If you fish long enough, prime spots that hold big fish become obvious. With Marty in my boat the day before, I stumbled onto what I knew was something special and warned him to be ready.
It was a tiny weed-lined bay, almost more of an indentation, bordered on either side by two rocky points. The spot lay at the entrance of a sizeable dark-bottomed arm of the lake – a prominent spawning bay and this spot at its entrance was a perfect ambush point for large pike as they filtered out to the main body of the lake after spawning.
Even better, the wind was blowing directly into the spot, a situation that tends to make large predators a little less wary.
Marty’s first cast towards the left point was short; the brisk wind had blown us closer than I would have liked, and sure enough, it happened.
We both saw the thick-backed monster of a pike glide slowly behind his spoon as he reeled it boat side.
Then, with a baleful glare, it darted into deeper water, leaving us both weak in the knees.
I backed off, and we tried again with different baits, but to no avail. However, I knew where the fish was, and it was interested in feeding…
The Stars And Moon Align
Joyce had been on my radar for over ten years. It’s a moderately sized lake, but I’d heard tremendous things about it from several people.
The consensus was that it was a lake that consistently coughs up surprisingly large numbers of big pike, and I filed it away for a possible future trip, always hoping that one day I’d get the chance.
As it happened this past spring, I finally had that chance after chatting with Kevin Kahoot about any possible openings. Kevin and his son Kodi operate Wild Eyes Wilderness Escape out of Ear Falls, Ontario. Since they acquired the camp, they’ve done an enormous amount of work renovating and rebuilding the original outpost camp to something that’s very, very special.
Sometimes, the stars and moon align, and I knew beforehand that this would be a memorable trip.
I had a gang of six flying in, myself included, a good bunch of guys all around, and after meeting in Ear Falls the previous evening, we were at Showalter’s airbase early in the am the next day with spirits running high, ready to go.

We had a literal mountain of gear between the six of us. It was one of my most enormous loads ever, and that’s saying a lot.
With a bemused smile, Eddie Showalter had his guys begin loading a smaller Beaver aircraft with a portion of our gear; then, not long afterward, we climbed into his Beech 18 along with the rest of our stuff and were quickly on our way.






We were incredibly fortunate as well.
The thing about Joyce is that it’s a remote lake but a very short flight north of the airbase.
The weather was nasty that morning with low dark clouds and a steady light rain falling, not optimum flying weather.
However, despite the low ceiling, we were still able to get into camp, which was something the other guests waiting around the airbase weren’t able to do.
Longer flights are just a little too risky, and I almost felt a little guilty as my group boarded the plane for our flight into camp.
Almost.
Wind, Rain & Walleyes
After unloading on the dock and a quick tour of the camp from the pilot, we began the herculean task of moving our mountain gear up the long flight of steps into the cabin and unpacking. However, six hands tend to make short work of any task, and it took us only a short time to settle in.
Two things make real estate valuable: it’s either proximity to water or a view, and this little slice of paradise has both in spades.


The camp faces almost directly west, and the view from the deck overlooking the lake was breathtaking.
It’s always primarily about the fishing, but as I’ve aged, I’ve grown to appreciate the entire experience just a little bit more, and this Joyce Lake camp had all of us smiling.
We were far luckier than we’d ever imagined as well. Not long after settling in, the ceiling dropped even further, and the intensity of the rain picked up even more.
The entire gang, myself included, laid down for a short nap after lunch, then at 3 pm, my boat partner Bill Defoe knocked gently on my door. “C’mon man, let’s go!” he grinned.
I’d met Bill the previous September at Gangler’s in northern Manitoba, and we’d become friends. He loves fishing, which is enough in my books, but he’s also an inspiration.
The man has been battling brain cancer for years and is living every day as it should be lived – to the fullest.
At that point, the rain had tapered off slightly, so I quickly got dressed, donned my rain suit, and joined Billy down at the dock.
The rest of the boys were a little wiser, opting to rest up and wait until the next day before venturing out, an idea which seemed even better once we got out on the lake.
I had no plans to venture far, initially figuring we’d poke around close to camp, and initially, that’s exactly what we did. Turning right at the dock, I picked my way along the shoreline and almost immediately began to pick off small pike and walleye. “This,” said Bill, “is fun!”
It wasn’t until the rain began to fall again in sheets that I briefly considered heading back to camp, but I’ve never been a quitter.
After conferring with Billy, we made our way northwest of camp, down a large neck down, into the upper portion of the lake. It’s just a stunning lake dotted with small rocky islands and seemingly endless structure.
The wind at that point began howling, and combined with the light rain and single-digit Celsius temperature, it was miserable. Under those types of situations, there is no pattern. The only pattern is staying out of the wind, so I tucked in behind two small islands, and we began to toss light jigs and plastics in the small saddle between them.
Right away, we began to catch chunky walleye hand over fist.


At one point, Billy hooked a mid-thirty-inch pike on his walleye rod. We both got a good look at it before it got unbuttoned, and that only added to the fun. What a great start despite the nasty weather!
We lost track of time and finally headed back to camp against the wind at 7:30 pm, like a couple of tired but happy drowned rats.
After changing into dry clothes, we poured a drink and joined the gang, who were happily prepping dinner: AAA-grade Angus beef rib eyes, salad, garlic bread, and baked potatoes.
A fitting way to cap off our first day.

Sun’s Out, Guns Out
I slid out of bed at 5:30 am, shuffled outside to pee, then hustled quickly back inside to stoke the wood stove. The thermometer tacked to the porch wall read 7 degrees, and cold, hard rain was still falling, not a very inspiring start.
I’ve always said you can be on the best waters in the world, but if you’re faced with adverse weather conditions, you’re still going to scratch hard for everything you get.
Walleye, for the most part, are always easy on these remote lakes, and Joyce was no exception; they seemed to be everywhere with appetites unaffected by the low pressure and lousy weather.
No one was in a rush to hit the water this morning, but after breakfast and several coffees, the lot of us donned our rain gear and headed out at 8 am to find some fish.
Bill and I headed northwest to the upper part of the lake where we’d fished the previous evening and immediately began to catch a mix of walleyes and pike, including a slightly larger class of walleyes. Some on plastics, some on spoons meant for pike, it didn’t seem to matter.
The surprising thing to me was the number of fat, jumbo perch we caught on larger walleye plastics; that was a pleasant surprise!
Joyce may be the best remote lake I’ve ever seen for numbers of big perch, and I was lamenting the fact I hadn’t brought my panfish box with me.
Who knew?










Of course, it was the bigger pike we were after, and we did try. A lake the size of Joyce is pretty easy to figure out, especially early season. The pike will usually still be either in or close to their spawning areas.
Typically, that means shallow, dark-bottomed bays, preferably with a southern exposure because they warm quicker, and preferably ones with an inflowing creek.
Nothing is ever etched in stone when it comes to fish, but there were several obvious spots on Joyce that checked off every box, and we fished each spot thoroughly.
It quickly became apparent that the larger pike weren’t in the shallow backwaters. It was not surprising, considering the cold temperatures and lack of warming sun, so I began to expand a bit further out.
The entire lake, in general, is quite shallow, so it’s easy to understand why a pike would drift out of the bays into slightly deeper, more comfortable water.
The problem was intercepting these fish was a challenge. Normally, I always cast for pike in the spring, but with the fish scattered, we began to cover water by trolling, zig-zagging back and forth, varying the speed at times, and trying to cover as much water as possible.
Around about 4 pm, the rain had stopped, and we finally began to see patches of blue poking through the dense layer of clouds.
With our spirits lifted, I chose a slightly different tactic and pulled out some larger lures to troll with. Even in early spring, bigger baits sometimes trigger hits from lethargic fish.
Suns out, guns out, that’s the saying, right? It didn’t take long.
Trolling a larger Len Thompson spoon past a well-defined rocky point at the mouth of a large bay, Billy connected with a solid 38-inch specimen, our first semi-decent pike of the trip.


We gave it the old college try, but that was it for larger pike on this day. The walleye, not surprisingly, continued to bite madly, and we capped things off with a good number more, including one very solid 25-inch specimen.



Tonight was fish fry night, something all of us were looking forward to, and each boat had kept a couple, including Billy and I.
Back at camp by 6 pm, magically, the wind died down, the skies cleared even more, and we were treated to an almost picture-perfect evening.
I fried up a big batch of crispy, hot walleye nuggets for the boys on the outdoor cooker, and we feasted like kings.


Perfection.

Success Is Subjective
It was an early ice out in the north this year, and I fully expected the fish, especially the larger pike, to be feeding ravenously, but that wasn’t the case.
It was an early spring but also an abnormally cold one after the ice melted, and things still hadn’t warmed up, even well into the last week of May.
So far, the water temperature had been hovering around 52 degrees Fahrenheit, which definitely isn’t optimal, and not surprisingly, it was hindering things a bit, at least so far.
Still, we were optimistic, and on this day at least we were blessed with sunny skies and light winds. The air temperature was still only 10 Celsius to start the day, but it seemed almost tropical as we sipped our coffee and enjoyed the view from the deck.

I truly did expect big things today, and honestly, I was a little surprised at the lack of larger fish. We started things off in the upper part of the lake, combing every obvious spawning bay, thoroughly catching endless numbers of chunky walleye and smaller pike in the process.
Success is often subjective, and despite the scarcity of larger fish, we were catching so many fish that I’m sure most anglers would be thrilled.
Joyce is a fish factory, plain and simple.




I alluded to it previously, but the fish were simply out of the bays and already beginning to disperse, so finding them was mostly a matter of covering water and persistence.
Late in the afternoon we caught a couple of solid mid-sized pike that hit with abandon raising our spirits a little, but that was it.


Not surprisingly, both fish were caught in the same corner of the lake with the warmest water.
With the sun shining brightly, we finally had water temperatures in the 57-58 degree range, a 6-degree jump from anything we’d seen to date.
Back at camp that evening, we reveled in the pristine weather and capped things off nicely with some pretty epic homemade bacon cheeseburgers on the grill.
We had no complaints…

Fish Are Weird
The camp was quiet when I rolled out of my bunk at 6 am, awakened by the staccato beat of rain drumming on the cabin roof once again. I slipped outside to relieve myself and shivered. A glance at the thermometer showed 6 Celsius; no wonder I was chilled.
While the rest of the boys slept, I put a pot of coffee on, stoked the wood stove, and then had my first shower of the trip. It’s such a luxury on these remote trips, and the scalding water was both a highlight and a necessity.
Slowly, the other lads stumbled out of bed, none of us in a rush to fish, considering the weather.
It finally tapered off by 10 am, so Billy and I bundled up and headed out on the water. It was fish fry night again today, so the first order of business was to get our two fish, get them cleaned, and put them on ice.
Motoring to the neck down almost straight across from camp, I was already half frozen and said to Bill, screw this, let’s get our fish and head back in.
He agreed, and that was the plan, at least initially. It took a matter of moments to catch our dinner fish, then tucked in behind a large island, we began to catch fish consistently one after another, something that tends to warm you up a bit…





Strangely, despite being the coldest day yet, the fish were biting like mad, an even better bite than the previous day of warmth and sunshine. Fish are weird; they rarely follow a script. I’ve been doing this for a very long time now, and nothing surprises me anymore.
Buoyed by our success, Bill and I braved the chill, headed to the upper portion of the lake, and continued to catch fish on anything we threw at them. Even the jumbo perch were on fire, all incidental catches and on baits I would typically never use for perch.
Fun is the word.






Late afternoon, the skies actually cleared, and the sun shone down warm and bright, and just like before, a big fish finally showed itself.
When it happened, we were in a small, warm, dark-bottomed bay in the northwest corner. I had noticed sporadic deep cabbage weed starting to emerge and had just flipped my spoon behind the boat to begin a troll when I felt a slight tap, and my rod buckled under the weight of a heavy fish.
Initially, I thought I’d snagged a clump of weed; that’s what it felt like, but then the water erupted 30 feet behind the boat in a shower of spray – it was a fish all right.
The skirmish didn’t last all that long, and we both gave a whoop when Billy slid the net under her.
Things were starting to look up!

We stopped to chat with Marty and Blake on our way back to camp and they were having fun themselves. As Marty said, well over 100 walleyes between the two of them fishing next to a small island just northwest of camp.


Everyone had fared well on this day, and spirits were running high. While the rest of the boys poured drinks, I fried up a huge batch of walleye nuggets for our fish tacos that night.
Perhaps a little messy, but absolutely delicious!


The fun wasn’t over yet, either.
Marty had gone outside to clean the large pan I’d used to fry the fish and came face to face with a very large, very unafraid black bear. It seems bears like fried walleye, too.
I snapped several good photos, and then, just like that, the bear ambled off into the bush, and we never saw him again.


The joys of a remote fishing trip in Canada, what a day!
A Resounding Success
On this day, I had the distinct pleasure of fishing with Steve Venarchick, which was long overdue and in the making for a very long time.
Steve and I had connected years ago, but this was our first fishing trip together, and sharing the boat with him was an honor.
Things were slowly turning in our favor with the bigger fish, and I had high hopes today. It was still breezy and a little cool, but the skies were clear, and zero rain was in the forecast. Even if the fishing proved tough, I knew it would be a good day…

We started in the upper portion of the lake, where I’d found bigger fish the day before with Bill, and it didn’t take long to start catching.
Just in the last couple of days, the cabbage weed had really started to grow, and that was the critical component of our success. Shallow dark-bottomed bays with six to ten feet of water, that’s it. It was there in those warming shallows that the weed was beginning to emerge, and it was attracting everything: baitfish, perch, schools of walleye, and larger predators on the prowl.
We caught walleye on spoons, small crankbaits, jigs, and plastics; it just didn’t seem to matter. Any way you want to catch walleye on Joyce Lake, you’ll catch them.
Of course the pike hit just about anything as well.
The fish were becoming much more aggressive, with water temperatures rapidly approaching 60 degrees.



Steve was having fun, but I badly wanted him to catch a larger pike and was trying my utmost to make that happen, and finally, it happened.
Within the largest bay, a broad area of dark muck bottom with scattered weed was a small rock pile. The rock pile was the marker for me. Go past it further into the bay, and the water was simply too shallow.
There was a clear line where the extreme shallows of the inner bay met slightly deeper water, and on the outside of the rocks, there was a good six to seven feet of water. It was an ideal ambush point, and as I drifted up to the spot, I suggested Steve cast his lure just to the right of the rocks.
First cast with an orange and copper Doctor spoon, a solid fish smacked it halfway through his retrieve. Steve just calmly said, “I think this is a good one.” It was.
She wasn’t really fat, but she was long, and at this point, no matter what happened, the day was a resounding success.

Later in the day, Steve and I were getting a little worn down and beginning to think about a hot shower and some food when something memorable happened.
We’d broken out the light jigging rods and were drifting a shallow flat with small plastics, happily catching walleye when it happened.
I felt a “tick,” then an obviously large fish engulfed my tiny bait, and my light rod buckled. At least initially, I thought it was a giant walleye, but when it began to scream off line, I knew it was a pike. It was quite a fight and one I thought I’d lose for sure, but eventually, Steve managed to slip the net under her.
Forty one inches on the tape, thick, fat and healthy! What a specimen.

Back at camp, it was all smiles – everyone had filled their boats with fish, and we had all enjoyed the sunshine.
Tonight’s dinner was simple but good—pasta with a thick meat sauce, garlic bread, and salad.

Best of all, we had no further unexpected visitors in camp, and with clear skies, we relaxed after dinner with drinks, just soaking it all in.

This view never gets old.
A Prime Spot
Once again, we were blessed with bluebird skies, but as always, the universe requires balance. You can’t have the good without the bad, it sometimes seems, and on this day, the wind was howling fiercely from the southwest.
As always, I had a game plan in mind, but the wind tossed that one right out the window, and we had to adapt. The only pattern on this day would be finding calm water and staying in the lee of the heavy winds.
Marty Johnson was my boat partner today, someone who I hadn’t met prior to the trip, but someone who quickly became a friend. He’s a great guy, and just like with Steve my main goal was to put him on a big fish.
The view from the deck was deceptive. The southern shoreline where the camp was situated was completely protected from the wind, so Marty and I took full advantage of it when we hit the water.
Turning left from the dock, we began a slow troll along the protected rocky shoreline, zig-zagging back and forth and varying the speed, attempting to lure a big pike into hitting, and it didn’t take long.
Trolling a perch-coloured Doctor spoon, I almost immediately had a heavy hit and quickly told Marty to reel in and turn on the camera. It’s always nice when a plan comes together!
The lure wasn’t just a normal stock Doctor spoon either; it was a doctored version. I’ll often swap out the factory trebles and replace them with bladed treble hooks made by VMC. The added flash and vibration will frequently trigger strikes and outfish a standard hook 4-1.


Reaching the first prominent point southwest of camp, we entered a large arm of the lake that eventually funneled down and formed the outlet of the Joyce River. It had all the right elements, primarily dark bottom, 6-10 feet deep, scattered and newly growing weed, and most of all, some level of protection from the wind.
It was an area I’d fished a couple of times previously with Bill, and on this day, it was almost the only game in town.
We slowly picked away at it, trolling and occasionally stopping to cast at what I perceived to be the grade-A spots.
One of them jumped out at me, a shallow reed-lined indentation bordered on either side by rocky points and directly adjacent to deeper water. The spot was near the entrance to that part of the lake and was an obvious spot for larger fish to stop and rest as they dispersed to deeper water after finishing the spawn.
This was the fish I mentioned in the introduction, and almost immediately it made its presence felt, following Marty’s spoon boat side then drifting away without committing. We backed off a bit and tried to entice it with several different offerings, but it was to no avail. The fish was hot, though; it clearly wanted to feed, and I knew exactly where it was.
Very often, you need to keep returning to a spot like that, and sooner or later, you’ll connect…
The rest of our day was spent in search of calm waters, and we were limited. We honestly fished water that day that I otherwise never would have fished, and despite that, we caught oodles of fish, including some larger walleyes.
Go figure.








We were all a little beaten up by the wind back at camp later that evening, and on my end, I was exhausted. After a hot shower, I changed and hit the sack; early mornings and long days on the water were catching up to me.
Pike As Fat As A Christmas Turkey
Every day that you spend on a body of water, you get a better feel of what’s going on, and you start figuring things out, and that was certainly the case at Joyce.
Today, I had another new boat partner, Blake Swearingen, another cool cat with whom I’d been wanting to fish with. With a laugh, I jokingly said to Marty, “I’ll race you to the spot!” as we headed down to the dock, words that proved to be prophetic.
I took Blake straight to the spot where Marty had raised the big fish the day before, and on his second cast with a gold Doctor Soon, he hooked the beast!
Amazingly, there was almost no reaction from Blake; he was actually sitting down in the front of the boat and never said a word to me until the fish got close. At that point, I lost my mind.
There were a couple of tense moments, but in the end, I managed to net the beast with some pretty brisk winds blowing us close to the rocks, and we had her. Forty-five inches long, thick across the back, and perhaps the fattest spring pike I’ve ever seen.
The thing was as fat as a Christmas turkey; it looked like it had just swallowed a duck.


Joyce had lived up to its reputation!
Everything after that was anticlimactic, but we put our best foot forward and caught a ton of fish. Just like the previous day, the wind began to blow fiercely, and we were severely limited as to where we could fish, but we made out okay…





On an unrelated note, pool noodles make great lure hangers in these small aluminum camp boats. Just cut a slit down the middle, snap them over the gunnel, and presto!
Works like a charm.

It was fish fry night again, and everyone had kept a couple for the impending feast, and what a feast it was! This time, I made a beer batter and fried the fish to golden brown perfection in the fryer outside on the deck.

Along with some fresh cole slaw and an ice-cold beer, it was hard to top.
I had no plans to fish again after dinner; I was only going to hop in the boat with our bucket of fish guts to dump, and then Blake asked if he could join me.
By that time, the wind had finally laid down, and the skies had cleared, and after dumping the bucket of guts, we simply had to fish.
Straight across from camp, right in front of the same island where he and Marty had pounded on walleyes a couple of days previously, we tossed out our jigs and immediately connected.
It was magical.




Another day in paradise…

A Fine Finale
I bustled about making coffee and putting bacon in the oven, then relaxed while the rest of the gang slowly emerged. By 8 am, heavy rain began to fall in sheets, and none of us were eager to punish ourselves.
This was our last day, and by all accounts, the bunch of us were fished out and almost ready to wave the white flag. But of course, we did fish; how could we not?
I awoke early at 6 am and took a quick peak outside. The sky was maybe half covered with clouds, and the wind seemed reasonable, so all in all, it was much better than most of our mornings. Unfortunately, that didn’t last.
Billy joined me again on this last day, and I had only one objective: catch enough walleyes for the hors d’oeuvres I had planned to make for the gang that night.
At least initially, the driving rain had tapered to a fine mist, but almost the moment we ventured out onto the lake, a front rolled through like a locomotive, and we were lashed with heavy drenching rain. Billy and I just laughed.
We didn’t venture far to get our walleyes, and it didn’t take long to get what we needed, but boy, did we ever get wet! There were even small hailstones mixed in with the rain, something that only occurs with cumulonimbus or thunderstorm storm clouds. It was volatile.
In between fronts, we’d have these brief respites of dry, and in one of those, I actually managed to catch one of my larger walleyes of the trip, for me, an excellent way to end things!

Not too long after that, I pulled into a protected bay, cleaned the fish on a board I’d brought for the purpose, put the fish on ice, and headed back to camp.
We packed and cleaned the cabin for a couple of hours, and then I began prepping dinner just as the rest of the gang pulled up to the dock, tired and wet but still smiling.
Right on cue, at 6 pm, the skies cleared just as I began to cook, and we enjoyed a glorious evening on our last night in camp.

The bacon-wrapped walleye and the steaks were pretty okay as well…


It was an almost perfect wrap-up to a truly fantastic trip!

Homeward Bound
When you’re on a fly-in trip, there’s nothing worse than waking up to bad weather on the day you’re supposed to fly out, and thankfully on this morning, we were blessed. There would be no flight delays.

Right on schedule at 7 am, our ride landed with a splash, taxied up to the dock, and just like that, in the blink of an eye, our trip was over.


I clambered up front next to the pilot, and with surprising speed, we were airborne and winging our way back to civilization…


In case you’re interested here’s a detailed video tour of this beautiful camp. We were told before the trip that we would love it, and it didn’t disappoint!
Big thanks to my friends, old and new, who joined me on this trip, and an even bigger thanks to our hosts, Kevin and Kodi Kahoot!
I’m very pleased to have gotten to know those guys and would return to their camp in a heartbeat!
I hope you enjoyed the story, until next time…
