The father-son fishing adventure comes to an end (Day 6)

And so it’s all over but for some nighttime kicking back (wood-fired hot tub!) and the float plane jaunt back to Yellowknife tomorrow morning. It’s hard to believe that my son, Riley, and I will be back home in suburban Ontario by this time tomorrow night—the past six days of fishing and fun at N.W.T.’s Yellow Dog Lodge just blew by. And today was no different.

We spent the day once again with guide Garrett Fyfe, this time venturing all the way to the south end of Duncan Lake to fish a number of bays we’d yet to explore. Soft-plastics fished over weedbeds were the ticket for the most part, resulting in plenty of explosive strikes. No trophy northerns were boated, but it was awesome fun.

Riley inadvertently provided the comic relief for the day by: a) pin-wheeling along the gunwale before going for an unintentional dip; and b) sliding on his arse (again, unintentionally) down a steep escarpment after he got bit by an ant during a hiking break. Garrett and I got some good chuckles from those mishaps, but it was Riley who laughed the hardest. Good man, my son.

With that, I’ll sign off, but not before first thanking the staff here at YDL: guides Garrett, Kirsten and Lisa, along with camp chef Heddy Jacobson, who kept us well-fed all week long with great, home-cooked meals. And of course, a big thank you goes to lodge owner Gord Gin for inviting us to fish his waters, and to NWT Tourism for facilitating the adventure. Cheers, everyone!

A full feature on my father-son adventure with Riley will appear in a future issue of Outdoor Canada magazine.