Why Rent On Little Manitou Lake

Little Manitou Lake carries the unofficial title of Canada’s Dead Sea for good reason: its extraordinarily high mineral content, including Epsom and Glauber’s Salts, makes its water among the most buoyant in the world, and the experience of floating effortlessly on its surface is one of those sensory surprises that stays with families long after the trip has ended. Located roughly midway between Regina and Saskatoon and just minutes from the town of Watrous, the lake is accessible without being remote, and the therapeutic reputation of its mineral waters has drawn visitors since the early 20th century when the area first established itself as a spa destination. The Little Manitou Art Gallery, showcasing the work of over 100 Saskatchewan artists in a garden setting, adds a cultural dimension that most fishing and boating lakes cannot match.

Floating, Farm Tours, and the Drive-In Movie Theatre

Little Manitou Lake is not a fishing destination: its high salinity supports very limited aquatic life, and the experience here is built around the water’s therapeutic qualities rather than its recreational fishing. The beach area is well-equipped for swimming and surface recreation, and paddleboarding on water this buoyant is a genuinely different physical experience from paddling on a conventional freshwater lake. The town of Watrous adds farm tours, a drive-in movie theatre, and the art gallery to the surrounding leisure calendar, giving families with multiple interests enough variety to fill a multi-day stay without ever feeling underserved. In winter, the lake’s therapeutic mineral mud draws visitors seeking spa-adjacent experiences, and the surrounding landscape offers cross-country skiing and snowshoeing.

A Little Manitou Rental and the Mineral Water Spa Experience

Staying in a cottage or vacation home near Little Manitou Lake gives your family a Saskatchewan lake stay unlike any other in the province. The private base, full kitchen, outdoor living space, and proximity to the lake’s beach access combine with the therapeutic floating experience in a way that a Watrous hotel stay approximates but cannot fully replicate. Properties near the lake offer the convenience of returning to your own space after a morning on the mineral water, the ability to prepare your own meals from local produce, and the evening quiet of a Saskatchewan prairie landscape that has very few peers in terms of open-sky serenity. Pet-friendly rentals are available in the Watrous area.

What To Know

Little Manitou Lake’s mineral content means it does not function as a conventional swimming or boating lake: no power boating, no fishing, and the water leaves a mineral residue on skin and swimwear that requires a fresh-water rinse after each visit. These are not drawbacks so much as they are the specific terms of what the lake offers. Families who arrive understanding that the experience is built around floating and therapeutic immersion rather than conventional water sports find it consistently memorable and worth the specific planning it requires.

Little Manitou Lake is the Saskatchewan lake that defies every expectation the word lake typically sets. It is a mineral spa wrapped in prairie scenery, a geological curiosity that turns out to be one of the most genuinely relaxing bodies of water in the country, and a cultural address that the Little Manitou Art Gallery gives a creative dimension entirely its own.