Grizzlies, Gales and Giant Salmon

by Pat Ardley

  I am so full of wonder that we made it through a whole summer without you here, but I do believe that you were with us in a different way. You were helping where you could, and that’s why we were able to muddle along with no major catastrophes. Thank you to our friends and family who pushed and pulled and held on to us throughout that summer.

  But most of all, thank you for sticking with us when we needed you so badly.

  Bottomless love and thanks Dear,

  Pat

  No Break for Me

  Dear George:

  Casey, Jimmy and I drove Sportspage to West Vancouver past all the familiar bad-weather landmarks: Grief Bay, Cape Caution and the Storm Islands. We made it in record time and shuffled up the dock to the street like our heads were stuffed with cotton batting. Cars zoomed past in all directions at once while we stood transfixed. I felt like I had just returned from the moon.

  I was anxious to meet with friends for coffee. On my way there, I stopped at the doctor to see why I was having trouble swallowing. Did I now have esophageal cancer? She assured me that I had simply cramped the muscles in my throat, in an effort to stave off my heartache. There was a lump down there that I couldn’t get past. Two blocks from the doctor’s, I pulled to the side of the road and cried for twenty minutes while the cramp eased a little. I mopped my face and then continued on to meet my friends. Best decision. And I can tell you, there is nothing more important to me than seeing my family and friends. I will drop everything to meet with them.

  The freight arrived in town not long after, and I started unpacking office work and dove right in to get myself organized. I had always taken a break when we got back from the lodge and would visit with my sisters or just relax while you continued with correspondence, but now I’m doing it all. I’m not as good at contacting guests as you have been. I set up a letter and had price lists printed and started sending out the letter and brochure to stir up more interest in bookings for next year.

  I lost quite a bit of money over the next several years because you always wanted the price lists printed in Canadian dollars for Canadians and US dollars for the US customers. The US dollar has fluctuated a lot lately, and I didn’t trust what was happening with it. I finally decided that they would just have to learn what our dollar is worth and eventually only printed our prices in Canadian dollars. We are in Canada after all.

  I took your place on the dfo’s Sport Fishing Advisory Board. You always believed that we had to stay involved with the politics of West Coast fishing so we wouldn’t be blindsided again by sudden regulation changes. The ban on chinook fishing in 1996 had protected fifty-seven female chinook on the west coast of Vancouver Island and cost the sport-fishing industry 130 million dollars. There were better ways of protecting the salmon for the future of the industry.

  I have had several groups get in touch with me to see if I want to sell the lodge. Beyond the fact that I can’t think about that now, I also don’t want to make a decision like this so soon. It’s Casey and Jessy’s favourite place in the whole world. I would have to think long and hard about selling. And I don’t want people to think that they can offer me peanuts just because it will be a huge job to carry on without you. So I told them all that, no, I wasn’t selling right now but might think about it tomorrow.

  I joined a singing group in North Vancouver with my friends. The power of music and singing has a healing effect on my soul, and it also gave me a focus beyond the lodge and how sad I was. Singing made me breathe better, too, and I found myself standing up straighter to facilitate my breath. The camaraderie of the group felt like a warm blanket wrapped around my shoulders.

  I love you, Dear,

  Pat

  A Big Break for Me

  Dear George:

  Our dearest chef Marc moved back to Quebec after cooking for us for five years, so the following year I interviewed and hired a lovely local fellow. He was with us for two years before he decided that he had to work full-time in town. Many of our staff continued to work with us over the next several years.

  I sometimes take guests out for tours in the afternoon. The country is so beautiful and not just where the trophy fish are. When the tide is almost halfway to low, I show our new guests that, when the water is very still, you can see faces where the reflection of the water meets the shore. I tell them about the totem pole–like images, just like you would. I tell them they have to turn sideways to see the monkeys with big noses, scary masks, and—what do you know—someone I used to know. We wait for the bubbles to subside from the small school of fish that are trying to get away from a bigger fish, and lots of pictures are taken. We have some of these images hanging in our guestrooms. I don’t drive through the narrow channels fast like you did though. I do what I can.

  When the water is very still, you can see “faces” where the reflection of the water meets the shore. When turned vertical they resemble totem poles. We instructed many guests over the years to look for this when the water was flat and calm.

  That summer, I turned over in my sleep and my shoulder dislocated. Yes, it had happened before but never in the busy summer with guests at the lodge that I had to take care of. We tried everything to pop it back in. I had put it back in place twice before, once in the middle of the night and once as I was sliding swiftly down Whistler Mountain in a slippery onesie. But nothing worked this time. Too bad I didn’t have a stash of Ativan that I could pop to help relax the muscles. I ended up flying to Port Hardy the next day to get it fixed. At that point, they had to give me enough drugs to knock out a horse to get my muscles to relax enough so that they could get my shoulder back into place. I spent the last week or so of the summer with my arm in a sling, feeling glad I wasn’t cooking this year.

  One of the dock crew that summer was a little off. Thinking back to my interview with him, I remember that he was wearing a cross on a chain around his neck, and he mentioned his family in such a kind way. I had called one reference, who said he was a good worker, so I hired him. And we were very sorry I did. He scared the crew when I wasn’t around, and was caught throwing apples trying to hit our beloved great blue herons. I had already warned him once and then given him written notice to change his attitude. Any time he was in the tackle shop and saw me walking toward it, the crew said that he would continuously stab the wooden countertop with a hunting knife with a vengeful look on his face. No one wanted to work near him. I had just been warned about him again, when I walked outside and heard him yelling and swearing at Jessy in front of the lodge and in front of several guests. I caught up to him on the back walkway and told him to pack his bags. There was a plane in the area heading back to Port Hardy and he was gone from the lodge in less than an hour. We all breathed a sigh of relief.

  You know that for me, the chef has always been the toughest staff member to hire. Chefs need to have a lot of experience, be creative, not mind living in the wilderness and be able to live away from home for three months. A very tall order for an older, responsible and skilled person.

  We had started preparations for the upcoming 2006 fishing season. I hired a chef who had run his own restaurant and had lots of experience in both cooking and living away from large cities. Partway through the summer, we brought his wife up to stay with him for a week, and I cooked several meals so he could have time off while she was there. After she left, he seemed to deflate. He tried to take shortcuts with meals, but I was always watchful and called him on a few things. The final straw for him was when I told him that frozen peas were not an appropriate vegetable on our guests’ dinner plates. He slammed a tea towel into the counter and stalked off.

  Casey bringing in supplies from the freight boat. The freight boats over the years were never able to make deliveries right at the lodge. We met the freight boats in Darby Channel or at our float outside the bay. Morning, noon and middle of the night, Casey was always ready to spring into action at the lodge. People all over the inlet calle
d on Casey in an emergency.

  I headed back to the house where I had to step over the doggy gate that I had put up to keep my new puppy on the porch. Minutes later I headed out the door and step-tripped over the gate and went flying down the front steps, landing with my left arm twisted under my side. I was filled with immediate, exquisite pain as my wrist bones blew apart into many pieces. Jessy came running with a frozen bag of peas—ha ha, much better use for them—and Casey leaped into action with a board and bandaged my arm into a cast.

  As Casey was cautiously wrapping my arm, the hot-headed chef arrived at my door, walked in and, while he watched the casting process, with me keeled over barely able to breathe through the pain, told me that he was leaving. That meant he was leaving me with a broken wing to cook for twenty-four guests and twelve staff for three more weeks. The next group of twenty-four people were arriving from South Africa, Chile, Costa Rica and Australia in about four hours.

  Both kids tried to talk me into flying to Port Hardy and going to the hospital to have a real cast put on. But I couldn’t do that—not yet. I had to say goodbye to the group that was leaving that day and greet the new group. I had to make sure the kitchen was organized. I had to call the accountant to have them calculate the amount to pay the pathetic cook who was leaving. Mr. Chef, I still wonder what you told your wife!

  I organized the kitchen and flew to the hospital the next day. The X-ray showed pieces of shattered wrist, no surprise there. The doctor wrapped my arm in a real cast that was not as comfortable as the one Casey had put on. I flew back to the lodge and took over the kitchen again.

  While I was gone, Jessy added chef duties to her dock-managing duties. She hadn’t left the kitchen for hours—I get that!—when Bunny walked in and shouted, “Oh God! What’s burning!” The crew’s dinner roast was an absolutely blackened lump of coal that had been welded to the pan. The whole shrivelled mess had to be tossed. Shortly after that, Jessy accidentally added baking soda instead of cornstarch to her meticulously sliced strawberry compote, and the whole pot of stewing gorgeous strawberries exploded like Mount Vesuvius all over the stove, walls and floor. After a major cleanup, and more help from Bunny, Jessy finally got dinner organized again.

  One of the dock crew who had kitchen experience helped me a lot, and the crew always passed the hall at the end of the kitchen to see if I—because of my broken arm—needed anything heavy moved. A guest brought me the milt (you know, the sperm-filled reproductive gland that has a creamy texture) from a male salmon that he had caught that morning. He thought the other guests would love having a taste of it if it were lightly fried in butter. I tried to convince him that I was pretty sure no one else would want any, but I agreed to quickly sauté it as an added “treat” for lunch. He happily passed the plate around the tables and was awfully disappointed when the plate came back to him with not one piece taken. Aside from that failure, we managed to finish the season with the same wonderful four-course dinners that Rivers Lodge built its reputation on.

  That fall I headed to France to meet up with friends. We drove to all the markets, bought gorgeous linens, ate delicious French food, drank lots of wine and saw amazing little towns and hillsides covered in vines, and little tractors pulling wagons full of grapes. While she was back at home, our darling Jessy was in over her head in a relationship with an older man who, I understand now, could see her vulnerability and took advantage. I felt that it was an emergency to get home to try to avert a disaster. A friend of the family offered to kneecap him. I was so very close to agreeing. There was a lot of tension at home, and we spent an excruciatingly bad Christmas season with none of our usual happy celebrations, but thankfully, our family won out in the end, and Jessy came back to her senses and back to us.

  I feel like I’m wearing out, but I love you, Darling,

  Pat

  Edgy Stock Market, Edgy Crew

  Dear George:

  I heard from three different groups of our guests that the new American resort owner near us is trying to undercut our success by telling people at sport shows in the US that Rivers Lodge is going bankrupt and so not to book with us. This, after Casey endlessly helped them with bits and parts, propane tanks and expertise as they were trying to pull a fishing resort together. It was like a knife in the back. Then another resort sent a fast boat around where other lodge guests were fishing, with a huge sign on the side of the boat saying that they will send fishermen a free photo of their fish that they just caught. A blatantly underhanded way of collecting everyone’s address for their own contact list. Oh George, you would not be happy about the way the inlet feels these days.

  Thanks to the instability of the 2007 stock market, some large companies cancelled their fishing trips. Once again, as in the mid eighties, the perception of the owners and top clients of a company going on an expensive fishing trip is not what people want to see, when the people who work for these guys are losing their jobs and losing their homes. There are still people with enough money to come fishing though, and for some people—the people whose eyes glow when they talk fishing stories—it would be the last thing they would give up.

  I hired a young woman to work at the lodge who had sent her excellent resumé from where she lived in Halifax. She wanted to move to the West Coast. She had studied in Europe for several years and now was fluent in German and Spanish, which would be a great asset because some of our large groups were from Germany and South America. Even without meeting her in person, I thought she would be a great addition to our team that summer.

  When she arrived at the lodge, the raven-haired beauty immediately caught Casey’s eye. The two of them soon became inseparable. We had always shied away from having couples at the lodge but Casey assured me that everything would be fine. Things weren’t fine, though—the woman became a major problem. She spread vicious rumours about the kitchen crew and created angst amongst the dock crew, then would head into the kitchen and spread vicious rumours about the dock crew and create angst among the kitchen crew. Before long they were all looking over their shoulders—no one trusted anyone. Jessy tried her utmost to keep the atmosphere from spiralling out of control, but it was exhausting her. We had never had this problem before. This young woman ordered the other crew around, wasn’t doing her own work and went swanning out to climb in the boat whenever Casey did the bait run. This broke a firm rule that we always followed: no extra people riding along on a bait run, as it should only be about business and helping our guests.

  The turning point came one night, as I sat working at my computer. This person came in and started haranguing me. I had given bonuses to a few of the crew for going above and beyond and, as she noted, she hadn’t received one. I had embarrassed her. She, who had barely lifted a finger unless it was to stab someone in the back. Blah, blah, blah, her life is so hard, she yelled. No one understands her. No one likes her. Casey came in and listened for ten whole excruciating minutes. Then they both left, and I could hear heavy objects crashing against the walls next door like there was a moose trying to get out. I sat stunned. What was that? Casey came back into the house and told me that he and this young woman were going to leave the lodge the next day.

  Now this has been no easy thing, George, running the lodge after you died. I knew that the lodge was Casey and Jessy’s favourite place in the world to be. I struggled these past five years, running the lodge to keep the kids happy. This was your thing and their thing. Many times I had checked in with them both to make sure they still wanted to manage the lodge. I asked that they let me know, with lots of time, if they ever wanted to move on to a different career. As I sat there hearing the threat, my breath caught, my heart seized and I knew that I would sell the lodge.

  For the time being though, Casey didn’t leave, so I kept a low profile and stayed away from the woman, until she finally left with the rest of the crew in early September. I used Jessy as a go-between with Casey to keep things running smoothly, and we crawled and c
lawed our way to the end of the season.

  We finished winterizing everything and waved goodbye to the last of the crew as they climbed on a Goose and headed to town. Just Casey, Jessy and I stayed on to tidy up any loose ends, and for some tentative family time as we all tiptoed around the girlfriend issue. One night Jessy and I were waiting for Casey to come over and watch a movie with us, when suddenly there was a glass-shattering, high-pitched shriek that lifted me off the couch. I flew across the room for the door. At the same time as the shriek, the door slammed on Casey’s cabin. As I raced around the house, I had visions of a cougar on Casey’s back and prepared myself to have to haul it off with hand-to-claw combat. What else could make that sound? Casey, however, was standing outside his cabin staring awestruck toward the main bay fifty feet from his dock. A humpback whale had come right up out of the water with its mouth wide open, scooping up the pilchards that were swarming in the bay in the hundreds of thousands. That was the sound of the humpback whale shrieking out of the water. He was telegraphing his friends that tonight’s banquet had started. It was unusual to see so many pilchards in Rivers Inlet, and I wondered if their large numbers helped feed all the humpback whales that we had been seeing in recent years. It was the first time we had ever seen a humpback whale in our main bay.

  The next morning I woke up to the sound of water falling all around. I had never heard such a sound coming from the front of our house, so I crept near a window to see what was happening. I had a vision of the humpback whale being stuck in the bay by the falling tide, and I was afraid that it might come crashing down on top of the house in its panic. Seems that my imagination is often working overtime. What I saw was sudden rushes of pilchards rising together, a foot out of the water then pouring back in. Thousands upon thousands of them lifting out of the water in an effort to get away from the eight hungry seals that were feasting on them. The constant action sounded like a waterfall. The poor pilchards didn’t have a chance. I was starting to get an inkling of how that feels.