The Fish Shop is One Amazing Culinary Tourism Roadside Attraction

Thunder Bay's tourism industry has a lot of great things developing. Two of my favorites are the blossoming local culinary scene and the awesome tourism entrepreneurs that call the city home.

This weekend, I'll be headed to Toronto to meet with tourism partners and be a part of the Toronto Outdoors Show where we're helping OTMPC with its Superior Adventure Contest. As busy as my schedule is with the various hats I wear, getting out and connecting one on one with visitors reminds me why we're all in the tourism industry. To serve great experiences to great people.

We're going to kick it up a notch this weekend and bring 90 pounds of our Northwestern Ontario culinary delights with us. Six varieties Thunder Oak gouda, smoked Lake Nipigon Lake Trout Fillets, whole smoked Lake Superior whitefish, some rainy river elk summer sausage and of course, Thunder Bay persians.

Why? Because food is the ultimate conversation starter and Northwestern Ontario entrepreneurs produce a myriad of great offerings that are talk worthy. We'll have a chance to talk with thousands of Torontonians about our area's incredible outdoor visitor experiences and ease of getting here while noshing on some great samples from our lakes, woods and fields. Its also great at getting media attention. Friday morning has us doing a live session about our culinary gems for Breakfast TV while Sunday morning sees us chatting it up with CP24.

This afternoon, as we we pulling the stories of our food suppliers together, I had a chance to talk on the phone with Liisa Karrkainen, the second generator proprietor of The Fish Shop, located on highway 11/17 at Crystal Beach. I can't believe I had never been there before. I made a beeline out there at the end of the day to meet her and her husband, Willy, in person.

The shop opened in 1970 by Lisa's mother and is run by Liisa and Willy today. Today they featured smoked trout, whitefish, herring and salmon, all sourced locally. What was even better is that they smoke their fish outdoors, using green alder for a completely nitrate or preservative free result. Sampling the trout fillet, its simply amazing. While talking with them, a long haul trucker pulled to the side of the highway to pick some smoked fish up. A first time customer, he'd heard about it over the airwaves as a must stop while passing through town. Thair fish is known all across Canada.

Liisa and Willy are indicative of the entrepreneurial spirit in our local culinary tourism industry. They are amazingly positive, upbeat and great ambassadors for the city and area. For all the time I spend at the screen pouring over trends and stats and performance indicators, nothing can compare to just having a chat with some of our local tourism partners to get a sense of visitor traffic and expenditure patterns.

If you're a restaurant in Thunder Bay who already serves their fresh and smoked fish, you're adding value to the local culinary industry. If you're a restaurant not serving local fish, what the heck are you waiting for? Its an amazing treat and a great part of our culture.

If you want to check them out, they are on highway 11/17 at Crystal Beach (about 15 minutes drive east of the Terry Fox Lookout) or you can learn more about them at http://www.thefishshop.ca/

Unique Culinary Spin Featured in Westjet's Up! Magazine

Building Thunder Bay as one of Canada's best- and hippest -outdoor communities to visit gives us a lot of material to work with, especially when courting new visitors who are looking for sustainable tourism experiences. Its also a chance for us to weave sustainable tourism experiences with more traditional urban experiences to create memorable vacations.

Working with Lois Nuttal at Lake Superior Visits (http://www.superiorvisits.com/), a fun little package called "Loaves and Fishes" took on a life of its own this spring when former Senior Managing Editor of Up! magazine (http://www.up-magazine.com/), Eric Rumble, heard about it from me over coffee in Calgary. Eric loved the concept and had to write about it.

This 3 day epic adventure combines outdoor experiences, culinary and unique accommodation options to encourage visitors (and our tourism partners for that matter) to explore the city in exciting new ways. The core of Loaves and Fishes is essentially collecting local ingredients for your own dinner - even if your cooking skills involve burning water. A stay aboard the http://www.sailsuperior.com/ floating bed and breakfast and at the iconic McVicar Manor Bed and Breakfast, a lake superior salmon and trout fishing excursion with Archie's Charters (http://www.archiescharters.com/), visits to Thunder Oak Gouda (http://www.cheesefarm.ca/), Both Hands Bread and other local food producers fills ones' basket with fresh, locally made ingredients while taking in the city's iconic land and water scapes. The day ends at the spa while The chef's at Lot 66 (www.lotsixtysix.com ) cook it all up and pair it with worldly wines to create a memorable dining experience.

At the end of the day, Loaves and Fishes demonstrates creativity in product and experience development that consumers are looking for, weaves urban and outdoors together and builds upon our mandate to build Thunder Bay as a urban sustainable tourism leader.

Don't take my word for it. Read Eric Rumble's mouth watering take on it in the September edition of Westjet's (http://www.westjet.com/) Up! Magazine. You can read the online version on page 53 and 54 at:

http://www.soulintegrated.com/up/

Eagle Ridge Trout Ponds Provides a Unique Angling Experience

Throughout the summer, I make time to get away from the desk and explore our community's visitor attractions, meet with the owners, chat with visitors and get a first hand look at the front lines of the tourism industry. With over 1400 businesses in the Thunder Bay area with a tourism focus of some sort, there are a lot of family owned gems that are as important to the visitor retention experience as our largest attractions are. I'm going to make a point of profiling them in my postings to increase industry awareness.

Perhaps the first visitor attraction U.S. residents see when heading up highway 61 is Eagle Ridge Trout Pond, owned by Judy and Rick Osipenko. This attraction, about 35 minutes south of the Thunder Bay Airport offers a unique angling experience with no fishing licence required. Folks can come in and fish for rainbow trout or bass and they offer choices of both catch and release and catch and consume. Adjacent to the catch and consume pond, picnic tables, fire pits and shelters line the area and make for a great setting for children's birthday parties, family reunions or just a great couple of hours of family entertainment.

While on a quick tour of the attraction, we headed up the trail to a collection of out buildings-which include two new cabins and a sauna building encircling a great little in ground swimming pool. The most spectacular part about this was the view from the pool and cabins...Lake Superior. You don't realize how close the highway is to the lake in that area and from the elevations, you can see the dramatic shoreline and archipelagos of the lake.

Eagle Ridge is a great quick getaway idea for Thunder Bay residents looking to entertain their visiting friends and family and is a prime example of a unique experience close to the city that can extend visitor stays and even provide corporate clients to the city a quick escape from the boardroom or conference center at the end of the day.

For more information, check out http://www.ertp.ca/.