FIVE
SOUNDS
BYOB
Think the wild west
side of Vancouver
Island is out of your
reach? Maybe not, if
you bring your own
boat. You can do this.
By PATRICK MCGANN
M
Y FIRST SALMON TRIP TO
the west side of Van-
couver Island was in
1985 and I didn’t even
get to fish. A friend
and I drove up to Tofino without stop-
ping, fueled by caffeine, nicotine and
Springsteen. The weather was severe. A
guide, about our age, mid-20s and bul-
letproof, said that if we wanted, he’d try
it, but only if we drove out to the end of
the Main Street and took a look, literally
from the end of the road.
So, OK. We did. What we saw was
insane. The whole Pacific Ocean was on
an agitated cycle. Normally, you’d try
and guestimate the size of the waves
but there weren’t any. It was more like
a vast pulsing mass of angry suds and a
deafening roar. We were laughing about
what we were going to say to that guide
when we got back to the resort.
“Well?” he said.
“Well what?,” we said.
“You wanna go fishing?”
“Of course, we want to go fishing,” we
said. “Just not here.”
Lesson learned. We headed for the
saloon where we found a house full of
dry docked fishermen who had come
a long way. One of them was the head
of B.C. fisheries. I did not get a good
fishing story that trip, but I got one hell
of a story on Columbia River salmon
mitigation fund allocation.
I’m addicted to the west coast of
Vancouver Island. And it is not just be-
cause when you can get at them, there
are always fish there. It is a drive-to
wilderness. And if there is one thing I’ve
learned about the wilderness, it’s that
people seem to be more civilized there.
I have not had a bad people experi-
ence on Vancouver Island in 30 years of
fishing up there. Everyone, and I mean
everyone I’ve met in the sportfishing
industry up there, has busted their butts
trying to help people have a good time.
I can’t really say that about anywhere
or anything else. They are competent,
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