Summer Camping at The Massasauga Provincial Park

I could see hundreds of small ant hills on the tent pad in front of me. Hmm…not sure that’s a good spot to put the tent. Luckily we had two more options, but the one I really liked, in the shade of the trees, had chipmunk holes and roots popping up in it.

“Have you decided yet?”

Darrell was unloading the last few things from the boat as he asked.

“The middle pad is best for the tent,” I replied. “Bug shelter goes under the trees I guess.”

It was a sunny, blue sky with a few fluffy clouds kind of day and we had just arrived at our home for the weekend.

The Massasauga Provincial Park always feels like home. We had arrived on a busy Friday afternoon, and while I waited in the boat, Darrell had to go all the way to the overflow parking lot to leave the truck and trailer. With the dogs and us donning our lifejackets, we went through Blackstone Harbour, into Woods Bay, and pointed the boat north.

Campsite 211 had been the only site available when I checked the reservation system for cancellations the weekend before. We hadn’t stayed at this particular site before, but both of us were thrilled to see it was in a quiet area, on a point, with a nice bay for fishing right near camp.

While we set-up camp Molly decided it was time for a swim. At 11-years-old she’s not a young dog, but she swam enough to make me exhausted just watching her.

Once the privy had been located (a little hike up the hill), and the tent and bug shelter were up, it was time for dinner. The dogs were dancing around each other when they saw me reach for the blue drybag we keep their food in. After eating our sandwiches we sat on the rocky point, looked out over the water, and just enjoyed being there.

We had planned to fish that night, but Erza kept heading for the tent. She was clearly exhausted so we decided it was time for all of us to get some sleep.

I don’t know about you, but we’re the early to bed, early to rise kind of campers. We’re usually up before the sun and getting breakfast started. This trip was no exception.

Since we were planning to cook steak over the fire at some point, we followed the trail leading up the hill and back into the forest. What a spectacular area! All the sites we’ve camped at at The Massasauga have been wonderful, but this one really was incredible. The dogs had fun playing while we gathered up firewood, then we all headed back to the site.

New areas to fish are always fun to figure out, so we started with trolling, with the hope that we would hook into a bass or pike. Getting a fish while trolling always gives you a good starting point.

If you don’t spend much time on Georgian Bay, you may not realize how much the depth changes. One minute you’re in 70 feet of water, the next you’re in 10 feet. Trolling calls for watching the contours on your chart so you can try to keep your lure from snagging bottom. It’s wild and so much fun! You can never be bored out there.

With no fish to show for our morning efforts, we headed back to camp and started casting from shore. A couple of smallmouth bass and a whole pile of rock bass were eager to bite. You really have to love those small fish that can make a day so much fun.

For lunch we had decided to try something new to us while camping. We were making pizza in our Coleman oven.

Game changer!

Pretty sure we’ll be having pizza on most camping trips now.

We used naan as the crust, brought the pizza sauce that comes in a squirt jar, and added cheese, pepperoni, and green peppers. A few minutes in the oven on some pizza trays we bought on Amazon, and a delicious lunch was waiting for us.

After that incredible meal we were ready to hit the water again, and this time we headed for the little bay in behind our site. With weedy edges, a fair bit of submerged weed, and some fallen trees for structure, it looked like a prime area for bass and pike.

I began to feel discouraged as cast after cast yielded no fish, so I decided I should at least be throwing a lure I enjoyed throwing and went back to my white Terminator spinnerbait. Nothing had hit it all day, but I love casting it.

A few casts later I had a bump.

On the next retrieve I had another bump, then a smash. Fish on!

That pike wasn’t huge, but it felt great to finally get one. And what followed? Oh, about an hour of non-stop pike action. Woohoo!

The crazy thing about the pike bites was that so many of them hit on the surface and crazy close to the boat. They wanted that flash and nothing would deter them. It lead to the best kind of adrenaline rush and a rod that needed to be retied. We were having so much fun that we didn’t even take any pictures. Watch the video below to see some of the pike.

All the action tired me out. When we moved on to another area, I felt myself dozing off in my seat. While I snoozed, Darrell fish a few more weed beds, finding smallies and more pike. Nothing huge, but still plenty of fun to play with.

There’s something about being at The Massasauga that makes me feel so relaxed. It’s easy for me to shut off other thoughts and just enjoy being there. It also helped that the Rogers outage was that weekend, so I put my phone on airplane mode and only used it as a camera. I love just being in the boat, floating around, or sitting at camp and looking out at the water. It’s just perfect.

Although we planned on having steak for dinner, the wind was blowing too much to safely have a fire. OTG Meals Chicken Pot Pie to the rescue. If you’ve never had OTG Meals, you need to try them. They’re a must on every camping trip for us.

Before we knew it the sun had set on another day and we all crawled into the tent for a much needed sleep. The dogs curled up on their sleeping bags, while we laid on top of ours. The nights didn’t cool down a whole lot so we slept with the tent doors open and every time I would shift during the night I’d look up at the stars and feel like the luckiest person in the world.

Sunday’s breakfast was apple turnovers baked in the oven. The Pillsbury variety. They were fantastic!

My favourite sight on Sunday was seeing a group of at least eight loons out front of our campsite. I adore loons. Maybe it sounds funny, but the represent the kind of life I want to live. I want to be somewhere where the sight and sounds of loons is an every day occurrence. Anyway, my initial thought was to grab a camera and try to film them, but then I just stood there, listening to their calls. Some flew off to the east. A couple flew to the west. The others stayed for few minutes longer before moving on. It was a moment.

Fishing ended up being slow that morning. The bay we caught the pike in the day before was quiet. Nothing came up while trolling. It was perfectly fine by me. We’d caught plenty of fish the day before and I was just happy to be on the water and taking in the stunning backdrop of The Massasauga. The rock, the trees, the islands, the water, the blue sky.

We headed into a bay we hadn’t yet tried and I had several small fish nibbling at my lure, but nothing eating it. I heard Darrell mutter, “That’s not good.”

I turned to see what had happened.

He had cast over a rock ledge, and when trying to bring the lure back, a smallie nailed it. Now he had to get the fish over that rock ledge without breaking his line. Of course, he made it happen and held the nicest smallmouth bass of the trip up for a picture. His line was buggered though and needed a retie.

Back at camp Darrell got a fire going while I started packing up our gear. We finally had our steak and potatoes! Well worth the wait. I’m lucky to have such a great camp chef.

After loading the gear, the dogs, and us into the boat, we headed back to the launch. I’ve never seen the launch as busy as it was that day. Once Darrell was on his way to the truck, I kept the boat out in the middle of the lake and let everyone else have the docks. It was a zoo! But everyone was pleasant and happy and took their turn getting out. It was kind of a shock after seeing next to no one all weekend.

Then it was time to head home. Another successful camping trip to The Massasauga Provincial Park was in the books, and the weather was a heck of a lot better than last year’s trips. I can’t wait to head out on the next adventure.

Want to know more about the gear we used? Check out this post. Our tent is a Woods Cascade 4-person tent. You can read our review here.