Steelhead Back Roads, Northern British Columbia Fall 2007 -- On The Edge of Maddness

I had just returned from four great days of rainbow fishing on the Kvichak River in Bristol Bay, Alaska and already I was thinking about fall steelhead fishing in British Columbia. I was booked for a spring 2008 trip with Gill McKean of West Coast Fishing Adventures out of Terrace, but something was nagging me that I should move the trip up 6 months. I called Gill to see what he had booked and how late he thought we could get fish. We talked about going north and fishing the Bell-Irving and Meziadin Rivers out of Stewart; the best time for me was late October. Gill had a potential client from Sweden that was also interested.

The Swedish client wouldn't commit and in the end I decided to fish by myself for 5 days starting October 23nd; the trip was set. I was to fly to Terrace out of Seattle, Gill would pick me up at the airport and we'd be on our way to Stewart, and that's the way it happened. We arrived in Stewart as it was getting dark, dropped the jet boat off at a friends home and checked into our hotel. After a couple of beers I was ready to call it a night, it had a been a long day and tomorrow would be here soon.

The next morning I met Gill in the restaurant. It was raining hard and as we ate breakfast and waited for our take-out lunches it turned to snow; it started to snow hard. It was still dark when we placed our gear in the truck and headed out of town. There is a long uphill grade as you leave Stewart, a pass, and the snow increased as we gained altitude. Plows had been through some time during the night but driving treacherous even with the big 4-wheel drive turbo diesel. At one point a grizzly crossed the road about 150 yards ahead of us; seemed late for him to be roaming around.

At the junction with 37 we turned south along Meziadin Lake; we were headed for the confluence of the Meziadin and Nass Rivers. The Meziadin is a short river that drains Meziadin Lake, it is clear whereas the Nass River carries a heavy load of silt. At an old logging road we pulled off the highway and dropped down toward the river. It continued to snow and the heavily snow laden alders were bent across the road in front of us. Finally, we reached the end of the road and I could see where the two rivers came together about a 100 yards from the truck.

It was long before the rods were rigged and we were following a path to the river. The water level in the Meziadin was low as we reached the bank of the river and started out into the current. I followed Gill as we worked our way toward the middle of the stream us above where it flowed into the Nass; the clear water of the Meziadin in stark contrast with the muddy Nass. We looked over the pools and Gill instructed me to cast to the seam between the two water colors. I was using my 8/9-weight switch rod with an egg pattern and strike indicator. I watched the line hit the water and followed the strike indicator as it followed the line between the two rivers and then suddenly the strike indicator went under and I was hooked into a good steelhead, on the first cast! At first the fish hung in the current but suddenly it came at me and I struggled to get the slack out. The fish came to the surface, rolled and my line went limp. I just wasn't ready for a fish on the first cast, and I blew the opportunity and I knew it. On the other hand I thought, wow, there must be a lot of fish here.




An hour later, I still hadn't had another take. We moved around a little, and changed egg patterns but nothing. Gill decided to move upstream so we hiked back to the truck retracing our drive in and then turning onto another logging road and down to a bridge that crossed the river. The river below the bridge fell-off rapidly in a series of rapids a rather sharp bend to the left; above the bridge was a long, wide pool 4-6 feet deep that looked promising. I moved up the left bank and out into the pool and started drifting egg patterns. A half hour later I returned to the truck to eat lunch.

After lunch I crossed the river and took a position on the right bank below the bridge. The river narrowed here and the current was fast. There was a deep seem in front of me and I cast upstream as far as possible to allow the egg to sink before hitting the hole. There was not much room to move down stream due to overhanging vegetation and the manner in which the bottom dropped off. I must have made 20-30 casts when suddenly I had a strike and hooked the fish. It had the current behind it as line started to peel off my reel, the fish jumped clear of the water and threw hook. It was over almost as fast as it started. I continued to work the hole for a while and then moved up above the bridge. The day ended steelhead 2, fly fisher 0.






The next day started cold and clear. We retraced the previous days footsteps and started at the confluence of the rivers. After a hour or so, not a take. We tried swinging some flies and still nothing. I went back to egg patterns and finally had a strike almost at my feet, it felt like a good fish but suddenly it was off and I was batting 0 for 3. After another 30 minutes or so and no take we moved back upstream, fished above and below the bridge without success and then had lunch. Tracks in the snow suggested that others had been to this spot earlier in the day. After lunch we crossed the bridge and drove to what looked like an old trail that paralleled the river. It was well above the river. Finally, we dropped of the trail and into the woods. The trailed ended up across from where we had been fishing in the morning. There was a large deep pool on this side of the river and it was immediately clear that if a hooked fish was allowed to leave the pool there would be no way of stopping it the turbulent water that rimmed the area. That didn't turn out to be problem because after an hour we didn't a single take decided to hike back to the truck and return to Stewart.

On day three we decided to move up the Casiar Highway to the Bell-Irving. This required the jet boat which we retrieved after breakfast. Cold and clear again as we pulled out of Stewart. As we headed north on the Casiar the mountains were heavy with fresh snow. The drive took about 1.5 hours on extremely icy roads; at one point a tractor-trailer lay on its side in a ditch. We came to a spot where the Bell-Irving was close to the highway and pulled off the road and down to the river at spot that appeared to be used to launch boats. Another guide with 3 clients pulled in almost behind us. They had fished this section of the river earlier in the week and landed one fish for 3 rods. They launched first and headed downstream, we followed and went upstream. The river was fairly low and log jams eventually blocked our progress. We beached the boat and waded upstream. We fished various holes for over an hour without any takes and then returned to the boat. We drift and fished from the boat, pasted the launch point and continued downstream. We saw several fresh bear tracks along the way.


We fished several stretches of river downstream without success. The clear morning turned to overcast and remained cold with occasional flurries. Discouraged we returned to the truck, pulled the boat from the river and motored back to Stewart.

That evening Gill and I decided to return to Terrace and do some late season coho fishing and to try for steelhead in streams along the way . The next morning we pulled out of Stewart and headed south. Me made three stops along the way but I luck didn't change; no steelheads. We pulled into Terrace late afternoon had and early dinner and I checked into a motel.

The next morning Gill picked me up a daybreak and we headed west toward Prince Rupert. Highway 16 follows the right bank of the Skeena River. At the Exchamsiks we pulled into a parking lot and launched the jet boat under the bridge. For almost an hour we ran up the valley which is lined by spectacular peaks with hanging glaciers and waterfalls. The weather was heavy overcast and raining.



The Exchamsiks snakes back and forth up the valley. Visibility in the water is excellent although the water is the color of dilute tea. The air temperature was considerably warmer than the past 4 days. We saw several groups of coho; the plan was not to stop, but to fish our way downstream. We went as far up the river as possible by jet boat and then got out to wade in a long deep pool. We tried a variety flies and caught one Dolley Varden and several white fish on egg patterns but no coho. We moved downstream where we spotted some coho earlier and I switched to clouser and finally hooked a good coho and then a second one shortly thereafter. The fish were still fairly bright considering how late it in the season. I hooked and released one more coho, a dark male, before we called it day and the end of my first fall steelhead trip.



I was disappointed that I had hooked 3 steelhead but failed to bring any to the net and Gill was generally disappointed in the number of steelhead we encountered. Commercial fishing near the mouth of the Skeena River earlier in the season had taken it's toll on the summer/fall steelhead return with the result that many guides had moved north in search of fish. That combined with evidence that individuals were using bait in the Meziadin (illegally) may have impacted that fishery, but for whatever reason the fish just weren't there. In spite of all that it was a fun trip and I will definitely do it again.