2021 Algoma Travel Guide - Magazine - Page 15
F
ifty-year anniversaries are golden, but this one is extra
special. I went on my first fly-in fishing trip 50 years
ago. But it didn’t come about the way you might think. I was
starting university at the time and my dad had dreamed for years
about flying into an untouched body of water where he would
experience world class fishing. But he had grown up during the
Depression, served with the RCAF over seas during World War
II and I knew, deep down, that he thought it was only wishful
thinking. So, I saved up some money from my summer job,
contacted a fly-in air service located in Algoma and booked a trip
for us to fly into their outpost camp on Jembi Lake. I surprised
him with the trip at Christmas.
Seven months later, we boarded a piston Beaver float plane
filled with our food and fishing gear and spent a fun-filled week
catching walleye and northern pike. Both of our dreams had
come true. That trip also started a love affair with Algoma Country
that has lasted to this day. It’s where I stared at the stars on a
lonely Lake Superior beach while catching steelhead trout and
where I landed my first Atlantic salmon in the St. Marys River in
downtown Sault Ste. Marie.
WORD ASSOCIATION
“Algoma Country is to fishing, what Las Vegas is to gambling,”
chuckles Angelo Viola, the popular co-host of the Fish’n Canada
television show. “Yes, there are a lot of great places in Ontario
where you can experience world class angling, but when you say,
Algoma, you’ve said it all.”
When I play the same word association game with my friend,
Scott Gardner, on the other hand, he says that space, distance
and water are the three things that immediately come to mind.
“By that I mean there are not many towns, not many people
and a lot of great places to go fishing,” says Gardner, who is
the Associate Editor and Fly Fishing Editor of Outdoor Canada
Magazine. “I don’t particularly enjoy rubbing shoulders with other
anglers when I am out on the water. But I know that once I go
north of the gateway city that is not going to be a problem.”
Trophy Alley is how Mark Melnyk describes his favourite patch of
Algoma heaven just north of the North Channel of Lake Huron.
“This is where the big fish live,” says Melnyk, who produces The
New Fly Fisher television series, as well as the Orvis Guide To
Fly Fishing. “With a catch and release spring bass season north
of Highway 17, you can target trophy size fish all year long. I
actually pulled my fly away from a 7-pound smallmouth once
because there was an even bigger nine-pound fish following it.”
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