"Dick's" fish camp at Mystery Lake


A MYSTERY LAKE

You wouldn’t believe this, but Western Outdoor turned this tale down for publication because they thought it was fiction, which they don’t accept. So maybe truth is stranger than fiction, after all.

After a long rambling argument over beer and cigars one night, my old fishing buddy Sam convinced me that I should spin a tale, for all you rabid trout fishermen out there, about the joys of our previously secret fishing hideaway. So, here goes a “true” fish story about one of my favorite spots, which Sam has since fallen in love with as well.

This rather rustic place (to say the least) is about 25 miles up a four wheel drive road off the Trans Canada highway, in central British Columbia.

The camp is really interesting, as is the owner, an old guy who we will call Dick. Dick really doesn't care for guests, and only tolerates them because they bring in (barely) enough money to support his drinking habit. Accordingly, he does everything possible to discourage them. To start with, he only has an obsolescent radiophone with no assigned phone number. Because almost every one of these phones was phased out about 10 years ago, no one, including the telephone operators, has a clue as to how to contact him, even if you have broken the code and obtained the channel name and number. So you spend 10 minutes arguing with an operator, and maybe after the third try you get Dick on the phone. Then you have to convince him to rent you a cabin. If it is early in the morning, you have a chance, if after noon, forget it, as he probably won't even answer the phone.

Sam stringin' his pole.
Note how the cabin sides sag.

It's also a good idea to call him back (going through the same hassle discussed above) about a week before your planned arrival date to make sure he hasn't forgotten. Not that he is overrun with business, but he just might have decided to shut the place down and take off for parts unknown, at the time of your planned stay.

Then there is the problem of getting there. As I mentioned, it is 25 miles up a four wheel drive road. I didn't mention that along the way there are innumerable road branches and cross roads going in all directions, and Dick, of course, does not believe in signs. If you had the foresight to get directions when booking, it still doesn't do much good as his verbal instructions are incomprehensible. For the last mile the road becomes downright impassable. Once a young friend of mine stuck his truck here so bad that we had to get two four wheel drives to pull it out.

What a sight awaits when you finally get there. The facilities are about 35 years old, and have had zero maintenance for the last 30. I have heard tales that there is a well somewhere, but otherwise there is no water except the lake, and no indoor plumbing. Some of the outhouses, however, do have doors. The cabins sag in all directions, with the floors being so uneven you get dizzy just walking across the floor, even without one of Sam's strong cigars. They also have wood stoves, which are totally burnt out, and smoke so bad they will drive you outside. Sometimes, if one is lucky, Dick even provides wood. Sam anticipated this, and brought along presto logs, which burnt so hot they almost melted the stove, and got the cabin up to about 120 degrees. Of course there is no electricity, but Dick does furnish one old time gas lantern, which you can sometimes get going without an explosion. The beds all sag, and in some cabins are partitioned off like the cribs in an old time whorehouse. (Or so the big boys tell me.) Bedding is non existent. There are some dishes, but if you use them, Dick charges you an additional twenty dollars.

Mystery Lake from the cabin front door.

Speaking of the cabins, the guests sometimes must share them with strange forest creatures. But let me explain. One night I am wakened from a sound sleep by Sam yelling and banging around. I ask him what is the problem, and he says that there is a rat in the cabin. I tell him that if it bothers him that much to get up, open the door and let it out, but not to wake me up with his problems. Sam replies that he (the rat) is eating our apples. So what's wrong with sharing, I ask, and try to go back to sleep over the sound of crunch, crunch, crunch. I don't know why Sam got so upset, as we trimmed off the parts, which the rat had gnawed on, and there was no real harm done.
Anyway, Sam now brings a BIG box of Decon, and gets real satisfaction from listening to the rats slurping this up.

Sam really appreciates the informality and the absence of women, who generally have enough sense to stay home. The informality, however, sometimes goes a bit far, as when Dick takes a pee out the front door of the office. Dick though, is really an OK guy after he has his second cup of coffee about 9:00 AM, and before he has had his fourth beer, at about 11:30. After Noon, if you want Dick, forget it, its every man for himself. Dick, incidentally, is the only guy I know who buys his beer by the pallet load.

So why do we go to this place. Simply because the fishing is fantastic. Rainbow up to 4 pounds, and we never fail to get our limit. Two days, though, is usually enough, before one has to retreat to the nearest town to get a hot shower and some decent food.

PS. We asked the Editors to run a contest to see if any of you fishermen out there could identify this camp, but on the advice of their attorneys, they declined.

John, after a hard day fishin'

MYSTERY LAKE AGAIN

You see, Sam and I don’t also stay in exotic lodges. We like the rustic places as well. The place I talked about in the previous story, for instance. And we like it so well that we fish there often. So here goes a story about another one of those trips.

Mystery Lake from the fish camp dock.

This trip was really nothing very exciting. Just limited out on two pound Rainbow Trout in two days. The loons, though, made this feat a bit difficult, as you will soon see.

Started out in Kamloops as usual, going to our favorite restaurant, The Keg, the first night. They probably should have named it Hooters instead, for reasons we don’t need to get into. Anyway, the scenery was great, and the food was acceptable. Sam though, thought that giving us bibs to keep us from drooling on the table was a little much.

Next morning for breakfast, our luck changed. Arriving at our favorite Denny’s we were seated, against our objections, in the unlucky section. And guess what?? Anything we tried to order, they didn’t have. Finally in desperation, we got the manager to ask the cook for a list of what he DID have.

Arriving at the fish camp, our bad luck held. Setting up the boat, we found that the hose connecting the motor to the gas tank was missing, and presumably had been left at home. We appealed to Dick, the owner, but instead of loaning us a spare hose, he insisted in renting it to us for ten dollars. That turned out to be his bad luck, because his intransigence on the hose issue cost him a twenty dollar tip, so he was out ten dollars on the transaction. Some people just never learn.

Mystery Lake looking north

One really does have to watch one’s pennies at Dick’s. At CAN $50 per night for the cabin, and an additional CAN $20 per day for the boat, one could go broke quick, if one was not careful.

As I said before, the fishing was great, but the loons were getting smarter. After checking us out for most of the first day, they decided that we were reasonably good fishermen, and started shadowing the boat. The result was, when we got a fish on, the loons dove for it, and it was a race to see if we could boat the fish before the loons got him. We managed to save about two out of three, but sometimes it was close. It is quite a site to see a loon paddling around eating your fifteen inch fish, while laughing at you with his RACK, RACK, cry. I have, incidentally, caught an unlucky loon or so (instead of the fish) under these circumstances, but not this time.

All in all it was a good trip. Fantastic fishing, and the weather was warm and sunny for a change. The rats ate the Decon instead of our food, and Sam’s excellent cooking made up for the terrible Australian wine, which he had brought. The Forest Service had even graded the last two miles of road into the place, for the first time in living memory. Although this eliminated the Jeep eating potholes, I suppose the improved road will eventually screw up the fishing.

I wonder, though, if those guys staying next door ever caught any fish on the flies we told them we were using.
















Sunset over Mystery Lake

AND YET ANOTHER MYSTERY LAKE TALE

After skipping a year, (due to lethargy and medical problems) Sam and I decided to give fishing at Mystery Lake, in central British Columbia, another try.

As we may have mentioned, this place is really interesting, as is the owner, an old Pollock named Dick. Dick really doesn't care for guests, and only tolerates them because they bring in (barely) enough money to support his drinking habit. However, times change, and with son Dickie now being his partner, things have improved somewhat.

In the old days, he only had an obsolete radiophone with no assigned phone number. Because almost every one of these phones was phased out about 15 years before, no one, including the telephone operators, had a clue as to how to contact him, even if you had broken the code and obtained the channel name and number. Now, although still sticking with the old phone, they have e mail, so If you can get hold of their address, which seems to be a closely held secret, you can book by that means, and maybe get a confirmation a week or so later.

Dickie also has made two significant improvements, he has pretty much rat and mouse proofed the cabins, so you no longer have to spend the night with these pesky forest creatures. And has installed doors, but no locks, on most of the outhouses. To compensate for all this luxury, though, he has raised prices to $CAN60 per night.

Speaking of money, we got two more nasty shocks before the trip got well underway. The exchange rate at the bank was $CAN.985 to $US1.00, almost one to one, and the BC Government had classified all Americans as ALIENS, thus justifying a charge of $CAN53 for an 8 day fishing license.

Anyway, upon arrival, we stowed our gear in short order, and then hit the lake. Temperature was near 60 degrees F, best I had seen there in September, real shorts and tee shirt weather for Canada. But guess what, no fish.

We tried every fly and lure we could think of, but all to no avail. I finally had to physically restrain Sam from trolling his tackle box, which he said would probably be more efficient. Even the loons, who usually hang around in hopes of stealing a hooked fish before one can reel it in, decided that shadowing us was a waste of time, and deserted the cause. Only consolation was that other fishermen seemed to be catching nothing as well. Anyway, after several hours of this, we gave up and retired for a session of beer and cigars on the cabin porch, which seemed to be a more productive use of our time.

Next day though, our luck changed, and we managed to almost catch our limits before heading home.

All in all, despite a slow start, it was a successful trip, and I even managed to almost convince Sam that due to the 5000-foot altitude, I was incapable of doing much useful work. The trip home was uneventful, except costing us $CAN100 for enough gas to get to the US, and a two hour delay at the border caused by the US Border Protection guys hassling every Canadian car coming through.

A nice mess of Mystery Lake fish