How do you enjoy Northern Ontario fly-in fishing without a taking plane? On a boat-in adventure!

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Outpost trips are the best value in the Canadian outdoors. If you’re not familiar with the concept, here’s the outpost trip in a nutshell: drive north for 8, 10, 14 or 24 hours, board a floatplane, get dropped off at a cabin on a remote lake or river, fish like crazy and then get picked up a week later.

The cost of an outpost trip, including cabin, use of a boat and motor and flight, is typically a fraction of what you’d pay at a full-service fishing lodge. The trade-off is that you have to cook and clean for yourself, and fish unfamiliar water without a guide. It’s a deal I’m usually willing to make. This year, I learned something new about outposts: you don’t have to fly, to get fly-in quality fishing.

Always on the hunt for new experiences, my fishing friends and I landed on a fresh spin: a boat-in trip with Kanipahow Wilderness Resort & Outposts. We chose Kanipahow for a few reasons: its location, near Chapleau, Ontario, was a manageable 10-hour drive from our homes in southern Ontario; we’d have the only cabin on the entire lake; the owners, Jamie Thibault and Josée Robitaille, were patient with my many questions and, most importantly, passionate about conserving their fishery. That last one is crucial, and believe it or not, many operators aren’t overly concerned about stewardship.

So, on the appointed morning in early June, we met Jamie and another staff member outside town. We followed them into the bush along a series of ever-narrowing industrial roads, to a rough-and-ready boat launch on Vezina Lake. We then loaded up our gear and took the boats to the end of the lake, across a short portage using an ATV and trailer, and into our final destination, Northwind Lake.

The full story of this remarkable experience will appear in Outdoor Canada magazine in 2024. But for now, here are a few things we learned, and experiences that stood out during our week on Northwind, including why it soon became a truly memorable angling adventure.

On a boat-in trip, it’s easier to bring bulky items like kayaks

Boat-in packing is a lot easier, since weight doesn’t matter (as much)

For obvious reasons, floatplanes have very strict weight limits. If you’re over your allotment, you either leave gear at the airbase or pay more—sometimes a lot more—to fly it in. In fact, I’ve been known to weigh all my gear at home (and demand that other anglers do as well) and enter it all into a spreadsheet, to see how we’re doing.

Boats do, of course, have weight limits, but if you have a giant stack of tackle, food and accessories (especially heavy stuff like, er, liquid refreshments), you just keep making trips back and forth until you’ve moved it all. For me, at least, not having the strict weight limits took a lot of the stress out of packing.

In addition, my group of four are all dedicated kayak anglers. We planned to fish out of our own boats—which are highly customized with sonar, rod holders, comfy seats and more—as much as possible. In the past, we’ve flown kayaks into our outpost. It’s doable, but also kind of a headache for everyone involved, including the aircrew. This time, we just towed them in.

Although I said weight doesn’t matter, that’s not totally true. Your gear may not be going in a plane, but do you still have to carry it around, which leads to my next point…

Be prepared to work a little harder on a boat-in trip

Boat-in trips cost less than a fly-in, but the trade-off is that you may have to sweat a little. The Kanipahow team were pros at moving guests into the Northwind outpost. But naturally, we helped with the hauling. So there was more lugging around of gear than at fly-in outposts, where all your gear is just unloaded out of the plane, and on the dock.

Though as I stood at the boat launch looking at our impressive mound of stuff, I did wonder if we’d taken our packing freedom a little too far. I apologized to Jamie for the volume, but he said it was no problem, and pretty typical for a group of four. And then he added with a grin, “If you show up with a Sherman tank, we’ll get it in here for you. We want to make sure you’ve got what you need to enjoy your trip.” A few days later, while hiking into a portage lake, I started to think a tank might not be such a bad idea, but that’s a story for later.

We knew it would take some effort, so we were ready with work clothes, bug nets and sturdy boots. Ultimately it’s just another reason why outposts tend to be so economical, and give you access to some pretty special places for less money than you might think. Still, there were a few moments when I was lugging gear up to the cabin, through a dense swarm of mosquitos, when I thought: This better be worth it. A couple of days later, I had my answer. It definitely was.