 on the world-famous Golden Road. This trip's gonna be a little bit different than some of my trips that you've seen in the past, because I think I'm gonna have a little bit higher level of comfort than I'm used to. I didn't bring the wood floor. I didn't bring my pop-up tent. Didn't bring a lot of that stuff, because I'm gonna be staying inside with running water, heat, and indoor plumbing. Pretty excited about this trip. We are gonna be targeting several different species of fish on several different bodies of water. First and foremost, we're looking for cusk. As you know, if you watch my channel, my favorite fish, and maybe favorite thing to eat, ah, partridge is up there too, rough grouse partridge. But I guess right up there with that would be the cusk, otherwise known as the baby. Targeting some burbats, hopefully I'll be getting my PB burbats, which is around five pounds now. I guess I never really put a scale on one. But I could tell by looking at one what my biggest one is. There are some big ones up here. We will also be fishing for lake trout, otherwise known as togue here in Maine. And Max, I think, has the togue fever, where he's looking for big togue. I know that from talking to him in the past. He's willing to set up for three or four or five days just for one or two flags if it's the right ones. Also fishing for splake, which is the GMO of Maine fisheries. Also fishing for native brook trout. And we might even put a little tear down on the salmon. Chazunkook Lake, otherwise pronounced as uncooked cheese lake has a no limit on salmon under 16 inches. Apparently there's a lot of them in here and they want to try to thin the numbers down. So there's no limit on those. I eat a few salmon a year. They're good eatin'. So maybe I'll keep a couple of those. Ripigenus dam, otherwise pronounced as ripoganus dam or ripoganyus dam, first built in the middle 1800s. I think it was 1853 by the login companies to kind of hold back some water for the log drive so they get these logs down to the mills. Later rebuilt in 1915, 1916 by great Northern paper company at a mill in Ocket, which was one of the largest companies in the world at the time. They built this dam at 704 foot long and 92 foot high. It's the largest dam ever built in the world that is completely privately funded and privately owned. When they built that dam, it created ripogenus lake, otherwise known as ripogenus or rip for short, caribou lake, moose pond. I think it backs all the way up into deer pond. The dam was used for loggin' mostly and the log drives to get the logs down to the great Northern paper company mill and even some down into Bangor, down the Penobscot River, in the shadows of Mount Cattadin, otherwise known as Cattadin. Max and his wife recently purchased the Rip Dam Sporting Camps and have done a pile of work on them and they're getting them set up to house sports like myself for ice fishing, moose hunting, deer hunting, partridge hunting, hiking, and just general exploring up here. Perfect location. It's 35 miles, I think, up the Golden Road from Mill in Ocket. Now the Golden Road, Rip Dam had a sluice way put in for the logs to go down for the log drives and they drove logs over the sluice and that dam till about 1971 when they transferred over to this road that I'm on right now, the Golden Road. And then they stopped driving logs down the river and just started bringing them into the mill by truck. As you can see guys, I'm super excited for this trip. I love, I actually love fishing for all types of fish as you've seen on my channel. I don't care if it's a little bitty smelt or if it's a giant pike or lake trout and this trip is a cold water species trip, a lot of native fish not stocked, which I really do prefer. Weather for this trip is up and down. It looks like we're gonna get some decent days warm up into the 30s during the days, not too brutally cold at night. This morning it was 13 below zero in Jefferson, where I'm from and it's been a weird winter. We've had like a week or so ago, maybe a couple of weeks ago, it was 65 degrees and we've had a couple of rain days and it looks like it might be coming to an end, which I hate, I love ice fishing season. Did you want me to throw that for you? Oh yeah. Do you want me to throw that? Come here. I can't mask on right now. Come here. What's up buddy? How's it going? Good, good to see ya. You got your slippers on too. I got my driving slippers on. Yeah. What do you think? I think we're gonna, we're gonna kill it. Yeah. So I think we're gonna do a little fish in the day. Oh yeah. Nice. Yeah. Good. Good day for, at least a wind ain't blowing. I know, it looks like we got a good week ahead of us, weather was. And tomorrow's supposed to be nice. I think we're on 30. Nice. But Sunday looks a little iffy, rain. All right. Getting loaded up here, do a little casking. Got a new set of 20 inch jack traps. I got the big bob flags on them so they show up pretty good and they're reflective even at night. And the four inch spools, which I like that a lot. You get a lot of line on those. And the nice part about them is they fit pretty well. Right in my, right in my baby box. You ready to catch some cask? You want me to throw that stick for you? Oh, did you want me to throw that stick? What am I supposed to do with this stick? Ready? Go get it. You never know he's seven years old. He is? Yeah. Holy cow, he's like a little puppy. I know. What do you think, bud? What are we going to do today? I think we're going to put some nice fish on the ice. All right. That's a plan. Go for a cask. Yes. Beautiful, cask nuggets tonight. Yeah, absolutely. Our check that's been here all year, that's efficient. What's up, bud? What's happened? What do you think? Welcome to the humble abode. Look at this, huh? There isn't a sofa in here. That's awesome. What a shack. Yeah? How big is this thing? 8 by 12. Perfect. Plenty of room to hang out. Oh, yeah. Got a couple of holes in the floor, huh? Yeah. That's a bummer. I know. It's going to be a shame sitting in here jigging. Yeah. Sweet. What do you want to do? I want some rifle, I want some crash. Okay. That's a pretty terrible view over there, huh? It's awful. I'm not looking for that. We're close. Don't want the batteries hitting. Maybe right here. Think I'm through. I think we got her. Got her. Got him. You want to keep these guys alive or you want to kill them? Because I got a bucket. Oh, it's a perch. See, what's he doing out here? All right, we're on the board. Holy, look at the stripes on him. The Canadians count the stripes and they're like a seven striper's good. This guy's got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, maybe 10. What's that right there coming in on the bottom? That's a nice gask. There's a 10 striper guys and he's not even bigger than my hand. 10 stripes, that's crazy. So that might be a school of yellers. Oh, look at him, he's on me. Is he? Look, see? Oh yeah. Can you deem? Come on, buddy. Oh, okay, these might be smelts with yellows in on them, eat them. Oh my God, look at those perches driving those smelt. I'm on the one right above you, see that? Yeah. He's about to hit. See that? You can actually see him hit. Heals like another yellow. Might be whitey. Yellow. Yeah, these yellows are just destroying that school of a smelt. Got him. Little guy. There's a jack smelt. Cool, we'll keep him. But when a gask comes in, he should show up really big and red. There you go. There's a gask. A gask? Nice. Do you want me to land them or anything? Oh. Still in the hole? Nope. Oh, there he goes. Look, do you see him just tear through? Look, that's him going to the bottom. He just tore through everything. Oh, look, look at that screen. You can hardly even see the water column. Trouble is, I don't know what is what on that screen. I don't have a clue where my jig is. I don't have a clue like, which ones are smelt, which ones are purge. I don't know. It's just a whole lot of something out there. I don't really care. I'll catch anything. That feels smelty. That feels smelty. Yep. Oh, geez. That's a perfect size for bait tomorrow. Yes, it is. All right, guys, you are not watching a rerun. I'm actually still jigging smelt here in Maine. That's a little jack smelt right there. I'm here with Max. We, the screen is lit up more than a Christmas tree. If you had this many lights on a Christmas tree, it'd be a fire hazard. It's crazy there. I think it's smelt eaten baby smelt and yellow purge eaten baby smelt that every once in a while, we'll watch a cast swim through the bottom. Max had one, I think pretty close to top side and it popped off right at the bottom of the hole. So that's a good sign. They are here. Holy cow, is that you? Yeah. I'm Joe. Hi, I'm Danny. Danny, nice to meet you. Look at the size of that dinosaur. Congratulations, what a giant. Oh, that's huge. Oh my goodness. This is one of the other ones. Just, holy cow. I mean, look how fat it is. Oh my God, you guys are getting me way too excited. I gotta go video this flag. Hopefully it's one of those, but I'll be right back. No, I didn't even show you. Well, congratulations on that fish. Thank you. If I got one half that size, I would freak out. Yeah, we'll be. Oh, it'll get me. It'll smell. I sent it to my brother. Yeah. Like you guys, maybe you'll see this video after. And if I get one half that size, I would freak out. Yeah, we kept the first one I had and I was like, that's a big cast and then we caught that one. And I'm like, this one looks rigid now. If you eat fish, you have to try those. They are the best eating fish. Yeah, I don't eat a lot of fish. We gave it away a bit. See, Max, you like what had it. It's way better than it had it. Yeah, I've had it before. That's not bad. What was I speaking to? I'm speaking to you too. Tell the kids, I said hi. I'll catch these all day. Well, okay. Wait, what is that? Mummy chub. What is that? Mummy chub. What? What is that? It's a mummy chub. What the heck is a mummy chub? It's a bait. What? What? It's a what? I'm telling you, it's a mummy chub. What is a mummy chub? Is it a chub? Yeah, it's a smart one. It doesn't look like the chubs I catch. No. The chamberlain chain. Good bait. Is it? Yeah. Let me show the viewers. The viewers are gonna be like, what's a mummy chub? But some are gonna be like, you idiot, you don't know what a mummy chub is. So guys, that's a mummy chub. It's not like the chubs I usually catch, but it's good bait, so we're gonna use it. Mummy chub. I brought the scoop this time. I don't know if it's gonna help us or not. Makes you wet. Somebody home? I can't tell you yet, it's small. Yeah? Maybe it's just a bait. No fight, it's gotta be just a bait. Just a bait. Feels like there's a head shake though. I mean, there's no weight to it. Oh, it's a whitey. Hey perch, he ate that big jack smelt. You worth keeping? Yeah. It's off to the side. Somebody's home? Small whitey? What? Now, is that what you're calling a big one? Yeah, that's a big one, look at that. That's trophy size right there. Master angler. Yeah. That is actually the smallest I've ever seen in my life. And look at that, you took that sucker, but you must have been hungry. That sucker's bigger than him. Nice, jigging the jack smelt. You got a stave and cask, Danny. Nice one, Danny. This giant. It's not even your biggest. No, no, it's not, but it's still pretty good. Oh yeah, that'd be my biggest. That is giant. Wow, it's over 30, I'd have to say, right? Yeah. That's definitely 30 inches. Oh yeah, that's over six pounds, I'd say. Buddy. Did they give you a good fight? Not really. It got caught up on the hole a little bit, so I thought I was going to lose it. And when I pulled it up, I barely had it hooked in the corner of its mouth. Nice, what did it eat? It ate a shiner. A live shiner? Yeah. You guys are doing really well in the live bait. Yeah, this is the only one we caught so far. So this has got a measuring device up to 26. So it's, oh yeah, it's 30. Yeah. You would have. That's pretty good. Ah yeah, congratulations, that's really good. That's phenomenal. Nice, do you want to warm up? No, I'm good. I just wanted to come over and show you guys. Well, thank you so much for showing us. He's like a huge fan of your videos and I've only seen one from the other day. So he said that you liked casks. So he's like, go show them. I love casks. They're actually my favorite out of everything. Yeah, nice. Yeah, and especially big ones. Yeah, I'll let you guys back. Thank you guys so much, congratulations. Thank you. Smell it, huh? Swimming around it, tell you what I'm saying. I think it is. They circle like a son of a gun. Yeah, decent size too. These are pretty good jack smells. Do guys come up and catch these smell? Some of the old timers do, but not many. Geez. Not many people do it anymore. Not many people fish anymore. Oh man, all right. Semi-high flyer. It's all perspective. Right? Yeah, if I was shorter, I'd call that a really high flyer. Looks like we got some activity. Really? Yeah, something small. Feels like a really small bourbon. Getting a little bigger, but not much. God, he's got enough line out. I know. There we go. Caught up to him. Yeah, can't tell if it's a bourbon. Feels bourbon-y. Yep, bourbon-y. They're getting bigger. Yeah, we're working our way out. We got to catch a lot of these to get to 10 pounds. Well, look at this, it's got a really cool spot on it. Look at this spot on his back right there. Yeah, that's cool. Bourbon-y. Hate a big dead smell. And they are pretty in this lake, aren't they? Just one up. Perfect. It's somebody's home. Think I left the scooper back in that hole. Looking good, huh? Man, I'm on fire. Oh, brown belly. Yeah, he was getting all set up. Yeah. There's a little bit of weight there. Oh, yeah. There's some weight there. Yeah. This ain't no small fry. It ain't big, but he's head shaking at least. Might be filayable. Yeah, this one's got sort of a filay on him, I think. He's not big, but two pounder, maybe. Found the three quarters. Getting bigger. Oh, we can get a filay off him. Oh, he's got lock spots on him, huh? No, they're a little bit different color over here. Coss Nuggets. Tell you one thing, they've got strong jaws. Seared-looking fish, but they taste good. But pretty certainly uglier. Anything is in life, the better it tastes. That looks like dinner to me. It is dinner. Good tonight. Got this, got a white perch. I'd say we're living like kings, wouldn't you, bud? Absolutely. Look where we are. Show them you've got a stick. Maximus, the man, the myth, the legend himself. Look at this bird. Boston down here. I know, right in on you. Yeah. You ready? Look at this bird. I can't believe you're over here. This is great. Oh, yeah. Love it up here. Beautiful. And the finest table fair, swimming in the waters in northern Maine. I just put one of the sleds. Did you, good one? Eater sauce. Yep. I'd call it a good one. I like this one. Rocks, I've been watching this all year. You like it? I do, I think, but it's hot. You've got to have big trails in the problem. Like, the only person I like, I don't want to see another guy in it because I'm not social. Look at that, look at that, that's a big, come on. He might have been. Oh, look at him turn. What are you missing? He's that big, huge, long red thing. Oh, that's him? Yeah. Dude, I'm all iced up. I can't even get my jig to drop in this ice. That's a big stave-in card. Maybe I don't, maybe I honestly don't think that hole is big enough. I was going to go down to steal one. Where did the ladle start? He's not that big. Is your ladle? It's right outside. You got him, baby. That's why I jigged it just right. He feels all right for a cast. I think I got him jabbed pretty good. Is he good? Oh, he's not getting a couple three pounds. Is he coming backwards or? You let me know if I can do anything. A couple times. Is he an eater? Yeah, he's a sport. He'll eat. He'll eat, he'll eat. That's not a cost-negative. Cost-negative, baby. Is he just jibbing off? Oh, yeah, you've just seen him on the long story. Oh, I'm dragging that. He snatched. Yeah, David was trying to steal it from me. I got called Operation Game Thief. You get him on my jig, too? No, no, I'm on. You got the phone number for Operation Game Thief. I was going to call Davey in. Trying to steal my cask. Nice. Pretty brutal out here. Yeah, it is. It's real. Yeah, it's definitely real. Let me see. I don't know if I brought the scoop or not. No scoop. Are you good? If you want me to run back, get it. I will. Fight through it, bud. Fight through it. Yeah? Oh, yeah. Good one? You want me to kick that hole? Nah, you ain't got one. Tiny? Yeah. I left my tweezers in there. All right, another little guy. This downright rude out here. Get there, bud. We're getting right, man. Nice, babe. Steven, babe. No, we don't want riffraff in here. This is my good friend, Trap and Joe, Joe Holland. Hey, what's up? How are you? My lady, Shona. I've heard so much about you. The one is? The one on TV. Nice to meet you. You too. Let me check your eyes. Can you see? I had one. I had one. You must be blind. I don't know. I'm just kidding. I love them. He's something. I'll tell you. He's sure he is. I feel like you're a public too, huh? I see you in my garage. Yeah, that was awesome. Oh, you have a big one. Look at David. Look, look, look. He's on again. Looked out, looked out. Looked out. That's a big one. He just kept fricking going. He didn't even stop. We haven't seen that guy yet. Oh, he turned around. He's not coming back. Now why? What's the matter with that guy? He hit bottom. Did you see that one, Max? That was a good one. Right, he's right in my face. You got him, David. Yeah. Ha-ha. And a ball. Oh, let me know if I've got to clean that hole anymore. We've got to clean that hole a little bit more. Does that need it? Yeah. He's bored a lot. Yeah, I don't think so. Wait, look big on that guy. Yeah. Well, what do you figure he is? He's over 16 inches. Yeah. Just about breed in size. Yeah. All in the pop-up on that. That was awesome. I like that rod. Yeah, that thing's a bit... It's so easy to get help. Hold him up for the camera. The little fella. Yeah, just a little guy. We'll let him go and get bigger. They're pretty long. They don't drop in the snow. Yeah, they are. The camel on them is unbelievable. They really are. I love the colors. Nice. Good job, bud. Here's what I do. I missed the hole. I go to the camp. Good job, buddy. My normal size. Oh, man. This is average. Yeah. Six-year-old. Another day in the life. What is that? Oh, dude, this is probably... That's the biggest one you saw. Yeah, that's my seventh one, that size. How was that? One more? That is good. Oh, you're a good boy. Oh, you're a good boy. You're going to chew them, you know. Max, you see this dog? When you get him up, throw him the hole there. You got to go over and... What do I do? Keep going. Is it in the hole? Yeah. Oh, it won't fit. Wait, wait, don't pull the hole. We got to make a bigger hole. No, he's coming. No, where's that? He's coming. Nice. Good job. I did that. That's your first fish? Yeah, ever. Showing a nice work. Good job. The hole's froze up. The hole froze up on it. You're going to get it. I see a thing coming forward on it. I hit the seal. I feel like I'm on YouTube. I was on this side. Nice job, Shawna. All right, you're going to be on YouTube. Yeah, you're famous. YouTube. Ooh, gotcha. You got your second one, too. He deserved it. Yeah, he did. Nice. What do you think, Shawna? Good night fishing. So cool. You liking it? Nice, you got your first fish tonight. I did. That was awesome. Give me a good fight? Well, I don't know. I guess so. I've never done it before, so... It was a good fight. We'll call it a good fight. You know, that was the fight of my life, actually. That was the fight of my life. There you go. I like the way you look at it. What's that thing weigh, David? 5.6. 5.66. Almost six pounds. Yeah. Nice. That's what you're after. Yeah, over five and a half. Beautiful. 5.6. That'll eat pretty good. Loins on that. Well, guys, we are starting to pack it up out here. I just picked up my traps. I had three traps out. One didn't have bait. The second had a cusk just sitting there on it. Didn't pull any line out. Just a little guy. And the third just wasn't doing too well. Yeah, no excuses for that third one. Should have had a fish on it. You know, if it was mine, I would have had it. If it was yours, they all would have had a fish on it. So we're packing up. We're going to leave Shawna and Davy out here. But we're probably going to take the electronics. Sorry. So good. So good. We're all loaded up. Quick and easy. And we're going to head back to the ranch and get something to eat for dinner. Those cusks might be too frozen for the night. I don't know. Yeah. We'll see. Oh, it's tomorrow. Yeah, that's right. Cool. Let's go. Good job, buddy. Actually, I didn't count. How many have we had? I got one at the end. So I think we ended up with 13. 13? Yeah. 13 cusk. Pretty awesome day. Pretty awesome afternoon. Yeah, afternoon. You didn't get out here until noontime. Yeah, I think it was like 1.32 when we got set up. Yeah? We're running a little late today. Sorry about that. But I got my biggest cusk ever and we got two other really nice-sized eaters. Yeah? So three. That's a great day. Yeah? Great job. All right, let's get after it. Hey, man. Absolutely. All right. Eating some good burgers tonight. Max, thanks for cooking that up. Yeah. They look pretty good. We got off the lake a little after 10 p.m. Yep. I had three degrees Fahrenheit in the truck. Balmy. Yeah, it was balmy. Balmy with that wind. It's probably close to 11 now, right? Yeah, it's got to be close to 11 now. 11.15. Yeah, so we're hitting the middle of 11.15. So we'll see what time we get on the water tomorrow. But tune in tomorrow, guys. Should be a great day. We're going after lakers. Yeah, we're going after some lake trucks tomorrow. Ultra clear water. Yes. Underwater camera. The works. Panoptics, live scope. Okay, we're going to have fun tomorrow, guys. Tune in for that one. Hope you like this episode. We'll look at the camps and stuff maybe tomorrow or one of the days. Yeah, we'll get to it eventually. Yeah, we'll talk about the camps tomorrow too. So tune in for tomorrow's episode. Should be a good one. Thanks for tuning in for the days.