Canadian Adventure.....

[alun j.]

Just got back from visiting friends and relatives on Vancouver Island........ a little island [the size of England] off the coast of a HUGE country.

 

I will post more details later.....but in five little trips I certainly experienced variety:

 

* spinning off a breakwater into over 100 feet of freezing cold water, trying to avoid fronds of kelp like treetrunks .... hauled out the most fiercesome fish you'd ever seen , a LINGCOD about 10 -12 lbs....a huge head full of teeth like a baracuda .........but it had to go back as it was in a conservation zone [ but I could have kept it if I'd been a Native Indian !! { hunting rights}]

 

* charter trip out to Swiftsure Bank ........22 miles out water comes up from 500 feet plus to about 300.......rods like poles , 2 lb leads, drifting with huge plugs or lure spoons on spreader boom........targetting HALIBUT....but.......rough conditions [ cross between perfct storm and our 'wind against tide'] what skipper called a 'snotty sea' only allowed sealegs to stand 30 mins. ...... but each drop produced a fish ........ lingcod [keepable,,,,over 70 cms.= about 10 lbs], seabass [not like ours; these look like the American freshwater bass [perch without stripes] and dark brown; some bright orange [ I mean fluorescent] rockfish and a cod [ like ours] but this got eaten!!; between hooking the bite and winding up from the depths......something had bitten great chunks out of it and there was little more than head,tail and bone in between!!

 

Back close inshore we joined a fleet of boats trolling with downriggers, using a hure lead ball on a wire to hold your bait / lure at a fixed depth [ 40 - 60 feet down in about 80 -90 feet........just a few yards off the coast]

Up and down, up and down at about 2 mph..........until BANG,,,,,,, a fish hits and pulls the line off the downrigger and you now have a salmon on basically a flyrod with a centrepin reel and no lead,,,,, and a lure with a single barbless hook [Canadian rules]. Most boats carry on , using the engine to help play the fish; but I asked him to stop,,,,,,,and 15 - 20 minutes of arm-aching fun got me a pb salmon of 24 lbs.

 

I saw two other boats hook into fish in a 30 min. spell, then all was dead...wierd!

 

* other new experience was fly fishing off the beach; swallow water , wading out in thermal waders at first light after pink salmon [ trout sized fish 2- 4 lbs] and wow! do they fight!..........but hard work to get just one fish!.....a lot get off those barbless hooks

 

Fantastic place to go fishing........spectacular scenery keeps distracting you BUT fishing is not easy........there's lots of water and concerns over fish stocks, fish farms and conflicts of interests

 

I'll post again in a different forum on the rules and regulations .......... I could see it coming our way in the not too distant future

 

I will definitely be returning there to fish again.......armed with a little experience.

 

Alun.

[Manic Moore]

Sounds fantastic. I love to try new styles and venues (preferably other countries)

[Member Removed]

Good to have you back, fancy an evening this week?

 

S

Pinafore