I love Father’s Day. Besides being so grateful for my son, David, it is also the one day of the year I can pick our activity. If I wanted to listen to bad hair metal from the 80’s, no problem. Binge watch pro wrestling: it’s your special day!!

Luckily, those are not activities we have ever done on Father’s Day. This year, I decided I wanted to go fishing as a family activity.

Rather than finding a river or lake where success was not guaranteed, I decided to up the odds and check out Countryside Adventures stocked fish pond.

We arrived on-site and made our way to the fishing pond. I was glad to see that Countryside Adventures rents out fishing rods and provided a net and bucket free of charge. My small fishing rod would have been no match for the large size rainbow trout found in the pond.

It was still early in the day so we had our pick of location on the pond shore. We chose to stay in the shade as the temperature was warm even at 9:30 am. I had the privilege of doing the first cast-offs. David was stationed with net in hand and my wife, Sandy, was on photo duty. After about ten minutes, I still did not have any success. I handed the fishing rod to Sandy, and, of course, she caught a huge fish on her first cast. She reeled it in like a pro and David scooped it up in the net.

It was my turn again, and this time I was able to catch a fair-sized trout. Truth be told, it probably wasn’t quite as big as Sandy’s but who was keeping score? Again, David caught the fish in the net and we took a photo of him holding the fish.

We decided to try for one more fish since we were having so much fun. It took a bit of time and a few tangled lines but we finally snagged our third fish. We thought three was perfect and went to go get them cleaned.

The fish were weighed and Sandy did officially beat me for largest fish by 0.2 kilograms. Countryside Adventures cleaned the fish and put them on ice for us. The price per pound is twelve dollars and no catch and release is allowed. It’s important to remember that you’ll be keeping the fish you catch.

I found the price to be fair considering the unique and fun experience we had. It was very close to the price paid in grocery stores, where you get the fish without any of the fun.

We paid for our fish and headed back to Ottawa. We had one of the most memorable Father’s Day suppers ever in that we had caught the food. There’s a good chance we’ll be eating fish for Father’s Day 2022!

Countryside Adventures is about forty-five minutes east of Ottawa. They will also have kayaks, pedal boats and paddle boards to rent for use on a larger pond. Fishing will also be offered on the big pond by boat.

For more information about Countryside Adventures, visit www.countrysideadventures.ca