North with Doc: Doc's Treasure Hunt

Our first day in the Bush we felt like we’d just finished a marathon. Or won the mountain stage of the El Tour de France. Or made the winning shot in double overtime in the title game of the Final Four. Elated, but exhausted.

A hectic day earlier, we’d stalled out waiting for our fishing buds to complete last-minute professional and family obligations, and we didn’t get away until more than six hours beyond our usual start time to make the drive from central Iowa to Northwest Ontario.

It was an all-night drive, and we took turns at the wheel. Listening to a Sox and Twins doubleheader through Minnesota at least kept the drivers awake. Then there were 200 miles of slapping wipers as we were peppered by rain, and the rest of the northbound odyssey was bleary eyes peering through a bug-smeared windshield.

Finally crossing in the wee hours at International Falls, then dodging roadside moose and deer near Kenora, we pulled into Knobby’s Sioux Lookout parking lot at dawn. Even though physically drained, our emotions ran high, and we loaded our gear and food onto the staging area, completed the requisite paperwork, and were in the air in an hour.

With depleted adrenalin barely keeping us upright, we emptied the plane, stowed provisions and bedding, rigged rods, got the boats ready, and fished the day away.

At nightfall, a fine meal devoured, and dishes done, Doc mixed a cocktail so strong that Aunt Lucy would have needed just an ounce of it to exterminate the termite colony that was eating her front porch. And when he lit up a cigar that smelled like a dumpster fire behind a taxidermy shop, we staggered outside to breathe in some unsullied air.

A welcome breeze kept the skeeters grounded. We grabbed chairs off the porch, and lounged groggily as the Aurora Borealis (or AB’s as we called them) swirled, and swept brilliant swatches of neon green across the magnificent starlit dome.

As drained as we were, what little chatter we produced included scattered references to the many good walleyes caught that first day, and an especially fine pike that Doc had boated and released.

“Look at those stars,” I said, realizing the rest were equally awed. “Can you even imagine using lights from the sky to sail your way across featureless oceans?”

“I can’t,” the attorney said.

“Impossible,” the banker said.

I said, “I read a National Geographic piece about Polynesians who took double-hulled canoes many hundreds of miles from what is now Taiwan all the way to Tahiti, New Zealand, and even Easter Island. All they had to guide them was the positions of stars and planets, wave patterns, and migrating birds.”

“Big deal,” Doc said. “With a GPS…”

“That was 5,000 years ago,” I said.

“Well, I have that same sense of direction,” Doc said.

“Doc,” the policeman said, “after shopping at Walmart, you can’t even find your car in the lot.”

“I still think I could figure it out,” Doc said.

“Sure, you could,” the policeman said. “You could navigate just fine in open water.”

“That is correct,” Doc said.

“How, exactly, would you do that?”

“Uh, follow the North Star?”

“Would you care to point that out right now?” the banker said.

“I’m sure it’s up there somewhere,” Doc said, squinting into the night. “In fact, I bet if I’d been born a couple hundred years ago, I would have used pirate maps to find buried treasure all over the Caribbean.”

“You have trouble reading the directions on a soup can,” the banker said. “With only an X marking the spot, you’d be helpless.”

“You give me a few clues, I can find anything,” Doc said.

We got some laughs out of that statement, then resumed our star gazing until the breeze died, and voracious mosquitoes came in force to drive us inside.

As was our custom, we cut cards, and Doc got the first shower. While he was in there, practically forever, I said, “I know a way to put Doc’s direction-following prowess to the test.”

“Do tell,” the policeman said.

“When we were little kids, my parents created treasure hunts for us,” I said. “They’d hide some candy, then give us written, poetic clues to send us from one spot to the next with another clue and another until we found it. So simple, but we got to use our developing minds, and we loved it.”

“How will you set it up?” the kid said.

“I’ll write down some ideas tomorrow, make some excuse to take the boat out alone for a while, and have it all ready the next morning,” I said.

“So it’ll be like hide and seek?” the kid said.

“Except the adult version,” I said.

“What will the treasure be?” the attorney said.

“I’ll figure out something,” I said.

“Don’t make it too tough,” the banker said. “You get Doc upset, and we’ll end up with minnows under our pillows.”

“Will do,” I said.

*   *   *

After breakfast our third day, kitchen clean-up done and everyone primed to fish, I said, “Doc, you ready to go?”

“Sure am,” he said.

“You got your stinky foul cigars?”

He patted his shirt pocket where he usually kept a box of the green gaggers, and got a confused look on his face. Then he went to his stash in the bedroom, and came back empty handed. “What’s going on here?” he said.

“Remember when you told us you could find anything if you had a few clues?” I said.

Sensing a conspiracy, Doc said, “Yeeeeah.”

“Well, here’s your chance to prove it,” I said. I handed him a Ziploc sandwich bag. “Inside this baggie is your first clue. Do not open it for 10 minutes. That will give us time to get out of your way. You’ll take our boat. It’s all gassed up. Questions?”

Doc was speechless.

We dashed for the boats, powered away, and 10 minutes later Doc looked at the first clue.

Do you want to find your stinks?

Then look in where we keep our drinks.

Doc rushed outside to yell unprintable words at us, but we were already out of sight. Hmmm, he thought. Where do we keep our drinks? In the refrigerator, of course. He went back in the cabin and opened the refrigerator door. Sure enough, between the cold cuts and the blue cheese, he found the second clue.

Inside the box with the salted minnows was another clue. He zipped open the baggie.

Start the boat and drive it to the honey hole I shared with you. Use the net to get the note inside the plastic bottle float.

Honey hole? There were several good ones on the lake. But only one Doc and I had fished the first day. It was a good 15 minutes south. He took off, wishing he had a cigar to keep him company. Finally at the walleye hot spot, he motored in circles for a while until he spied a water bottle bobbing in the shallows. It was easier to walk to the bow and reach it with a net than tilt the engine, so he did. The bottle was tied to a short piece of fishing line and had a rock for an anchor. He pulled the baggie from the bottle, tossed the bottle in the boat, the rock back in the lake, and read the clue.

Find the spot where, with a jig,

You hooked and boated Mr. Big.

We won’t make you take a swim.

A clue is fastened to a limb.

Not five minutes away was the fallen tree in six feet of water where Doc caught the monster pike. As advertised, the clue was tied to a branch.

See that nearest island, Doc?

You’ll find a clue beneath a rock.

The nearest island was huge, and a good 500 yards away. He made a beeline across to it, and after several passes along the west edge, found the clue poking out from under a rock on an elevated outcrop. He had to ground the boat and climb out to get the clue.

Step by step, you’ve shown us jerks

That most of our directions work.

Put that boat in gear and ride.

You’ll find us on the other side.

Doc’s boat came roaring around the island. We were rafted up, awaiting his arrival.

“You made it, Doc,” the kid said.

“Congratulations,” the banker said.

“I am impressed,” the policeman said.

“A modern day Marco Polo,” the attorney said.

After what seemed a couple minutes of silence, Doc said, “Okay, then. Where are my cigars?”

“Remember the first clue?” I said.

Doc rummaged in his pockets, and found the crumpled up first clue.

“Read it,” I said.

Doc reluctantly complied. “Do you want to find your stinks? Then look in where we keep our drinks.”

“Well?”

“But I already did that,” Doc said. “I looked in the refrigerator.”

“Think deeper, Mr. I Can Find Anything,” I said. “Where else do we keep our drinks?”

Doc said, with more than a little edge to his voice, “This is crazy.”

The kid stifled a laugh, and the rest of us did high fives.

“What?” Doc said.

“Read it again,” I said.

With a sour expression, Doc read it to himself, looked over the top of the clue in his hand and there was our Igloo cooler in the bottom of our boat. He opened it up, and found the final clue.

We’re tired of writing all these rhymes.

Cigars were right here all the time.

Sure enough, under the clue itself, were all of Doc’s vile cigars, exactly where the first clue told him they would be.

Doc’s face quickly lost its pinkish glow of anger, and he smiled wide and happily. “Getting here was so much fun,” he said, and we could tell he meant it.

I said, “Believe me. Imagining your rush from one clue to another, we enjoyed it almost as much as you did. You can be mighty entertaining, even when you’re not with us. From me and the rest of the treasure hunt crew, I am pleased to say, thanks, Doc.”

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North with Doc columnist Greg Knowles lives in Green Valley, Arizona. A 5-­volume set of the first 20 years of North with Doc is available in e-reader form at amazon.com.

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