That's awesome, so you've seen the nakwakto rapids do their thing! We only work with barges so I don't have the salmon fishing option unfortunately. I do bring along fishing gear though incase we are ever tied up in a decent spot
I may have to start packing an inflatable dingy as we go to some premier fishing locations lol.
We went through Schooner Channel had to break the tow down and tow 12 sections at time one slackish tide at a time. I roared through there standing on a bundle of logs when we pulled a boom stick through there lucky to be alive actually was just exciting then.It would take 4-5 days to rebuild the tow on the other end. I would get off watch and sleep go back on watch 6 hours later a mile farther from home.Bucking tides in Johnstone Strait. A little info on the area.
Cruise Planning Center > Featured Articles > Article Title
Beyond Nakwakto Rapids
By Réanne Hemmingway and Don Douglass
Pacific Yachting, December 1999
HIDDEN behind the world's fastest tidal rapids lies a totally landlocked area, little-known to cruising boaters. Here, two major fjords--Seymour and Belize inlets--cut deep into the mainland coast range off the southern end of Queen Charlotte Sound. Although the area is only 28 miles north of Port Hardy, it has largely been ignored as a cruising destination, because its entrance, guarded by Nakwakto Rapids, has been turbulent enough to discourage large numbers of pleasure craft.
Study the charts of this area (3550, 3552, 3921) and you'll notice the many fingers that spread out northward, eastward, and southward from Seymour and Belize inlets: from Lascelles Point east through the rapids, and from Lassiter Bay to Seymour River is a distance of over 50 nautical miles. Here you see a series of lagoons, there an arm, a long sound, and numerous bays. Four major watersheds drain an area of roughly 1,000 square miles through Nakwakto Narrows, a passage less than 400 meters wide where the rapids can attain a velocity of up to 16 knots on a spring ebb tide. How can you not be intrigued? This is a true wilderness cruising destination, worthy of at least two weeks' exploration.
One of the last areas to be explored along the British Columbia coast (1865) these waters, which were only partially surveyed in the 19th Century, were a holdout for indigenous natives who penetrated further into the backcountry as Europeans arrived. Chart 3552, issued in 1987, was the first chart to show details of Seymour & Belize inlets. Prior to that, the inlets and sounds within this area were shown by dashed lines. It is here, too, that an exceptional, little-known rock painting documents the last European encounter with the native holdouts.
Chart 3552, issued in 1987, was the first chart to show details of Seymour and Belize inlets. Prior to that, dashed lines denoted the inlets and sounds of this area. Both inlets were named in honor of Frederick Seymour wh, in1865, was appointed governor of B.C. The unlikely name, Belize, comes from the fact that Seymour had previously served as lieutenant governor of British Honduras where he was based in the capital city (the name of the now-independent country). He died of acute alcoholism about four years after his appointment, but no one thought it appropriate to rename the inlets.
TWO CHANNELS From Queen Charlotte Sound, entry into this wonderland of fjords and lagoons lies through Schooner Channel or Slingsby Channel. Since all the water behind Nakwakto Narrows flows in and out of these two channels, tidal streams are strong on all tides, sometimes reaching 5 to 9 knots. In fact, so much water empties out of the area that the tidal range inside Seymour and Belize inlets never has a chance to fluctuate more than four feet before the outside tide--more than 14 feet in range--comes roaring back in.