God’s River 2024 – Epic Pike and Brook Trout Experience
Hitting the jackpot
Starting about 5 years ago I heard rumors of God’s River Outpost on Semmens Lake turning out 20 pike over 40 inches on a daily fly-out which is normally only 6-7 hours. I heard similar stories from 3 different people, so it resonated as something I wanted to try. The only condition seemed to be it was good the first couple of weeks of June. So, what did I do? I tried to fly over there in September of 2023, and it was a big bust. We caught some pike but nothing special and we returned after a short-day sort of disappointed and with a few hundred less in our wallets.
Well, this is where fate intervened. In 2022 I had booked a prime week at the big pike factory on Great Slave known as Trout rock for June of 2024. Then in January 2024 my wife was scheduled for some special testing at Denver National hospital for June of 2024. I COULDN’T go to Trout rock. #!@$%@#%!. Then I decided to make the best of the change and booked a return trip to God’s River Lodge in late May and was given the privilege of helping them do a ‘soft’ open at the Semmens Lake brand new cabins. I would be in there prime time and once and for all see if the stories were real.
God’s River near lodge
The new plan was put into action with the help of the new GM at God’s River Kory Wickdahl. I would go to God’s River Memorial Day week May 26-31 and help open the new cabins and test drive Semmens for 3 days VERY early season (pre-open really) which sounded great if the other stories about early June were good could May be a even better?
Getting to God’s River is super easy. All you have to do is get to Winnipeg and take a charter to God’s River or fly one of the commercial flights. Note the commercial flights are daily and allow you to schedule trips to start and end on any day you like. Sure, most guys do Saturday to Saturday but it really isn’t required which is nice. Have time for a 3 trip Tues-Fri No problem. 4 days Sun-Wed no problem. Once in God’s River the lodge will pick you up for a 1-mile trip to the lodge.
Accommodations are neat and clean and offer WIFI/cell service/cable tv/heat. The meals are served at the main lodge morning and evening and most fishermen take a sandwich out to the boat for lunch.
Fishing in the river in May is fantastic and close to the lodge. We managed 24 brookies in about 12 hours of fishing including 5 that were over 21 inches and qualify as Manitoba Master Anglers. More on that later.
Semmens Lake view from the Cabins
We took one morning to check out the main lake for pike and fished two different bays that were stacked with pike in the 26–36-inch range it was super easy fast fishing, but I figured we would get enough pike fishing in Semmens and cut it off to return to the brookies after about 3 hours.
We had hoped to fly out to Semmens on Monday, but weather delayed that to Tuesday. So finally, Tuesday arrived, and we board the 1950s era Beaver and made the quick 10 mile flight over to Semmens to see what we would find.
Well, we arrived with beautiful weather. It was 60s and sunny. The new cabins were a work in process. The kitchens weren’t done but we could make do with a propane cooktop. We found some beds and bedding and got three beds together for George, David our guide, and me. The outhouse was also brand new but in a flooded area. In general, we had a solid roof / insulated walls / limited cooking gear / a generator / and a desire to get out fishing ASAP. So that is what we did – rigged it up and head out.
This is where the craziness really starts and honestly, I am not sure how many guys will believe my story. We motored over to the prime pike fishing area which is a large creek/small river or a slough depending on how you look at it. To lay it out you have a clear waterway about 40-60ft wide by a mile long with the sides about 2 ft deep filtering into swampy marsh with a cut down the middle about 6-10ft deep. One thing I noticed right away was that the edge of the (river) held thousands of suckers eagerly waiting to run up the river. They were everywhere and nice size with most pushing past 12inches. To sum it up. We had bright sunny weather after 10 days of dreary cloud cover where the highs struggled to meet 50f. We had a major sucker run going and this river was UNTOUCHED for the season.
I’ve waited as long as possible so here goes. It was an EPIC / INSANE / AWESOME / EXTREVAGANZA / BLOCK BUSTER pike fishing orgy. I asked George what I should call it and he started through out adjectives so in honor of the gentleman George I added some of his descriptors. Semmens isn’t huge maybe 10 miles by 4 miles, but every large pike was in that river and feeding like crazy. NEARLY every cast for 3 days straight resulted in an arm / elbow / shoulder busting hit from pike gone wild in this river. Each catch also scattered dozens of fish in the general vicitiy over and over. Glad they didn’t turn off after being spooked. We easily caught 400 pike maybe pushing 500 pike (and a couple of thrill seeking walleyes that had no business in that river) with the majority being heavy well fed mid 30s specimens. What will really call my sanity into question is the number 126. We boated 126 pike over 40inches. We quickly measured 100s of likely pike and in the end the number of 126 stands. Other numbers – 8 were 44 or better up to 46. Bigger than 46 was seen in the clear water but the biggest in the net was 46. The other 100 plus over 40 were evenly spread between 40/41/42/43. I know what you are thinking probably a bunch of 36s were counted as 40s. No, we measured most of the fish that were close. How could you cast hook measure release so many fish. Well our guide was there busting his butt to help us do this. We also were fishing single barbless for the majority of the time to save on the clearly under 40in fish. Remember the area was very tight so most casts were mere 20-foot flips to the deeper water with fish hitting the net fast and either quickly measured by George / David or popped off and released. The boat was total mayhem for 3 days straight with gear broken. Lures destroyed. Plastic burned through like a dumpster fire. I’ve seen some awesome pike fishing days in Alaska. I’ve seen more fish over 45 in Alaska but nothing compared to these 3 days. George has seen similar fishing 10+ years ago at Holmes Lake (incidentally also in far north MB) where he boated 47 over 40 between two guys but we had 50 day 1 / 54 day 2 / 22 day 3 (1/2 day) breaking his record twice.
Yes! I’ve rebooked Memorial Day week at Semmens and Kory W the GM at God’s River is trying to figure out what sort of packages he is offering for 2025 but I am going back and hoping to see if this fishing is sustainable as in the past it was fished a handful of times a year.
One more pike story. In the middle of this insanity. I had something I have never seen before. I had two 30+ inch pike attack my lure at the same time and wind up in an impossible 60in pike mess. And no, I don’t think the second pike meant to try and eat the first pike. It really would be insane since both pike were roughly the same size. Have a look and let me know what you think.
BTW…Like I said we had 24 beautiful Brookie caught in the river around the pike insanity and 5 of those were gorgeous Masters Angler fish that deserve a lot more attention than I can give here but I’ll let the pictures do the talking.
