With canoes overturned, tents pitched and dinner digesting we watch as Kiri grabs a fishing rod and skips down to the grassy shoreline. Bathed in the last light of the warm summer evening, the nine-year- old casts into the dark, confused waters funnelling between the narrows at the base of our campsite.
Francine and I are sitting with Kiri’s parents, Neil and Kathy Simpson, as well as Mike and Anj Cotterill while the rest of the seven children are winding down in their tents after a long day on the water.
“I got a fish!” Kiri shrieks, reeling quickly as a 15-inch walleye is pulled to the surface. Neil rushes to his beaming daughter’s aid, unhooking and admiring the gold and green fish before slipping her back in the darkening water. Donned in their pajamas, the children emerge from their weariness to cast and be similarly rewarded. The bite dies with the setting sun; the good fortune of being camped beside a pool of walleye adds a pleasant flavour to the night.
We did not choose this campsite for its angling potential. It was the only one with enough room for our group of six adults and seven children aged five to eleven. And after a full day of paddling, lining and portaging we were quite thankful to find it.
It’s our second day of a three-family canoe trip along a section of the Brightsand River, a waterway park south of the 900,000 hectare Wabakimi Provincial Park in northwestern Ontario. Via Rail dropped us off near the Allanwater River, 80 kilometres west of the town of Armstrong, Ontario. From here we head south through a series of interconnected lakes and rivers marked by the drops, rapids and portages that spell the end of the road for anything but a canoe.
Easy fishing is one of the premier ingredients for successful family fishing, and a great diversion for children on a paddling trip. However, when morning arrives it’s my wife who is first to break the silence with a thrashing fish. I wipe sleep from my eyes as I head down to the water where Francine is standing on a large boulder where the gentle current slips past a large eddy.
She is hauling in fish at virtually every cast.
Francine reluctantly follows my encouragement to release the fish, until Kathy arrives on the scene. Kathy is the only vegetarian in the group but she harbours suppressed carnivorous urges. “Oh, wouldn’t a walleye breakfast be nice,” Kathy says clutching her hands together. This is all Francine needs to hear to initiate the harvest.
One by one, pajama-clad children emerge from tents to form a growing army of anglers. I begin to feel like a soldier loading muskets in battle as I’m presented with a procession of rods needing to be untangled or retied. What a rare pleasure to watch the children catching fish right from shore.
By the time the bite dies off, many fish have been released and nine walleye lay on the bank for brunch. I clean and cook them on one stove while my daughter, Islay, makes pancakes on the other. A long line of hungry children and adults forms behind the frying pans awaiting the tasty flapjacks and fish, a combination you’d only consider when camping.
We travel only 40 kilometres over five days, striking a balance between paddling, play and angling. Each day as we move along the waterway to a new campsite, I’m in awe of how three canoes can comfortably transport 13 people, two dogs and a mountain of gear.
We certainly don’t break any speed or distance records; with predominantly hot and clear weather our progress is kept in check by the dark, swirling pools at the base of falls and rapids, as tempting for angling as they are for swimming. While some in our party swim, others fish, deftly plucking large walleye from the stained water beneath.
Discover more routes and adventure stories in the Canoeroots and Family Camping’s Spring 2010 issue, where this article was first published. For more great canoeing content, download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it here.
