Where does the time go...

Where does the time go…

    It’s easy to fall into a groove up at Big Hook: fish, eat, sleep, repeat… For our guests, the weeks are almost always too short. For our staff, it’s the same story with the whole summer. We have just a few precious weeks of our season to go. Boy it’s a magnificent time to be up here, though – we will savor it.

    The weather has been near perfect. Highs in the mid-70’s and lows in the upper 50’s have meant comfortable weather on the water and about the best sleeping conditions in the evening that one could ask for. Our days are getting noticeably shorter with real darkness setting in around 10pm now. The stars here never disappoint – they are as vivid and bold as I have seen anywhere. We’ve gotten a few glimpses of the northern lights too.

    We’ve been fortunate to have a few great family groups in recent weeks – it’s so fun watching kids getting HOOKED on fishing and the outdoors. And, often times, they catch the biggest fish of the trip!

    Speaking of fishing: it has been great!

    I have had the chance to get out on the water quite a bit the past two weeks. We hosted Troy Lindner and a production of his show, The Canadian Experience, last week. We fished lots and had an all-around spectacular time. The episode will air this spring and should be available on the Sportsman Channel, The World Fishing Network, and YouTube. I will look to get more details in time for our holiday mailer and make sure to post a head up on our social platforms too.

    We banged up on the walleye for sure and boated some nice pike also. Most of the walleye were caught snap jigging 1/4 – 3/8 oz jig heads with 3” swimbait tails – orange, purple, and perch colors were particularly productive.

    For the northern, a white Bucktail spinner was the favourite, and definitely got lots of attention; the skirt on his first was cut so short from all the pike in the first two days that it definitely would have been sent home from Catholic School. As a few other guests have noted, pike were not as interested as usual for top water lures for reasons unknown.

    Other guests had great luck with spoons like 5 of Diamonds and Johnson silver minnows in Red / White and Gold.

    Several 40” ‘ers have been reported including the last pike that Troy and I caught which was right at the mark.

    We did get a full, and much needed, day of rain Wednesday – I am estimating a full 2 inches, although a more precise measurement is not available due to a dog vs. rain gauge fight here at Central. It turns our Ripp still has some puppy in him. The rain brought the water levels up some, but they are still low. It seems that most of it soaked right up in the soil – it was getting pretty dry around here previously.

    We’ll hope for some more soon (just not during your stay for our customers with a remaining 2023 reservation). Hopefully that will give me the chance to get out one more update before we wrap up our season.

    It’s crazy thinking about 2024 already, but that calendar is filling up fast. Now’s the time to start thinking about Big Hook ’24. Please reach out by phone or email if you have any questions or would like to make a reservation.

    Thanks so much and happy August everyone!