Forest Service Cabin - Manzanita Lake

Tuesday August 9th was a light day for me, and Dan's day off. There was only one ship in on Wednesday, so Dan asked off and I asked off as well. And since Dan has been teaching Jarad how to fly floats, Jarad said we could use his PA12 any time we wanted. So we decided that with finally some good weather, we would reserve the Forest Service cabin on Manzanita Lake. After my rounds on the two ships, we loaded up the PA12 with some "camping" gear that we borrowed from Dale and Ailsa and headed out toward the Misty Fjords and the lake. 

But first Dan wanted to show me Patching Lake. I have heard so much about it. That's the lake that Dan and Mike stayed at and fished 4 years ago. It is a pretty lake and the cabin is right at the water's edge, right next to where a stream flows into the lake.


The cabin was very nice and it looked just like the one on Manzanita Lake, with one exception; there was a wood crib. Dan decided to chop a big piece of log and take the wood with us for a camp fire later.

It was time to press on to Manzanita. When we flew over the lake it seemed like the water level was low. There was more of the grassy area showing. We could also see the channels that we wanted to canoe on.

checking the wind direction and preparing for landing

With the water level so low, we couldn't tie up the airplane in the same location that we did the month before when we came here for our picnic.

So Dan taxied over to the grassy area to beach the plane. There was a huge log that we could tie the tail to. We decided to put the canoe to good use and unload our stuff into it, drag it over closer to the path to the cabin.

Once we got the plane unloaded and everything brought up to the cabin we could climb into the canoe and start our Lewis and Clark expedition up the channel. But first, Dan decided to pan for gold in the stream. I think he thought if he found a good sized piece of gold, that would take my mind off the nugget I found in the jewelry store the other day.  ;-)

As you can see, it was a beautiful day with no wind. Should be a great paddle. My imagination started right in. We were native Indians paddling up the little river to the next village. Or, we were pioneers paddling up the little river to escape the native Indians. Or, we exploring the new territory. Or........"Shut up Nance and keep paddling, I want to fish that wide spot around the bend."

I've never seen grasses and flowers growing out of a rock

The only wildlife we saw were these cute little ducks

The stream got so shallow that Dan thought he'd look for that nugget for me again

The day was ending, the sun was getting low behind the mountains and we decided to turn around, go back to the main part of the lake and Dan could do a little bit of fishing before it got too late.

A "little" success!

After dinner we decided to have a warming campfire. The sun was setting and the temperature was cooling.

Soon it was bed time and we wanted to take care of a couple of things before it got dark. If you remember from the previous posting, the "throne" was way up behind the cabin and I was NOT going to go out after dark.

Note the bear protection

The next morning was cool, clear with just a hint of a little breeze stirring up the water surface. It was going to prove to be a warm day and I had to change into a short sleeved shirt a little later in the morning.

Time to load up the plane and head out. We planned on flying into the Misty's for my own personal Misty Fjord's tour. Because we were flying our own plane, we could land in any of the lakes that we'd wanted to. I, of course, wanted to land in Nooya (my favorite lake). Dan was also going to take me to Manzoni Lake. Dale told us that the fishing there was very good.

One last time for Dan to try his hand at panning for gold

Wow, this is a first....Nancy, fishing! But of course I didn't catch anything. It was such a beautiful day to sit out on the floats. There was one other airplane down near the other shoreline of the lake. It was Michelle from Southeast Aviation. She often likes to take her passengers to this lake, stop over at the beach area and let them out to explore a little of the shoreline.

Time for Michelle to take off. We should be heading back as well. We told everyone we would be back about 3pm and we didn't want anyone to worry. Candi told me she would come looking for us if we were much later than that!

Might as well buzz the George Inlet Lodge on our way back to Ketchikan.

"Hi Trish and Carstens!"