Great Spirit Circle Trail wins Tourism Champion of the Year award

By Rick Garrick

Great Spirit Circle Trail’s Kevin Eshkawkogan credits a solid team and open communication for his Tourism Champion of the Year award at this year’s Ontario Tourism Summit.

“Although it’s an individual award, it definitely takes a team to win any kind of individual award,” says Eshkawkogan, CEO of Great Spirit Circle Trail. “It’s definitely something our whole team here at Great Spirit Circle Trail takes pride in.”

Eshkawkogan enjoys working with his colleagues at the Great Spirit Circle Trail.

“Without a solid team and open communication within that team, there can’t be a champion leading the way,” Eshkawkogan says. “I’m grateful for the team around me. They get it and are a pleasure to work with while we try to trail blaze and grow the economy for all and attempt to improve the socio-economic conditions for our First Nation partners and everyone in our region.”

Eshkawkogan was presented with the award by the Tourism Industry Association of Ontario during the Nov. 10 Ontario Tourism Summit in Toronto.

“I’ve taken pride in the work ethic my family instilled in me and have tried to always do my personal best for my employers and the people I work for,” Eshkawkogan says. “This award is a testament to my hard working family members who have come before me, those still working hard around me, my family that supports me, and all those trying to do positive work to help others alongside me. For me, it’s not about me, it’s really about all of them.”

Eshkawkogan says the team at Great Spirit Circle Trail is currently looking to create a unified voice for Indigenous tourism across Ontario by establishing Aboriginal Tourism Ontario. The province was once covered by two regional Aboriginal tourism associations, but the last of the two closed down seven or eight years ago.

“We took an economic impact approach to the strategy,” Eshkawkogan says. “With the businesses we currently have, and minimal growth each year over the next five years, the Aboriginal tourism business in Ontario could have a $12 billion economic impact on Ontario’s economy and of course Canada’s economy.”

Eshkawkogan says the team researched best practices from around the world, including the Aboriginal Tourism Association of British Columbia, a non-profit, stakeholder-based organization located at: www.aboriginalbc.com.

“We looked at their model and we looked at models from other Indigenous groups from around the world to see what the best practices were to implement into this strategy,” Eshkawkogan says. “With this strategy, we’d want to provide those support systems to the Aboriginal tourism businesses to get them to market, get them more market ready and basically do more business.”

Eshkawkogan says Aboriginal tourism includes more than cultural tourism, noting that the Great Spirit Circle Trail also works with accommodations and restaurant businesses, such as the Manitoulin Hotel and Conference Centre in Little Current.

“We were an integral player in development of the Manitoulin Hotel and Conference Centre,” Eshkawkogan says. “We helped pull together seven different owners, seven different funding agencies and bankers and financing options to make that happen.”

The Great Spirit Circle Trail is also working with hunting and fishing lodge owners to provide a guide training program for First Nations people to learn how to prepare a proper shore lunch, how to field dress an animal and how to share Aboriginal and cultural stories while working with their guests.

“The lodges are requesting specifically First Nations hunting and fishing guides,” Eshkawkogan says. “Who better to be tour guides than the original tour guides of these lands.”