Wandering with Norm Minas: Access points to fishing, and to a life

BOURBONNAIS — I could hear water. A hawk screamed as I tried to navigate a faint deer path to the creek’s edge.

‘‘World ends, and it is a spot of solitude,’’ Norm Minas said. ‘‘I never run across another person fishing here.’’

That’s my kind of wild space.

‘‘By the creek, it’s a little rough,’’ Minas said. ‘‘But it is another place of solitude. The only other person I’ve taken here is Zachary.’’

Zach is his son.

I drove Minas around Friday. For the first time together, neither of us had a fishing rod along. He is coming off a cancer-treatment regimen that kicked his ass. He hopes to be fishing again next year.

I picked his brain about access to subdivision and farm ponds, creeks and river spots in the Kankakee River basin. We wandered Will and Kankakee counties and stopped at highlights.

‘‘Taking me back to the days when I rolled several doobies, packed a sack lunch and county maps and went exploring,’’ Minas said.

Life.

In recent years, Minas, like many of us, transitioned to Google Earth to map his quests.

We drove back roads, some of them gravel, to hidden spots where the water ran free and blessed solitude rested.

Minas walked in with me at one flat spot. A pair of wood ducks burst off, while a couple of dozen Canada geese swam upstream.

A few miles later, we passed a no-trespassing sign.

‘‘Too many signs like that,’’ Minas said.

We circled by Kankakee River Trading Post in Altorf to chat.

It was time.

Waterfowl

Hunters at Braidwood Lake had 50 or more ducks Wednesday through Saturday, then it fell off Sunday (17 ducks, 13 boats). Heidecke had its best week yet (29 boats, 91 ducks), site tech Mikical Davis emailed. Wolf Lake was very slow.

Stray cast

My deer seasons far too often match Bears seasons.

Follow me on Twitter @BowmanOutside.