Ask anybody who has taken a spring vacation in Ontario’s northland how good the walleye fishing can be and the answer is always the same, it is great!
How about summertime walleye?
Sure, it can be good, but sometimes you have to fish deeper or put a little more time and effort into catching walleye all day long. Still, on a recent road trip to Northwest Ontario during the heat spell of summer, in the middle of August focusing on showcasing some Sunset Country angling lodges and outfitters, we experienced some of the finest walleye fishing we have ever had at drive-to locations, fishing in water depths ranging from five to fifteen feet deep!
One of those lodges included Indian Lake Lodge, nestled on the shores of the famous Indian Lake Chain, located just seven miles north of Vermillion Bay, Ontario.
This place has PREMIER walleye fishing!
The Indian Lake Chain has almost 30 miles of water with nine connecting lakes where you can catch your fill of walleye, your trophy Muskie or even try smallmouth bass or lake trout. Whatever you pick, grab your fishing buddies or bring the family and have the time of your life!
Bring your own boat or travel the Chain in style in one of the camp’s boats. Indian Lake Lodge offers top-of-the-line fishing boats. The eighteen-foot boat package comes complete with a 50hp Yamaha outboard motor and bow-mounted trolling motor. Each package has fish finders and live wells.
They have twelve modern cabins that are fully equipped with linens and towels provided! You can come on the Housekeeping Plan where you cook meals in one of our waterfront cabins with screened-in porches. Also available is the American Plan, where you enjoy your homecooked meals served in our authentically Canadian log-built main lodge.
You can relax in the main lodge overlooking the water or share some laughs in the games room with a pool table, ping pong, darts and satellite TV. They also offer wireless internet!
We spent four days at this lodge and shared some incredible angling moments with the lodge owners in the boat and at the kitchen table along with a traditional Ontario shore lunch of freshly caught walleye on a pristine location below a set of waterfalls.
Ninety percent of the walleye we caught were in water depths ranging from thirteen to fifteen feet deep with either rock or weeds on the bottom, slowly vertical jigging one-quarter-ounce ball head jigs tipped with either a minnow or nightcrawler at locations within eyesight of the lodge no less!
The walleye ranged in year class from thirteen inches to the thick-bodied fish in the twenty-two to twenty-four-inch class that were all released to sustain this incredible fishery. And this was during a mid-summer heat spell with bright sunny skies and dead calm conditions that can sometimes make walleye fishing a little tricky, but not here, the sheer number of walleye on this system is staggering.
The first morning alone, we stopped counting the number of walleyes we caught at forty and that was in the first couple of hours of fishing, again, within eyesight of the lodge docks.
We repeated similar walleye fishing each evening and morning of the trip and spent our days enjoying a relaxing lodge life vacation on the safe sandy beach and conversing with other guests of the lodge.
If it's non-stop walleye action you so desire with all the amenities of a traditional Northern Ontario lodge looks no further than Indian Lake Lodge. This is a place I personally plan on vacationing when I retire from fishing for a living.
