The author with a typical Chinook caught
on a flasher, anchovy and a single action
mooching reel.
and services, accommodations, menus,
pamperings and indulgences, none
cheap but all memorable. At all three
the fishing for saltwater salmon is guided, fully equipped and targeted to the
fish species and season.
Tied to each resort dock is a fleet of
Grady White cruisers, 24- to 36-footers,
covered cabins, with heat and heads. No
written snobbery about the Grady bias
but the inference is that in the Discoveries you guide from a high-end Grady
White or from a rock on the beach. Jet
boats are acceptable, when rivers or
beach landings are involved, it seems.
Like the crashing whirlpool tides,
salmon surge into the Discoveries
spring, summer and fall, some sorting
out capillaries that lead south to Georgia
Strait past Campbell River, others north
into the wild 42 miles of Bute Inlet, and
still others, hopefully, to the rock face
under the overhanging hemlock where
our helmeted anchovies flash through
green reflections.
On the first morning Justin Farr and
I leave Dent Island and run up Bute,
stopping to ooh and ahh below a 1,500foot waterfall then beaching the boat
in the fern-sprouting skeleton of an old
logging camp. Rusting iron hides in the
salmonberries behind the gravel beach.
A small river pours in across the bay and
Justin lets me know that brown bears
feed there in late summer, and local
tribes have built elevated platforms and
a bear viewing business.
We leave to look for salmon near
Over there, across Big Bay from Sonora on Stuart Island is Nanook Lodge, an
upscale fish camp built on pilings and
stilts, with private cedar rooms for 20
guests, where salmon are the priority
and the reason for being, solid meals
the rule, and guides pride themselves on
fishing hard and well.
Up the bay past a float plane dock
beyond a dark green wall of drooping cedars is Dent Island Lodge, a small lodge
on a small island of quiet quality where
fishing is as important as the ambiance.
A stream rumbles through the lodge between buildings and Canoe Pass Rapids
thunders down a natural sluice beyond
the hot tub.
To reach this civilized and upscale
amphitheater in such an uncivilized
waterscape anglers arrive by float plane
from Seattle and Vancouver and by boat
from Campbell River on the east side of
Vancouver Island an hour or so to the
so