We hung around this same area for another good two hours, and did get some action.  Greg had a big white glow Tomic plug on at 48' when his rod tip got pulled right under the water!  He grabbed the rod but had a bit of trouble on the reel in to set the hook and the fish was off even before he got any weight on it.  This scenario seemed to be playing out for some of the other anglers as well.  When we did see someone with a fish on they'd either be reeling in just the hook after the hit or, they'd have the fish right by the boat and that hook would just "slip" out!  After the boat traffic picked up to the point of being DufusVille, we decided to call it a trip.  I've seen alot of Dufus's on our home lakes but some of these guys may just top the list!  When you've got 30 or more boats cutting you off and "butting" in where your fishing, it gets pretty frustrating and can really put a damper on what should be a great outing.

Speaking of dampers on great outings, here's a Dufus/Zipperhead story for ya!  Apparently, people on Vancouver Isl. don't like us folks from other parts of BC to fish their waters!!  That's right, in fact, they even have a name for us, they call us "inlanders"!!  Greg and I had just returned to the resort to meet up with our buddies and have an ale in the ambiance of the setting sun when we saw our guys embroiled in a verbal jousting match with some other angler.  It got to the point where it was "well come over here and we'll settle it!" kind of thing but finally the blowhard bubble headed salad tossing finch $%^#*& walked away, quickly turning around every couple steps to give us the "stare down" tactic. What was it about?  Our buddies fishing guide had parked his boat, where it was supposed to be, and the Dufus had put his coolers right in the same spot.  So the guys moved the coolers down the dock about 15' to where Dufus boat would have been parked.  When this guy parked his boat he saw the coolers had been moved and blew a gasket.  He had the usual ka ka coming from his yap and told us to leave and never come back and that he'd been coming here for 14 years and we weren't welcome here, us "inlanders", blah blah blah blah!  What a moron.

In any event, we had a great time!  We came home with a few pounds of fish to feed on, got some sunburn but more importantly, got off the couch!  Sure, its easy to toss the old boat into the local lakes but it sure is nice to try different spots, especially for salmon.  I haven't been to any other resorts such as Critter Cove but I can tell you, there will be a return trip here.  You can't beat the friendliness and service that awaits you here.  Nice to meet you Catherine, I know you won't remember us because of all the folks you deal with.  Another story, our second night there was supposed to be on the floor of Greg's boat!  He only managed a cabin for one night so was laughing all day about me having to sleep on the floor next to the fishy bilge.  When we were back cleaning up some of our fish we saw a boat being towed in to the resort, apparently the guy caught a crab pot line and it wrapped around his prop. My first thought was "great, maybe he's leaving now and we can get his room!", is that a bad thing?  I ran for the office and put in our request and low and behold, later that evening the fella had to get towed back to Gold and we got his room!!!  No stinky floor!  If your planning such a trip, book now, they fill up fast and unless you have a big boat to sleep in, the cabin route is the only way to go.

So we headed back to Gold River, big winds came up and that inlet all the way back was really boiling!  We spoke to a couple fellas in a open 16' aluminum who just got back and they were pretty white!  Not a good place to be in a small boat.  Back at Gold River we stayed in a local hotel for the night, supper at the local pub and headed out early the next AM to catch the ferry again at Duke Pt..  Oh, here's a word of warning.  Do not, I repeat, do not, get into an argument with the ticket folks at the ferry terminal.  Greg was insisting to the "gal" that his boat was not over height, because they hadn't charged that on the way over.  She of course got her measuring stick and found that the top of the windshield was in fact 6" to high!  That only compounded the problem that we had reserved a spot but, we were 5 minutes late so lost the reservation!  I told her we were waiting in line!  Didn't matter, the reservation rule is that you have to be there 30 minutes before boarding. I guess we would have made it if we hadn't got lost and wound up down around Chemainus and had to turn around to even make the ferry!  Lucky for us the ferry wasn't full and we got on with the "regular folk".  The remainder of the trip was uneventful, diesel isn't any more expensive than it is back here in "inlanders" country.  I did find that apparently 125 kmh downhill isn't fast enough for Albertans, as they were passing me like I was sitting in a lawn chair!  If you ever get a chance to head out onto the chuck, give Critter Cove Resort a whirl, I really don't think you'll be disappointed, Greg's making our reservations for next year as I type!  Four nights this time and no sleeping on the slimy floor!