Saskatchewan Fishing Dream
Oliver Lake Wilderness Fishing Lodge
As the Cessna 185 banked to the left, I caught my first glimpse of the Oliver Lake Wilderness Fishing Lodge. It was tucked into an island cove that protected it from the wind. Spruce and birch trees partially hid the cabins and the main lodge. The pilot gently lowered the pontoons onto the water and we taxied up to the dock.
Bill, my lifelong friend and only other occupant, was wedged into the back seat along with our gear that took up every square inch of storage. After 40 years of dreaming about a Canadian fishing trip, I was now deep in the Saskatchewan wilderness about to see if my expectations would match reality.
In the bustle of unloading the plane we introduced ourselves to the staff waiting on the dock. Our gear was quickly stowed in our cabin, and we walked up to the main lodge for breakfast. I was expecting basic fare but was served poached eggs, toasted homemade bread and buffalo sausages. With breakfast over, we organized our fishing gear and loaded it into a 16-foot aluminum boat.
When I saw Mike Pundyk, one of the lodge owners, walking down with his guide bag and wearing a mad bomber hat, I wondered how this was going to work out. He looked like a Viking by way of Jamaica - not exactly the fishing guide from my day dreams. Jean-Luc, the other co-owner, and Mike briefly explained that the management policy for Oliver Lake and the connecting lake, called Nokomis, is catch and release with barbless hooks. We could keep up to three fish, none longer than 30 inches.
Fish fantasies
I had been having these day dreams for a long time, and this trip was the chance to mark off one of the items on my life wish list. Ever since I received a subscription to Outdoor Life magazine as a teenager, I dreamt of a fishing trip to a remote Canadian lake. The stories that fed this fantasy described wild, glacial carved lakes teeming with large and fierce northern pike. The pike is the king predator in these waters and can grow to more than 50 inches and weigh more than 40 pounds. They are in their element in the remote Canadian lakes; the perfect match between fish and landscape.
In planning the trip I soon found out that there were some 500 fishing lodges in Saskatchewan and 50,000 fishable lakes. It was going to be a blind dart toss. After some searching, we threw the dart and it hit Oliver Lake. We then made contact with Jean-Luc. It takes a big leap of faith to commit to a trip six months in advance and send a healthy down payment. There were a lot of unknowns about the accommodations, service and fishing - but we were up for the adventure.
Air, land and water
To reach our float plane base we drove to the tiny community of Missinipe, located 160 miles north of Prince Albert. We packed into the Cessna and flew over a landscape of Precambrian shield lakes that are distinguished by their many islands and bays. Ancient outcrops of granite form the shore and islands. The surrounding forest is a dense mix of lichens, black spruce and birch. Most of it looks impenetrable by man or beast.
Finally, after all the anticipation, planning and travel, I was sitting in the boat at the Oliver Lake dock. Mike started the motor and headed the boat north. He took us to a sheltered bay with a good weed bed; it was the perfect habitat for pike. The action started on my first cast and did not let up until Mike announced, "Pull in your lines fellas, we’re heading in for lunch." He put the boat into a perfectly situated site out of the wind and with a beautiful view of the lake. The one exception to the catch-and-release policy is keeping one "eater" for lunch.
Shoreline delicatessen
I read about shore lunches, but never experienced one. It quickly became one of my favourite parts of the day. Without a wasted motion, Mike gathered firewood, expertly filleted a northern with all the bones removed, started a fire and set an iron grill over it. Into a well-used frying pan he poured a generous amount of cooking oil. While that heated, he cut potatoes and opened a can of chili or beans and set it on the grill.
When the oil temperature was right, he tossed in the potatoes and cooked them until golden brown. He removed them and added the pike which he had cut into strips and breaded with his special mix. These were also cooked to a golden brown, and in a few minutes, everything was ready.
Mike’s shoreline culinary expertise was impressive. He baked the potatoes and fish together in aluminum foil. Once he flavoured the pike using a black bean sauce and for another lunch made a sauce from Dijon mustard and cream cheese. Most people don’t bother to eat pike because of the notorious y-bones. But filleted right, pike are at par or better eating than walleye.
The fish finder
It didn’t take long to realize that Mike was an excellent guide. He knew every nook and cranny of the lake, offered good advice on tactics, expertly released caught fish, kept the boat in the right position and could do field repair on any equipment. We fished with lures and flies with equal success.
At the end of our seven days, Bill and I had each caught two fish more than 40 inches. That entitles you to post them "on the board," a list kept in the main lodge. On a couple of days we varied the routine and jigged for lake trout. We also varied the lunch menu by having baked trout in salsa, with a dusting of cayenne pepper and topped with shredded cheese.
On the last two days the lake trout had moved toward shore, and we had fast and furious action catching them on lures. At the end of each day we returned to our cabin, started a fire in the stove, organized for the next day and got ready for the evening meal. The cabins are rustic but they do have bathrooms and showers.
Rhythm of lodge life
In the main lodge everyone gathered before the meal and recapped the day. The meals were uniformly excellent and amazingly varied considering that everything had to be flown or portage into the lodge. The desserts included such delicacies as chocolate mouse, chocolate cheese cake and walnut cake with a whiskey sauce.
By the end of the third day I had fallen easily into the rhythm of this place. As we cruised back to the lodge, my mind felt cleansed of the electronic buzz and clutter that seems to surround me at home. In the crisp air of impending fall, the boat plied through the light chop on the water.
Speckled clouds floated in the sky and a bald eagle was riding thermal currents in great looping circles. A loon’s tremulous yodel was serenading us home. It was a thrill to realize that I was now in the middle of a place that I had been dreaming about for more than 40 years. All that time, I had a vision in my mind’s eye what it would be like. Absorbing the scene around me, it was clear my imagination was no match for the real thing.
Submitted by Gene Colling, Magic City Magazine, November 2008 Vol. 6, Issue 6
Oliver Lake: Where Fantastic Fishing is Only Part of the Fun
Anglers spend a nice chunk of change to go to a fly-in fishing lodge, and the primary reason is always the terrific fishing. But fly-in fishing lodges offer more than fishing. What goes on before, after and during the fishing also matters, which is what makes the little fishing camp on Oliver Lake so special.
Oliver Lake Wilderness Lodge stresses fishing over luxury, and treats clients like individuals, not part of a group. Owned by Jean-Luc Dube and Mike Pundyk (also our guide), the classic fishing camp on expansive Oliver Lake has a small, friendly staff. Everybody gets to know the owners and would have a hard time not liking them.
And, lest we forget the prime objective, the fishing is spectacular, especially for trophy northern pike.
In September, my fishing partner, Gene Colling, and I made our second trip to Oliver Lake. We put seven trophy pike (over 40 inches) in the boat, including two 45-inchers, and it seems, lost even more than we caught. We also caught a dozen or more just under 40 inches, along with hundreds of smaller pike, and a few lake trout, too.
Oliver Lake Wilderness Lodge offers an exclusive fishing opportunity. This is the only lodge on Oliver Lake and four other large lakes (Ghana, Horvath, Nakomis and Prichard). Together, this chain of pristine Precambrian Shield lakes spans about 70 miles of remote wilderness lake country, much more than most lodges can offer.
When you fish there, you might not see another boat all day. Even during the busiest two or three weeks of the year, there are less than ten boats on all of this water at any one time, and even then the lakes are so vast, you might not see one except at the lodge.
I’ve only been to about a dozen fishing lodges in my life, but given that limited experience, I must say the setting of this one - in a protected bay in the middle of the lake - has to be among the most stunning of them all. The view deserves to be on a postcard or magazine cover.
Early every morning, while waiting for the start the fishing day, I’d sit on the deck of our cabin, watching the sunrise, marveling at that view, and listening to the only sound I could hear, a concerto of singing loons.
Visualize yourself sitting there on that deck soaking in the essence of wildness found everywhere. No cell phones. No Internet. No talking heads on cable news. No checking your retirement fund to see if you have enough left to go fishing again.
After a few of these postcard moments on the deck I surprised myself. I caught myself enjoying the experience more than the fishing.
And then there’s the food. It’s almost worth going to Oliver Lake just to do lunch - shore lunch, that is. And Mike, our chef who doubles as our guide with a little time left over to be a lodge owner, has turned shore lunch into a back country gourmet, long ago leaving behind the tradition of throwing spuds and chunks of breaded fish into a skillet of pure lard. His passion for cooking pops up every day about noon. "If I had a choice, I’d be cooking over a fire all the time," he said as he served the meal one day.
But we’re the ones who really benefited from that passion.
Incidentally, Mike thinks northern pike tastes better than walleye, which makes two of us in the whole wide world of anglers who believe walleyes are the best tasting freshwater fish. For starters, he notes, you have to carefully cook walleye and hit it just right, but you can overcook pike, and it still tastes great.
Another difference between Oliver Lake and other fly-in lodges is that it isn’t strictly fly-in. Here, you have a portage option, which involves another two-hours driving on an unpaved road north of Missinippi, Saskatchewan, boat rides across two lakes and a short trip on an ATV to get to Oliver Lake, but you save the expense of the floatplane ride, the cost of which is skyrocketing with higher fuel prices.
Like some other lodges, Oliver Lake offers a "light housekeeping" option, which costs less than the "full plan" i.e. three full meals served per day. If you take the light housekeeping option, which we did this year, you have to bring a week’s supply of food, including supplies for shore lunch. You cook your own breakfast and dinner, but your guide cooks shore lunch with the supplies you provide. If you decide to try the light housekeeping, be sure to ask the lodge for a specific list of supplies you need for shore lunch, such as what type of cooking oil or foil and how much.
So, that’s the story of Oliver Lake. Obviously, it’s more than the fishing story. It’s the scenic setting, the friendly folks, and the incredibly large, naturally functioning environment that makes a long drive and the price tag well worth it.
Original content by Bill Schneider from New West Travel and Outdoors
