The ten best professional walleye fishermen in North America this season on the Professional Walleye Trail (PWT) along with the In-Fisherman entourage and film crews arrived at the Winnipeg headquarter hotel, the Canad-Inn Fort Garry, on Friday evening. After exchanging greetings and a few night-caps, everyone was off to get a good night's rest before a busy schedule on Saturday. Under the leadership of Don Lamont of Travel Manitoba (TM), the local angling fraternity prepared a full day of fishing adventures and meeting the public. A convoy of brightly crested and decaled trucks headed for Selkirk and the catfish capital of the world at 6:00 AM. The Lund Pro-Staff fishing team was there to host and guide the pros for Manitoba's 2nd most prolific trophy species, the mighty Red River channel catfish. Many trophies were caught and released and fun was had by all. An interesting sidenote was that the only In-fisherwoman, Julie Meister (PWT tournament coordinator), caught two trophy cats. You can see her in one of the pictures above. She caught the first trophy of the day, and to quote Jim Kalkofen, PWT tournament director,"If you've ever wanted to see 10 pros hunker down and really concentrate on landing a big fish, you should have been there on Saturday morning!" The adventure on the Red was followed by a public reception and Q&A forum back at the Canad-Inns. There, Manitoba anglers, guides and fisherkids had the opportunity to greet and meet their tournament heroes and ask them the tough questions about walleye fishing... individually and collectively. The delegation was then hosted by Travel MB in an intimate banquet to network with Travel MB, Manitoba Lodges and Outfitters Association (MLOA), and the Department of Conservation before retiring to prepare for the adventure at Aikens Lake. Thanks to Don Lamont and the Travel Manitoba team for putting together such a great day!

Manitoba Welcomes the PWT champions