Gillam
A Northern Manitoba Town Built For The Kettle And Long Spruce Hydro Stations On The Nelson River, With A Dam And Generating Station Tours (Confirm), Kettle Rapids, Wildlife And Lakes, On A Long Road That Ends At The Railway To Churchill. A Working Power Town For Those Exploring The Boreal North · Gillam, Manitoba
Gillam is a hydroelectric town of about 1,200 people on the Nelson River in northern Manitoba, reached by Provincial Road 280 from Thompson or by the Hudson Bay railway that runs on to Churchill. The town is named for Zachariah Gillam, the English captain whose 1668 voyage into Hudson Bay led to the founding of the Hudson Bay Company. It grew in the 1950s as a railway stop and then boomed with the building of the Kettle and Long Spruce stations in the 1960s and 1970s, and the Limestone and Keeyask stations followed downstream and upstream. Visitors come for the rail journey, the river, the walleye and pike fishing, the aurora in winter and the chance to see how northern power is made. Cree communities including Fox Lake and Split Lake have lived on these waters for centuries. Services are modest and distances are long, so plan fuel, food and a bed, and ask locally before you venture onto side roads.
Gillam, a hydroelectric town of about 1,200 people on the Nelson River in northern Manitoba, on Provincial Road 280 about 300 km north-east of Thompson; coordinates approximate, Gillam, Manitoba, Canada
The town never closes, but visitor services keep ordinary small-town hours: shops and the restaurant roughly 9 to 6 on weekdays, shorter on Saturdays and often closed on Sundays - confirm by phone. The passenger train from Winnipeg calls at Gillam on scheduled days of the week, commonly at night, so check the timetable and the arrival hour before you book a room. Any hydro plant visit depends on Manitoba Hydro, which may offer scheduled tours or none at all (confirm), and outdoor viewpoints near the stations are open to the public at any hour unless signs say otherwise. Fishing and aurora season follow the weather, not a clock.