Travel Hack for Fishing the Boundary Waters - Packed Tight but Ready to Fish

Tim Mitchell, a biologist in Minnesota is an extremely seasoned wilderness angler. One of his main motivations for traveling north to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area is to find fish. Although he packs light with most of his gear in a single pack and includes multiple portages in his trip planning, he’s always trolling while covering water. He even brings 1-piece rods with him because he has no intention of packing away his fishing gear. You can read more about that here:  Best Rod for Fishing the Boundary Waters.

Tim uses a constant fishing strategy while also portaging, so he’s had to get creative with his gear to save time. His large tackle boxes are always packed away, so he started using an old, hard sunglasses case filled with a couple specific baits that helps him work a wide range of the water column in hopes to find a pattern and location that work.

Wilderness fishing like the BWCA opportunity doesn’t normally have well defined spots for holding fish and anglers rarely travel through the same lakes. Anglers rely on maps created through holes in the ice in the 1960s in the Boundary Waters and the season is so short that patterns transition quickly. Tim uses the constant fishing technique to find areas that hold fish by trolling along the way. This requires that Tim is ready to cover multiple depths in the water column so he keeps a mix of different baits in a hard sunglasses case that can be inserted into his pocket at portage time.

Tim’s sunglasses case normally holds a deep diving crankbait, an inline spinner, a couple extra jigs and softbaits, and a shallow diving crankbait. He’ll position the rod under a foot and wedged against the other and paddle with an intention of staying within the desired water column.

So, next time you’re at a garage sale or instead of throwing out that old sunglasses case, think about loading it up with a nice mix of top producing baits that you can toss in your pants or pack on a portage.