Becoming a Guide in Northern Ontario

I am Canadian by birth; my parents are of Scottish and Indian (Canadian Aboriginal) heritage. My Scottish grandparents and great grandparents emigrated as sailors from the UK in the early days of fur trading near the end of the 18^th century and marrying into Mushkegowuk or Swamp Cree families in the Moosonee and Moose Factory area or James Bay region of Northern Canada. Eventually, my parents traveled by canoe and settled in the newly opened town of Chapleau, Ontario.

My younger days were all spent in the little town of Chapleau where I received my education in the Public School and later in the High School which were built in the early to mid 1900s. These schools were the best in the North Country and later, my children got their education there too before leaving Chapleau for post-secondary education.

I have always spent as much of my time as possible in the bushland around Chapleau, and in the outlying district. My greatest times were had on hunting and fishing expeditions to the remote regions, with buddies of my own age, since the time I was twelve years old. My father was the best teacher in the ways of the bushmen, as he called the seasoned guides and woodsmen of the Northland. The bush, as we call our forests, lakes, rivers and streams offers countless hours of hunting, fishing and travelling pleasure, that is the inheritance of every man and boy with red blood in his veins. In Chapleau, you can go two miles in any direction and look upon completely natural bushland that, to all appearances, is as wild as the day it was formed by the great creator.

Needless to say, in my younger days, the guides in our locality were the heroes, as they still are today. They came in with their tourists, who we thought in those days as all millionaires, bringing in moose, bear, and fish of such size our young minds swam in thought of going out to these remote lakes to get ourselves the big ones. This we managed during our summer holidays, and with a map from one of our genial guides, we set out to get those big ones, and sometimes we did just that. We would form a party of four to eight boys, ranging from twelve to eighteen years of age. At this time, the older boys were the “bosses” or “head guides” and we, if we were younger, to our orders from them. In this way, we learned the rules of safety and comfort in the bush. We also learned, from our fathers, bigger brothers, uncles, and, of course, the ever popular guides in our area, the value of never underestimating Mother Nature or her children the elements. She and hers still have all our respect.

When I grew older, around the age of seventeen, I began to take out my first tourists, under the guidance of an older, and more experienced woodsman. This was the beginning of my training as a guide. On a large party, you always had a head guide, one that had handled large parties before. The training I received from them would lead to becoming completely self-reliant, and able to take out tourists on my own. Later, I was to lead large parties as head guide. In this capacity, your real talents as a guide are tested to the full. A young inexperienced tourist, or older one for that matter, can completely disrupt a party, if the guide lets him. Here one uses diplomacy that would shame our ambassadors. A good guide always comes through and everyone has the time of their lives.

The years added experience and each guide I met, or worked with, managed to show me some pointer, or method of his own, that made my knowledge a little more complete. This, I must point out to you took me years and years, and all of them were as good as yours will be after learning the know-how from an experienced guide. For the man who wants to be a better all-round bushman, whether he hunts the big ones, or just takes his boy out for a camping trip in the great outdoors, the experience of learning the ways of the North will pay-back great dividends to you and your “tourists” throughout your life. The kick you will get out of showing your buddies or your children some new tricks in the woods, will bring more satisfaction than that big deal you pulled off last week. If you have children, when you watch their eyes light up, on showing them your new-found talents, this is the greatest reward of all. Lastly, the knowhow you pick up as a guide will enable you to take care of your wife, sweetheart, or mother-in-law, under any adverse conditions and you know how vital this is.

Hilda and I at our Bear Hunt operation on Mulligan's Bay near Chapleau in 1966

Being a guide has also been a very rewarding and friendship-building experience. Every man that I have hunted or fished with has always come back, or wrote that as soon as he could make it, we would go out together again. The number of friends I have made, by making their trip in our Northland a good one, I can scarcely remember. Their occasional letter, or Christmas card, brings back our good times together, and these memories, and the ones of camping and hunting with my children are the best treasures I have as a guide.

In my life, I have had other occupations working in carpentry and eventually a full-time job as an electrician for the Canadian Pacific Railway in the Chapleau “Shops”, as the locomotive repair facilities were called. But in 1967, when the locomotives became more reliable, and the CPR downsized their operation in Chapleau, I turned down an opportunity to transfer to Southern Ontario and began a full-time occupation as a guide and tourist operator.

My children eventually grew to become professionals in their own right but they also became head guides; each of them as well, eventually taking out large parties or running their own outpost hunting and fishing camps. Even my beautiful and loving wife, Hilda, became part of the guiding world as the best cook that a hunter or a hunting party ever had in the woods with fresh meals of ham, turkey, stews and pastas including all the trimmings, pies and pastries. Many of our clients said in our memories journal that they returned more for the great food, than they did for the hunting or fishing. What began as summer trips in the woods with my friends, idolizing the guides of the bush-country, turned into a life-long passion of professional guiding and eventually running a full-time tourism operation with out-post moose and bear-hunting and a three-acre, five cottage, fishing resort on Prairie Bee Lake. For me, there could have been no more fulfilling an occupation or life-experience that would have provided more satisfaction and reward than being a Northern Ontario Guide.

A few happy fishing clients at our lodge on Pairrie Bee Lake