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Voyageur camp sites


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Thought I'd post this again. Took off from Crane this Thursday morning (4th) intending to camp somewhere on Sandpoint or Namakan. Searched every campsite from north Sandpoint to Kettle Falls and never found an available site. Spent several hours doing this. Very discouraging. Came to one site where a person was sitting on the shore "holding" the campsite---there was no boat, gear, or tent. Just told us it was taken. I thought that wasn't allowed. That person was likely holding the site while others in a boat searched for a better site. What does a person do if no site is available? Can you camp anywhere, or just go home?

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I believe you can camp on any island as long as everything else is filled.

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That happened to me one time and we thought about finding a nice spot that had room for a tent on an island somewhere and just setting up camp. We figured if we were stopped we'd tell the CO that all spots were filled and had no other option. But then I decided to head up into Grassy Bay on Sand Point. There are several campsites in there and all of them were open. So even though the whole lake appeared full, it truly wasn't. We just had to back track and go someplace we hadn't thought about. Grassy Bay has some of the best Walleye action anyway, so it actually worked out OK.

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Yep, a person used to think getting up there on Friday would be plenty early. How things change!

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I also noticed that every camp/houseboat site was taken on both Kab and Nam. We were on the lakes the final full week of July.

I am glad to see people using the park and facilities. On the other hand, it was frustrating not being able to find a spot for a quick shore lunch.

We observed that nearly every safe place to land a boat, was a camp/houseboat site. The remaining shore lines were all rock, mud, or privately owned.

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Marmot, Not all sites are sandy beaches. Thier are many houseboat site on the chain of lakes that you tie up to rocks. Just like up at Kettle Falls when you bring a houseboat up their you tie up to Rocks. Not all sites are sand access.

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Every campsite on Kab is either a sand beach or has a dock. I am not even sure if Kab has docks. I cannot think of any rocky campsites on Kab.

I am not very familiar with Nam. We used our map to check several campsites and each had a sandy beach or dock.

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We were up from the 5th to the 9th and were on the Wolf Pack islands. The westernmost site opened up sunday night and the next day someone came and pitched a tent and put 2 camp chairs down on the shoreline and left, never to be seen again. The next day the NPS workers came to clean sites and asked if anyone was next door as they saw just the tent and chairs. They called the ranger and informed him and the next morning they both arrived and took down the tent and chairs and confiscated them. Never did see anyone come into that site by the time we left wednesday afternoon. I can tell you that they said this type of thing happens all the time nowadays, and I will in the future definitly be looking alot closer at sites that appear to be being "held", and if there is no gear other than a tent around and noone shows up, there will be some gear left on the nearest shoreline til the ranger stops by.

Fishing was good, leeches on rigs and spinners both produced in many spots. 28-34' mainly with about 50% overs and not a single fish under the slot, which was very different from a week prior when I fished Kab and caught about 4 shorts for every slot and over.

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We were on Kab from July 15-22 and found a bunch of campsites open. Bluefin Bay, which is a beautiful site, didn't have anyone camping all week. There were a number of sites in Lost Bay open and lots on the Gold Portage end. Maybe bears had something to do with them being open, but I didn't see any bear advisories at the Park HDQ's. We saw a bear on one small island but other than that nothing. Fishing was great, never had to travel more than 5-6 miles from the resort to get walleyes. Leeches on a lindy rig, red or orange hook, 28' of water. 5:00-7:00 AM was the best and again after 8:00 PM to dark in the evening. It was way to hot to fish midday, that was time to swim.

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xplorer - glad to hear all is well and the fishing is still good. Nice to chat with you and your buddies @ Kettle Falls

a few weeks back and thanks for trading cameras so we could all bring back memories on film. My son tells everyone he met xplorer. Good luck with the campsites and maybe we will see you in the Fall!

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laker taker,

Great to meet you also, hope you and your boys had a great time. When I returned with the family we had another fantastic trip, a small storm and quite a bit of wind but non problems to speak of. And thanks for the tip on Rainy, I'll keep that in mind if i venture down there in the future to stay on the far south side of the reef.

Xplorer

mjgrose: You'll have mail in a bit!

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  • Your Responses - Share & Have Fun :)

    • leech~~
      Nope not me.  May want to go nextdoor and ask around?  
    • smurfy
      Looks to me like Leech brought his chair home!!😅😆
    • Brianf.
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    • SkunkedAgain
      Black Bay had great ice before but a few spots near rockpiles where there were spots of open water. It looks like the weight of the snow has created a little lake in the middle of the bay.  
    • LakeofthewoodsMN
      On the south end...   Thanks to some cold spring weather, ice fishing continues strong for those still ice fishing.  The bite remains very good.  Most resorts have pulled their fish houses off for the year, however, some still have fish houses out and others are allowing ATV and side by sides.  Check social media or call ahead to your favorite resort for specifics. Reports this week for walleyes and saugers remain excellent.   A nice mix of jumbo perch, pike, eelpout, and an occasional crappie, tullibee or sturgeon being reported by anglers. Jigging one line and using a live minnow on the second line is the way to go.  Green, glow red, pink and gold were good colors this week.     Monster pike are on a tear!  Good number of pike, some reaching over 45 inches long, being caught using tip ups with live suckers or dead bait such as smelt and herring in 8 - 14' of water.   As always, work through a resort or outfitter for ice road conditions.  Safety first always. Fish houses are allowed on the ice through March 31st, the walleye / sauger season goes through April 14th and the pike season never ends. On the Rainy River...  The river is opened up along the Nelson Park boat ramp in Birchdale, the Frontier boat ramp and Vidas boat ramp.  This past week, much of the open water skimmed over with the single digit overnight temps.   Areas of the river have popped open again and with temps getting warmer, things are shaping up for the last stretch through the rest of the spring season, which continues through April 14th.   Very good numbers of walleyes are in the river.  Reports this week, even with fewer anglers, have been good.  When temps warm up and the sun shines, things will fire up again.   Jigs with brightly colored plastics or jigs with a frozen emerald shiner have been the desired bait on the river.  Don't overlook slow trolling crankbaits upstream as well.   Good reports of sturgeon being caught on the river as well.  Sturgeon put the feed bag on in the spring.  The bite has been very good.  Most are using a sturgeon rig with a circle hook loaded with crawlers or crawlers / frozen emerald shiners. Up at the NW Angle...  Ice fishing is winding down up at the Angle.  Walleyes, saugers, and a number of various species in the mix again this week.  The bite is still very good with good numbers of fish.  The one two punch of jigging one line and deadsticking the second line is working well.   Check with Angle resorts on transport options from Young's Bay.  Call ahead for ice road guidelines.  
    • CigarGuy
      With the drifting, kind of hard to tell for sure, but I'm guessing about a foot and still lightly snowing. Cook end!
    • PSU
      How much snow did you get on Vermilion? 
    • Mike89
      lake here refroze too...  started opening again yesterday with the wet snow and wind...  very little ice left today...
    • Hookmaster
      A friend who has a cabin between Alex and Fergus said the lake he's on refroze. He texted me a pic from March 12th when it was open and one from 23rd when it wasn't. 🤯
    • SkunkedAgain
      I don't think that there has been any ice melt in the past few weeks on Vermilion. Things looked like a record and then Mother Nature swept in again.   I'll give my revised guess of April 21st
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