Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Canadian Fishing Lodge...

Fishman Dan,

I've fished several places in Alaska and actually just returned from a trip to Mexico, but don't have any experience in Canada. If you are interested in either Alaska or Mexico (or other Carribean fishing spots), I'd be happy to offer my experiences.

Dan:

I've been lucky enough to take about a dozen Canadian trips, maybe more and I'm not sure you gave enough information to give you a good specific answer. What type of fish do you want to catch and how much do you want to spend? Do you want to be fully guided or do some fishing on your own. Cook your own meals or American Plan? Dropped in the wildnerness and be the only people on the lake or fish from a main lodge? Nueltin Lake is considered the premier Canadian fly in lodge with many options on remote camps and lodges but pricey and no walleye.

We did a combined fishing/duck hunting trip to The Pas Manitoba this past fall that was great and economical. Wish we had time for more fishing but the management was outstanding and willing to go the extra mile to make sure you have a good time. They had great food and many options to fish including walleye, lake trout, northerns and brook trout. All our fishing was unguided but guides were available. It wasn't fishing, it was catching (it was also October). My best advice wherever you go is to get several references on the staff and call every one of them. The outfitters will tell you that Gunisao Lake is the best walleye lake in Manitoba but I haven't been there. Gods, Reindeer, are well known. In Ontario you have Kesagami, Lac Seul in the upper echelon.

Being a person who heads over the boarder more than a few times a year to do some fishing, there are many places that are very good. Most of the best places are those where you will not see advertised. They are truly word of mouth.

I have a few places where it is about a 5 hr drive from my house where I get great smally fishing and some larger northern pikes and some average size walleyes ( place has cottage and 12 ft boat for about$400 canadian a week ). I also know of a few places to fly into that are more aimed at trout and big walleyes ( can have meal plan or bare bones and can go anywhere from $500/wk to $1500/wk ).

The general thing you might want to look at is how comfy a place do you want to stay at and what type of fish are important to you as well as how much do you want to spend. From there I could give you some general ideas as to where I have been and how they worked out.

Good luck and let me know what is the ideal place for you.

I went up for my first trip with http://airivanhoe.com/ this past July. We were the only cabin with five lakes all to ourselves. Two of the lakes had a total of 6 boats with motors and a couple lakes had canoes. Our cabin had a generator, hot and cold running water, shower, gas and electric lights, a gas and a wood burning stove, refridgerator and freezer and even air conditioning. It was a really long drive to Northern Ontario where we took the float plan from and the roads there were not nearly as good as the US. The mosquitos were HORRIBLE! Had to use tons of deet and mosquito coils to keep them at bay. I can't compare this guide to others but we had a nice place to stay, caught lots of pike and smallies and had a great time in a very remote location. I plan to repeat many times in the future. Here are a few pics of our trip.

Ryan, that is a neat place. Good to see that they have the "conveniences".

Finally took the 40th birthday fishing trip last week. We ended up going to Silsby Lake Lodge in Northern Manitoba. We had a great time, though the weather was not ideal -- we couldn't go out one day because of the wind, and as a result we only had three days to fish. Otherwise, a terrific time with pretty good fishing. We each caught at least one "Manitoba Master Angler" pike (over 41 inches), and tons of "teenagers" (between 35-41 inches). Here are a couple of my trophy pike: [/IMG] [/IMG]
A lot of forest fires up there as well. In most cases they just let them run their course. This one was just smoldering one day, then the wind picked up and the fire took off. This picture was from about 20 miles away: [/IMG]