the North Branch of the AuSable and were going to paddle back to the cabin.
I joked with my father-in-law that I was planning on naming the canoe “Serenity” which is the name of a favorite sci-fi movie, and also the feeling one gets when being on a river. I’ll probably stick with the namebecause it is pretty darn cool, but actual serenity was not achieved on this voyage.
Even my dog River would be joining us on this inaugural journey. While not the best swimmer, River seemed to be okay for most of the ride, but he had some moments of fear.
The North Branch is definitely a beautiful section of river:
So, as we’re getting ready to disembark, I did a double-check of all equipment and realized my wallet containing my fishing license was missing. My wife graciously offered to go back to the cabin and return with my wallet. Unfortunately two things happened. First, she took a wrong turn and went about 10 miles out of the way, and took near 45 minutes for her return. Second, she never found my wallet. I checked everything again when I realized a combination of a broken belt and wearing my waders caused my pants to fall about five inches lower then they should have. My back pocket containing my wallet was behind my knee, and no one was very happy that I had my wallet the whole time.
My father-in-law hopped in the canoe, and I followed. We took off from the access point, and canoe completely turned around and we were floating down the river backwards.; I realized I had a lot to learn about navigating a canoe. A short time later, I had to get out of the canoe because the water was too shallow. I almost went head first into the water because my wading boot had caught on the canoe. When I looked down, the reason it caught was because the sole completely fell off. We were having a hard time navigating the canoe, and my lack of skills caused us to hit many log jams and trees, even head-on once. At least four times the water became so shallow, I would get out and push us through the rocks. Also, the loud noises started to have an effect on my dog, and he was getting antsy from being confined so long. My father-in-law was pushing us to keep going because I think he was afraid we were not going to make it back before dark.
The culmination of bad luck happened when we came around a bend and saw the only other person of the entire trip. A gentleman was fly fishing just north of Kellogs Bridge, and we moved to the right of the river to make sure we did not interfere with his fishing. My father-in-law leaned back and said, “Let’s at least not embarrass ourselves in front of another fisherman.” As we approached the man, we moved to the right and I gave a greeting with the nod of the head. A few seconds later, the canoe grinded to a halt atop a gravel bed, directly parallel to the fisherman. My father-in-law said hello, and I think I said we were stuck. The fisherman jokingly asked if my dog was going to get out and push, and I got out and pushed us along.
Eventually, the not-so-fun fishing adventure had turned into a somewhat decent canoe ride. Finally we stopped the canoe to fish, and I caught a big creek chub. I would say it was not a prized fish. We finally got the hang of canoeing and probably the highlight of the trip was when we stumbled onto a couple deer taking a rest at the river.
When we finally made it back to the dock at the cabin, and my wife mentioned that she kept seeing huge fish near the the bank. I immediately rigged up a large nymph thinking I would have a go at them, but stopped when I realized what was happening. It seemed as there were brook trout spawning right off the bank under a big log. I attempted to take some underwater video below, and here is a picture of some of the fish.
I did go fishing again later that evening, and did catch a few brookies that exceeded the 8″ range, like this one below:
At the end of the day, the canoe ride tired me out but good, and I started to doze off after putting my daughter to sleep while sitting on the couch.
Day3 – Out-fished by a girl
Almost every morning, the difference in water and air temps caused a mist to settle on top of the water, making for a picturesque view from the cabin.
Without wading boots, it would be difficult to fish. I decided to go to the Gates Lodge and buy a pair of wading boots. Their least expensive pair were a pair of Orvis Pack and Travel boots, which I liked because they were so light. I bought that and my wife decided that because I had packed her waders, she would be a fishing license for the day as well. I noticed that they had several leaders made by Kathy Scott, so I bought one because I had bought her DVD on how to make them and now I would have something to compare against.
With new wadding boots, my father-in-law and I took off to fish the AuSable mainstream. I decided to check out a new access point listed in the handy AuSable River Guide. When we came to the small parking area, there was another fisherman eating his lunch. We swapped a few stories, and he said the fishing was slow and he had only caught a few small fish. My father-in-law tied on a white wulff, and ended up catching a small brookie. My highlight of the visit, was when I had an 8″ to 10″ brookie smash a hopper pattern I was tossing next to a grassy bank. The fish went airborne to try and eat it, but there was no hookup. I did end up running into some more deer though:
As we waded out, an AuSable River boat passed us by, asking how we did. I told them it was slow, and the guide said, “At least your fishing.” He was right.
We headed back to the cabin, where my father-in-law made up a pot roast in a dutch oven. We took some pictures of my daughter too:
My wife and I then geared up, and fished while dinner was cooking. It ended up being the best night of fishing and we caught a bunch of brookies, and I finally caught something other than a brookie when I hooked two browns.
The average brookie we were catching looked something like this:
The first catch of the evening looked like this, but the big one was just up around the bend for my wife:
After attempting to match the hatch by fishing with some BWO emergers and dry flies, my wife kept catching brookies on a dry adams. So I switched over as well, and that seemed to be what the fish were keying on. I ened up with my biggest fish of the trip:
I told my wife to wade down and take a picture of my nice sized brookie which ran around 10″ or so.
She took the picture and asked, “Where did you cast to catch this one?” I pointed to the nearby log jam, and she casted almost exactly where I had, and immediately hooked an even bigger fish. Both mad and excited, I helped her get it in a take a couple pictures:
After releasing the trout, I went to grab my fly rod and it was missing. I panicked, looked around, and saw my rod slowly moving downstream about 10 feet away. I about lost my favorite rod and reel… oops. And, I was out-fished by my wife.
Day4 – Dream Stream
I fished early that morning, but caught nothing near the cabin.
Last year, I got lost out in state land trying to find a stream referenced in an old Michigan Trout guide I had bought off of Ebay. I used an atlas to discover this hidden gem of a creek, and told my father-in-law that it was a short drive there. It ended up being about 6 to 7 miles away, and when we came to the first access point I quickly became discouraged. I knew this would be a small stream, but it looked as though it had greatly dried up. We travelled downstream and found a nother set of two-tracks I could venture into with the minivan. I came to a hill, and told my father-in-law I would take the walk down to check out the conditions. What I found was my dream stream I had been imagining for months. This was an ankle deep stream with holes that were about knee deep. As I surveyed the water before going back to tell my father-in-law, I saw a trout rise. I definitely wanted to fish here. I could tell my father-in-law was not having as much fun as I was, so I explained that sometimes it was about the challenge of fishing a highly technical stream. When you have to work for the fish, it is much more meaningful. I had a few tiny fish that I moved, but neither of us caught anything. I did find a place I will need to explore again though.
Later that afternoon, we went into Grayling and I got to visit the new Old AuSable Fly Shop. I picked up some stickers for the canoe, and some tippet. It is a nice place and highly recommend it. It even looks like they rent out fishing kayaks, which I think might be something fun to try in the future. We also stopped into a souvenir shop and I bought a fly fishing T-shirt before heading to dinner. We ate at the Canadian Steakhouse which had really good food. The restaurant has a lodge-type theme to it, and was very clean. I highly recommend you check it out if you are looking for a place to eat in Grayling.
We went back and I geared up for my last evening of fishing, where I again caught a few more brookies.
Day5 – The fun ends
After catching small brookies all weekend, I thought I might just be able to coax a big fish out early in the morning. I decided to fish with a zoo cougar streamer, basically using Kelly Galloup’s method. Toss the big chunky streamer in a grid pattern across the water attempting to trigger a huge fish to come after it. After fishing both up and downstream with this method, I had no takers. I think I sacred all the other fish into hiding as well, as I walked out of the water without catching anything that morning.
Well, the canoe has left the building, and that building was Dick’s Sporting Goods. With my big fishing trip around the corner, I decided it was time to buy the canoe. This is what I bought:
Here’s what I did to save money:
I bought a $20 off coupon from Ebay = -$17
The canoe had some scratches/blemishes = -$50
Opened a store credit card = -$10 (plus additional $10)
Final Cost: $422
I had $150 in gift cards that I had been saving up as well. Then I asked about a “Package” deal by adding paddles and life jacket vests that they were trying to clearance out for the end of season. They took $10 off each $60 vest, and paddles were $15 each.
I figured out I saved somewhere in the neighborhood of $125 total. Time to go canoeing.
So, I have purchased a Thule roof rack system for my vehicle to transport my canoe. I was considering a DIY approach, but decided it is going to be on my vehicle, I’d rather have something that looks good.
But after looking at all the accessories that can go along with a canoe, there are some things I think could be DIY. So far I am considering the following projects, with some examples:
I had an opportunity to fish one of the only local trout waters near where I live. I drove to about the farthest access point from my house which is about a 45 minute drive. Unfortunately, I there was no trout to be caught today. The good news was I didn’t get skunked.
There was some rain the night before, and the water flow definitely went up but was still clear when I arrived.
The water looked really good actually…
So, with not much time to spare, I rigged up a black woolly bugger and started working upstream. Casting streamers upstream are not fun. After I lost my fly on rock I switched to a gray adams, and worked the seams until I lost the adams in a tree. With my new Cocoon sunglasses on I was able to see into the water very clearly, and did notice a nice sized trout get spooked out from underneath an undercut bank as I walked by.
I switched back to a black bugger and worked a pool that gave me good luck before…
I tossed my bugger under a log jam, and saw something slash at it. So, I kept working the area and reeled in a short fat creek chub. I tossed the creek chub back in, and worked my way back downstream with my black woolly bugger. I lost this streamer on another underwatermbranch, and decided to put on a stone fly nymph for the rest of the walk out.
I worked my way back to where I entered the stream, and tossed the nymph into some slack water, and felt a nice bend in the rod. I could already see it was not a trout, and after a small battle I had a decent sized rock bass in hand. I wonder how many brown trout fingerlings this guy has eaten.
So, my drive up to the creek to fish for trout ended up with two fish caught, but no trout. At least I didn’t get skunked, and every time out is another learning experience.
Not much really going on here lately. I am hoping to get out for a short fishing trip up North before the end of the season in September.
Last year we hit the AuSable just as the White Fly hatches were tapering off below Mio, and we ended up having an amazing fishing time. See the post from last year here.
Maybe we can do something similar, but my hope this time is to have my very own canoe. I have been saving up gift cards and coins over the last few months to buy the same type of canoe my friend Matt owns. You can see the canoe back in my Tennessee trip post here.
So, I will be able to do float fishing by myself. Sounds like fun.
The other night I made what has been the most tasty treat baked in my dutch oven yet. My wife is a fan of the dessert pizza usually available at the lunch buffet at Pizza Hut. Lately I’ve been making pizza for dinner using our local grocery store’s ready made pizza dough, and I had a nice sized chunk of dough left over and thought I would try to make a dessert pizza.
I researched a couple web sites looking at how others have made pizza in a dutch oven, and others how they made a similar dessert pizza. I bought a can of apple pie filling, and whipped up a cumble topping and gave it a try. What I ended up with was extremely tasty and probably very unhealthy, but you can’t win ‘em all.
Here was my recipe:
Using a 10″ dutch oven.
Ready made pizza dough. (about the size of a Big-mac)
1 Can apple pie filling (probably need around 16 oz, my can was 20 oz)
1 Stick butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oats (or quick oats)
1/2 cup flour (I used whole wheat)
1/2 tsp cinammon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
Butter Crisco (to grease dutch oven)
Vegetable oil
First, get the charcoal going. I used around 30 briquettes in my handy charcoal chimney.
I greased the dutch oven with butter flavored Crisco. Next, I took my pizza dough and lined the bottom of the dutch oven creating a crust around the edges. I then used a fork to poke a bunch of holes across the bottom to keep it from bubbling up (it still did somewhat). I then brushed the dough lightly with vegetable oil to help it brown up.
I then whipped up the crumble topping by mixing the the brown sugar, flour, and oats and then cutting in the stick of butter.
Next, I put the lid on and took it outside with the charcoal. 20 briquettes on top and 10 on the bottom. I pre-baked the dough for just under four minutes.
Leaving the coals on top, I set the top to the side and dumped about 2/3 of the can of apple filling onto the dough that was starting to bubble up. I then dumped enough of the crumble mix to generously cover the top. I put the lid back on and let it cook for 10 more minutes. The crust was starting to brown up when I checked on it and I brought the dutch oven inside and carefully extracted the pizza with a spatula.
My wife made a powered sugar glaze and we drizzled that over the top. It was definitely the best dessert I’ve made in the dutch oven thus far.
