As to physical coins, Tulving charges the lowest premiums but requires purchasing in a large size which many may not want to do.

The other thought is to look at CEF's sister fund which unlike CEF holds only silver and is much smaller and thus much less liquid. However, it has a very small premium right now only 2.9% in CDN. See for example, http://www.silverbulliontrust.com/net_asset_value.htm In the US it trades only on the pink sheets under SVRZF and is highly illiquid although having a nice run as of Friday.

There are tax advantages to the closed ended funds like CEF, GTU, and SBU (all run by the same folks with Canadian storage of physical), if you hold outside of a retirement account but you have to file the necessary paperwork which is on their sites. Not sure if this is the same for the Canadians. Currently premiums for all three are as follows based on US:

GTU at $48.76 premium is 4.8%, CEF (50% silver, 50% gold) at $15.76 premium is 9.6%, SBU at $11.57 it trades at a 1.4% discount. Notice the low premium for GTU versus the Sprott fund, PHYS which trades around a 11% premium.