Along the Peshtigo 
A Tramping and Camping Trip of a Family Party in 
the Badger State 
By 0. W. SMITH 
{Concluded from page 170.) 
S OON after leaving High Falls we crossed 
the trail of a large buck and heard him 
snort close by. but did not catch sight of 
him. I carried in the neighborhood of a hun¬ 
dred pounds—the tent, blankets, rods, grub, etc. 
Wife carried the cooking outfit and a few odds 
and ends. Girl carried the camera, tripod and 
axe, which were packed in my canvas creel. At 
first we arranged a pack for her back, but soon 
discarded it for tlie creel. 
That August day the flies and mosquitoes held 
high carnival. To sit down was to invite the 
mosquitoes; to move was to stir up the deer 
dies. I apostrophized and anathematized the 
buzzing, biting insects until my vocabulary was 
exhausted, then I tried to ignore them. Girl 
endured their attacks with great good nature 
and trudged along, bearing her little load like 
a woman. We took our time, resting often. 
Reaching Twin Falls, we went into camp, not 
because we were tired, but because the water 
looked good, and the water was good. There 
I took a monster rainbow—the largest it has ever 
been my good fortune to capture—but the story 
of that battle must be reserved for another time, 
though the telling of it would be rare fun. 
Twin Falls takes its name from the fact that 
the river tumbles over two ledges of rock; the 
lower Twin is but an elongated rapid, the upper 
Twin is as pretty a little fall as one will see 
in a day’s travel. It w'as at the upper Twdn that 
we should have camped, for the camping ground 
there is ideal, but we did not know that, so we 
pitched our tent at the lower I'win close to the 
water’s edge. It does not pay to camp on low 
ground in mosquito time, even for the sake of 
a fine view; we found that the low ground 
would always be inhabited by myriads of the 
annoying insects while the high ground would 
be comparatively free from them. 
One day we were early astir and bivouacked 
on the banks of the Little Eagle for dinner, a 
stream entering the Peshtigo from the east. The 
Little Eagle is an ideal trout stream, and though 
we fished only a few rods of water near the 
mouth, we secured all the trout we could cat, 
and good ones, too.. I am told that the upper 
reaches of the river are even better. Below the 
mouth there is a deep hole and the rainbow 
were "jumping crazy for the fly.” A well-worn 
path indicated that former campers had fished 
the pool faithfully. They must have taken some 
veritable whales, for a more likely pool never 
smiled uir at the sun. W'e failed, for the wind 
was against us. \Ve could not send our flies 
“wife secured a good one.” 
out over the water and there was not current 
enough to carry a bait free of the bottom. The 
ideal method would be to fish the Peshtigo from 
a boat; then one could cast out under the over¬ 
hanging brush, places impossible to reach by 
wading where the water is deep.. We found 
that by standing below the falls and rapids— 
when there was sufficient current—we could let 
our lines out one or two hundred feet and were 
reasonably sure of a strike when fishing late 
in the afternoon. From 3 o’clock to dark was 
the best time. Grasshoppers were by all odds 
the best bait, though we hooked several large 
fish on minnows. Any gray or dun fly seemed 
attractive, while all brilliantly colored ones were 
eschewed, \^'hen you hook a rainbow something 
is doing from that moment until he rests in the 
landing net four rods from the water. He is 
a fighter from the word go. 
From the Little Eagle camp we followed up 
the main river, fording the Big Eagle, a shallow 
stream where it empties into the Peshtigo, but 
a fairly good trout stream above. At last we 
reached Caldron Falls, as wild and untamed a 
bit of water as you will find in all the North 
country. The fall is sixty-eight feet, higher by 
six feet than High Falls, a fact that will come 
in the nature of a surprise to some people; but 
I secured my figures from the civil engineers at 
work qt High Falls and they should be correct. 
I have tried several times to secure a satisfac¬ 
tory view of Caldron Falls, but have always 
failed. The gorge in the rock is so deep and 
the shadows so dense that one must have the 
best light possible, and whenever I have been 
there the sun has been playing tricks. Some 
of the largest rainbow ever caught in the Pesh¬ 
tigo have been taken below these falls, fish so 
large that I would be accused of telling fish 
stories should I give measurements, but Wife 
says that next year we will capture one of those 
large ones, pictures too, for we will camp right 
there till fortune and the sun smile. 
There is an Indian le.gend connected with Cal¬ 
dron Falls which is well worth the telling. A 
band of Pottawattemies chased a lone Chippe- 
way to the brink of the falls, where, every 
avenue of escape cut off, he paused for an in¬ 
stant, then leaped far out over the chasm. So 
mighty was the leap that he cleared the gorge, 
landed safely upon the other side and escaped. 
If you do not believe the story you can find the 
moccasin tracks of both pursuer and pursued 
in the rock on the south side of the gorge. 
We lingered at Caldron Falls for some time, 
clambered over the rocks, roamed through the 
woods, picked out a camping place for a possi¬ 
ble future trip, and selected an advantageous 
spot to place the camera when photographing 
the battle with the future big rainbow. As the 
sun continued to sulk and time to speed by at 
last we regretfully swung down the river, camp- 
