Quatsino Sound
By Peter Vassilopoulos
This pristine northwest
Vancouver Island sound is great as a launching point for sport fishing
adventure, a foul weather refuge or a cruising destination all its own
We arrived in Quatsino Sound after
a fast trip up the east side of Vancouver Island in our speedy Monaro 27, Balladeer
II. Rather than risk the trip around the top of the island to complete our
’round Vancouver Island adventure, we opted to load our boat onto a trailer in
Port Hardy and travel the short distance to Coal Harbour by road. The plan was
to launch the boat and continue south as quickly as possible, but after taking
in our surroundings when we got there, we ended up staying a week.
Quatsino Sound is a large, mostly
protected inlet at the northwest end of Vancouver Island. Its entrance is
washed by the vast Pacific Ocean, and large swells often roll around Kains
Island off Cape Parkins to greet the boats emerging from the sound.
Quatsino Sound’s settlements have
a history dating back to the late 1800s, and were founded on fishing, logging
and mining. In more recent years, cruisers have relied on Winter Harbour for
supplies, fuel and sheltered moorage before continuing on their way, and the
sound has been a storied destination for sports fishermen for decades.
The appeal of Quatsino Sound
includes its tranquility and remoteness as well as the promise of big salmon
fishing. Throughout our stay, fishermen were returning after a day of fishing
with catches that included coho and spring salmon, halibut, red snapper and
lingcod.
Coal Harbour At the head of the sound Coal Harbour is a
charming place, quiet and peaceful, with its tranquility interrupted only by
the irregular arrival of boats on trailers waiting to be launched at the old
whaling station ramp, also used now as a landing for floatplanes.
There is a whole new atmosphere on
the west side of Vancouver Island. From a busy world of cruising boats in the
Strait of Georgia and the Broughton Islands, we had entered the arena of
enthusiastic sports fishing. The majority of the boats were no longer plodding
sailboats, trawlers and large cruising yachts, but rather zippy little sports
fishing machines, mostly with high output outboard motors. And for us, the
awareness of the extent of fishing activity on the west coast began right at
Coal Harbour.
On an old privately owned,
converted fish boat, a man was fishing right there at the public dock. “I went
out earlier, just a few hundred metres, and came back with a couple of coho,”
he told us.
Next morning he was off again just
to round up a few more. We were not equipped to go fishing on this trip, so
instead we relaxed at the dock for a while, watching the coming and going of
sports fishing enthusiasts setting off into Quatsino Sound. Then we became
tourists. We walked up the road to the small general store where customers can
sit and enjoy a coffee inside or at tables on the sidewalk in sunny weather.
Nearby there is a much-photographed pair of huge whalebones erected as an
upright arch, a reminder of the whaling history of Coal Harbour.
There is not a great deal of
moorage space at the Coal Harbour dock. Some sports fishermen were tied up and
using their slips as a home base for fishing excursions into Quatsino Sound.
Eric La Couvee and his young family had stayed aboard a small boat adjacent to
us overnight. They travel extensively on Vancouver Island and reminded us about
some of the opportunities and places not to miss in the sound such as the good
crabbing at Marble River, Rupert Inlet and Varney Bay and the good anchorage at
Pamphlet Cove. Later, Florian and Michelle Tovstigo at Eagle Manor Resort
repeated these suggestions at the hamlet of Quatsino. Florian says, “Marble
River is navigable in a small boat for some one or two miles at high tide, and
is worth seeing.”
Holberg The hamlet of Holberg lies at the very tip of
Holberg Inlet—about 18 miles to the northwest of Coal Harbour. There are no
notable anchorages along the way, but this small community of around 200 people
offers a store, restaurant and post office, and guided services to Cape Scott.
The settlement at Holberg was a long-time logging camp with an adjacent
Canadian Forces radar station. Today it is a base for the nearby recreational
fishing areas. It also boasts outstanding bird and wildlife viewing as well as
a unique garden of exotic trees, shrubs and plants.
Leaving Holberg Inlet we travelled
through Quatsino Narrows and on toward the hamlet of Quatsino in Bergh Cove.
Quatsino If you are travelling with
company or plan to meet friends who need a place to stay, lodges such as Eagle
Manor may be the answer. It was for us. This lodge is in an historic settler’s
house near the centrally located hamlet of Quatsino. Built in 1912 on 14
hectares overlooking the sound, it has been lovingly restored and attracts
guests for its ambience and as a base for fishing charters. Needless to say,
the meals are delicious and the atmosphere casual. While sitting at the dock we
watched orcas swimming by not far off.
Nearby is the
settlement of Quatsino with its museum and quaint St. Olaf’s Anglican church. A
memento of the early years, the church was built as a schoolhouse in 1896 and
is one of the community’s oldest remaining buildings.
The early
arrival of settlers at Quatsino saw the coming and going of the steamer Mischief,
carrying homesteaders and supplies. It would stop as close to the communities
or homesteads as possible and offload its cargo by rowboat.
The colonists
who settled Quatsino, like many other places, were promised government help if
they met certain criteria. Like other communities, such as the one at Cape
Scott, some fell slightly short of meeting the requirements for assistance, and
had to struggle on their own or abandon their dreams to the reclamation of the
forests they had so labouriously cleared. Despite a lack of the expected
government assistance, Quatsino survived. The settlement at Bergh Cove thrived,
sharing community gatherings and water-borne excursions with people of the
nearby First Nations village.
The community
today has been much depleted since its heyday, but a few of the original homes
remain with some buildings housing permanent residents and others turned into
lodges and holiday homes.
Port Alice An excursion to Port Alice took us a paltry 20
minutes from Quatsino and the folks at the Port Alice Yacht Club kindly gave us
a place to tie up the boat, as well as a quick tour of the town. The club
offers overnight moorage to mariners coming in off the coast. They have sparse
facilities for guests, but there are showers and laundry at the nearby
campground, as well as a small shopping centre just across the road from the
club. The centre includes restaurants, a general store, post office, bank,
liquor store and a hotel. Port Alice, like many other coastal settlements, has
turned to tourism for its future.
The Anchorages There are some fine, albeit few, anchorages in
Quatsino Sound, including Pamphlet Cove and Julian Cove. These are not far from
the settlement of Quatsino and offer good holding for extended stays. On
previous voyages we had anchored in Pamphlet Cove and now we cruised into the
sheltered, snug basin and noted that nothing had changed in many years.
Other anchorages in Quatsino Sound
include Hecate Cove, Atkins Cove, Julian Cove and Smith Cove. A more exposed
anchorage is in the large Koprino Harbour on the approaches to Winter Harbour.
Anchoring in Koprino Harbour on the way out of inner Quatsino Sound provides
access to the Spencer Cove recreational site, which has a boat launching ramp,
campsites and a small dock. We bypassed this anchorage as it was being
disturbed by winds from the southwest.
Winter Harbour We headed for Winter Harbour located deep
inside Forward Inlet on the western end of Quatsino Sound, where mariners often
await calm seas before going south. Boats arriving in the sound often anchor in
North Harbour in the lee of Matthews Island a short way into Forward Harbour.
Or they continue beyond Hazard Point and Greenwood Point into Winter Harbour,
steering west of the shallows at Hall Bank.
As a busy sports fishing centre in
the summer, Winter Harbour sees a flurry of trailered boats arriving over the
rough 70-mile gravel road and parking at the launch ramp or nearby campgrounds.
Many of them also launch at Port Alice or Coal Harbour and use facilities at
The Outpost marina in Winter Harbour as a base. Fishing takes place off Kains
Island and often some distance out to sea, sometimes in weather I would
consider too rough for venturing beyond the confines of Quatsino Sound.
The settlement at Winter Harbour
has shown little change over the years. A rustic boardwalk winds along the
shore from the main concentration of the community, centred around The Outpost
resort, store and marina, to the adjacent and nearby private homes, B&Bs
and fishing lodges.
We entered the harbour and tied up
at The Outpost’s dock, where we browsed around the store for any supplies that
were running low. We awoke in the morning to the sound of thrashing alongside
the hull. It turned out to be mackerel feeding on shiners. Balls of these tiny
silvery fish swayed around the hull, along the dock and around adjacent pilings
as the mackerel attacked. Nearby a sea otter kept a curious eye on the activity
at the dock.
We were pleased
to be moored in such good shelter, as a storm had been raging on the north
coast of Vancouver Island since our road trip from Port Hardy. A 62-foot
Sonship had arrived from Shearwater, north of Cape Caution, in the midst of the
storm. They had left Shearwater as the storm approached, hoping to beat it to
safety. But the vessel had been pounded in huge seas as the storm overtook them
before reaching the refuge of Winter Harbour. Their experience was a reminder
to us that anyone intent on cruising out of the sound should wait for suitable
weather to avoid any possibility of being caught in high winds and rough
conditions.
But if you are caught waiting out
a West Coast storm, what better place could there be to wait than lovely Winter
Harbour or one of the sheltered areas in Quatsino Sound—that do, fairly
frequently, enjoy long sunny, calm breaks between periods of rolling fog and
summer breezes.
To view the full article click here.
Article supplied by Pacific Yachting Magazine: http://www.pacificyachting.com
