Shawl Bay, BC

Sunday,

We left Port Hardy at 0500 (yawn) in order to fish along Duvall Point (according to our beautifully-French-accented dock neighbor, that’s the ONLY place to catch King Salmon)…arrived, along with a bunch of fishing boats, and proceeded to troll. I did my part - I kept the boat at under 2.0 knots and in over 320 feet of water……..Bob got everything ready, trolled for , oh, I don’t know, maybe 30 minutes - and OOPS….the cable on the downrigger got caught. Soooo, we finally had to cut the cable, leaving the weights and cable on the sea floor. Our story is that we actually hooked a 200-pound halibut and the two of us couldn’t haul it up so we had to cut the line. We’re sticking to it.

So, we went back to Port Hardy (not a super great town, by the way - makes Neah Bay look good) in search of another downrigger cable. Ummmm, it’s SUNDAY. Nothing is open, so Bob said, that’s enough, let it go. We left Port Hardy’s government docks (not much to recommend there, either) and headed across the Queen Charlotte Straits for the third time. (Lucky for us the weather has been very calm). While we were running, we were accompanied by a really huge sea lion. He/she was simply enormous - very pale, almost white….but simply enormous. Entertained us for a few miles while he/she dove and surfaced. We anchored in a little bay in the Walker Group for the night. It was calm, it was peaceful, it was BORING. But, we caught five crab, so all is not lost.

Total so far: crab is now $20 each (based on the $110 paid for the fishing license.) No prawns so far. I’m disappointed.

Monday

After pulling up more crab and cooking them, we left our anchorage and headed back to the Broughton Archipelago, where we feel a lot more comfortable. This is our fourth crossing of Queen Charlotte Straits…..all the stories are hooey. They say the Straits are dangerous, scary, etc., etc. So far, we’ve been lucky. They’ve been fine. Today, it was calm as a mill pond. (Next year it’ll be insane and I will eat these words.)

We’ve anchored for the night in a tiny cove on Dickson Island. Absolutely nothing to recommend it except total isolation, which isn’t a bad thing. We’ll take off tomorrow for a little more fishing…..still hunting for anything with fins!

Tuesday

We went to Sullivan Bay Marina here in the Broughtons, which had the necessary cable for the downrigger, AND a to-die-for cherry turnover, hot from the over. Yum. After fishing for a few hours, (no luck) we anchored for the night in Carriden Bay, which could easily win my “best anchorage in the Broughtons” award. We were alone in a lovely big bay, as still as a mill pond…..and pulled out three spot prawns. Okay, so 3 prawns is not a lot, but at least we know the bait works.

We are spending tonight (Wednesday) in the Shawl Bay Marina. We’ve been here before - a nice little marina, with pancake breakfasts for travelers. We won’t be leaving until AFTER breakfast. Tomorrow we will go to Pierre’s at Echo Bay - a favorite marina. Tove and Pierre are just the best hosts ever. Tove greets boaters wearing a tiara and carrying roses - how much more welcome can you get, eh?