Corbett Lake Diaries: Stories for the Fireside Angler

By J. E. Baker

J.E. Bakers Corbett Lake Diaries will transport you on a nostalgic trip through the Golden Age of fly-fishing and five-star wilderness lodges from the era of Roderick Haig-Brown and General Money. Along the way youll experience fishing for grayling in the waters that drain into the Arctic Ocean, angling for trout in the big lakes of Interior British Columbia, and searching for steelhead and salmon in the waters along the Pacific Northwest.

In Bakers short stories, youll be introduced to a host of characters that the author meets through his connection with a very special fishing lodge, Corbett Lake. These insightful anecdotes approach the world of fishing and nature with reverence and humor. Youll long to travel these highways and byways for yourself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 7, 2009
• ISBN: 9781440168635

J. E. Baker

J.E. Baker was born in Victoria, British Columbia. A musician and professional fly tier, he travels throughout western North America fishing and performing. His deep interest in the natural environment is reflected in his stories. He works from his home base in the Selkirk Mountains overlooking the Columbia River.

Book preview

Mrs. Evans’ Gramophone

Fall comes early to Corbett Lake. Mid-October signals the end of the fishing season, and even for those hearty souls that remain, sudden snow squalls and blustery weather can leave even the most ardent fly fisherman lingering a little longer than usual by the fireplace or over morning coffee.

The ending of a season brings mixed feelings of both regret and anticipation, regret that the current season is coming to an end; anticipation that a new one will begin with new tackle to try and new methods to master. Above all, the end of the season allows time for reflections on seasons past, of other lakes and other times. The snow arrived last night leaving no doubt that winter is well on its way. Sitting in the cabin on the hill, I’m taken back to another lake, the lake of my boyhood, the lake where I first learned to fish and then ultimately fish with the fly.

Every angler speculates at some time or another how the infatuation with angling began. Are anglers born with the instinct, or do they acquire the desire over time? Looking back on my own experiences, the answer is probably both. In my own case, the foundation to become a fisherman was established early in childhood.

One of my earliest memories was sitting at the side of a ditch with my friend Carrie Hemstock ‘fishing’ with a cane pole, the kind designed to secure tomato plants and cleverly liberated from my mother’s garden supplies, along with the string that make up the line. It didn’t really matter that we had no hooks or bait and that the drainage ditch in front of Mr. Renoff’s house had only about four inches of stagnant water in it, and no possibility of fish. We were fishing. I think I was about three or four years old at the time.

It was about then that the summer trips to my grandparents’ cabin at the lake began to become a regular occurrence. At the time, the lake contained cutthroat and rainbow trout, and for a youngster with an attraction for fishing, Sundays at the lake came as close to heaven as one could get. Upon arrival, I would disappear and most often would not reappear until Sunday supper. Those times were spent as most boys spend them, catching bugs, observing the water, and above all – fishing, first, for sculpins or bullheads, then as I got older, for trout.

I came from a family of bait fishers and trollers, and by the age of nine my tackle consisted of a short solid glass bait casting road, a Shakespeare level wind reel, and my most prized possession, my very own eight foot row boat. At the age of nine, the lake was mine and I was the master of my domain.

My introduction to the concept of fly fishing was a gradual one. It started, oddly enough, with the tobacco industry. One of the brands of cigarettes used to feature trout fly prints on the back of the packages. As soon as I saw one, I grew instantly fascinated with the idea of actually being able to catch a trout on one of these creations. I collected all of the packages I could find, laboriously cut out the image of the flies and glued them into a scrapbook. I scoured the neighbourhood collecting pop bottles. The refund on each was five cents, and with the proceeds purchased my first two flies, a Parmachenee Belle and a Silver Doctor. Both were snelled and by my recollection now, poorly tied. Up to that point, I had no idea what fly gear looked like or how to fish it. I didn’t know anyone who fly-fished, let alone had ever seen anyone actually doing it. The local hardware store didn’t carry much in the way of fishing tackle and were less than helpful with an inquisitive child who had no real chance of being able to purchase such tackle even if they had it in stock.

All of this changed on a trip from my home on Vancouver Island to Portland, Oregon. My parents had generously given me twenty dollars for spending money. The big city beckoned, and one of the places that caught my attention was a place that sold all manner of fishing tackle. I came out with a six dollar rod, a cheap reel and line, and a small green aluminium fly box. What it did not come with were any instructions on how to use it. But no matter, the threshold had been crossed. I was going to be a fly fisherman.

From then on, my pattern of fishing habits changed dramatically. Weekdays were spent practising casting on the front lawn in eager anticipation of the possibility of a fishing day on Sunday. I became more interested in the hatches of insects on my grandparents’ lake and morning and evening became the focus of my efforts. With some persuasion, my parents started to extend their weekly visits into the fall where previously they would end their summer activities with Labour Day and the beginning of the school year. September rapidly became my favourite month of the year and the measure of my early success.

Autumn is a time of transformation on many waters. The weather starts to cool; the trees start to adopt the panorama of colour associated with fall. The air has a certain edge that indicates that winter is not far away. The dragon and damselflies disappear and instead smaller hatches and terrestrial insects take their places. After the summer doldrums the trout start to resume their feeding activity with progressively more enthusiasm in readiness for winter.

September was a special time at my grandparents’ place. Most of the ‘summer people’ returned to the city locking up their cabins for the winter. The quantity of boaters diminished with the decline of summer water sports and a quiet calm settled over the lake. The evening air hung heavy with a damp chill that is typical of west coast waters at that time of the year.

The smell of wood-smoke was prevalent in the air and overhead, flights of ducks passed on their way south. As a budding fly fisherman, the fall meant two things to me, the chance to take trout consistently on the dry fly and Mrs. Evans’ gramophone.

In early September, an annual event occurs throughout southern Vancouver Island. The forests become alive with large flying insects. As children we called them termites. I was never to understand what triggered this event, but as a fisherman, I was certainly aware of it. It soon became the highlight of my season. At this time of the year, one could count on the bigger fish in the lake feeding almost exclusively on these terrestrial insects for three weeks or more. Quite by accident, I learned that if I rowed upwind and let the boat drift its natural course, I could present a dry fly to the rising fish as I passed. Quite unbeknown to me, I had taken the classic drift method from stream fishing and adapted it to lake fishing with me moving rather than a current. I used the boat’s motion to present the fly in the feeding ‘lanes’ as the trout rose freely to the insects that struggled on the surface. Once I had passed the productive water, I rowed back upwind and the whole process began again. The most productive stretch was in front of Mrs. Evans’ place, and it was on these drifts that I first heard her gramophone.

Not all the residents of the lake were ‘summer people.’ There were a few who lived there all year round. By and large these tended to be older or retired couples who had decided to spend their remaining years removed from the crowds of larger centres. Mrs. Evans was foremost among these.

No-one I knew could ever remember a time when Mrs. Evans did not live in her little house on the side hill among the trees. Her place, like so many of the early cottages on the lake, predated electricity which only became available in the 1960’s. We never saw her. She was elderly at the time and kept pretty much to herself. The only way one was reminded of her presence was by her gramophone.

Mrs. Evans loved music but was slightly deaf. She had a windup record player on which she would play music every evening from about four o’clock onward. All Mrs. Evans ever played on her gramophone was piano music, pieces that later I was to recognize as Chopin played on a 78 rpm disc and recorded by some European master.

I would always make a point of starting my fishing just upwind of her house. With the stillness and the chill in the evening air among the bursts of colour from the maples and alders, the sounds of some etude or polonaise would drift out across the lake. The only interruption would be the sound of a splashing trout trying to round up a meal of the flying insects on the water.

As the years went by, I became more adept at casting and catching trout with the fly. I always made a point to start my drift in front of Mrs. Evans’ house. What I did gain from the experience was an appreciation for music, and although I did not know it at the time, music, along with fly fishing, was to become the dominant force in my life.

Ultimately life is about change. Things change and while it might not be progress, it is inevitable. When I travel I always take a small portable stereo with me. A slight skiff of snow on the ground and a piece by Chopin always puts me in a contemplative mood.

My grandparents’ lake has changed a great deal. Better access has led to a building boom and now houses and cabins surround the lake where once there were relatively few. Paved roads replace the narrow gravel ones that I remember. Many more people choose to live there all year round and the evidence of human activity is constant.

The biology of the lake has changed, thanks to the efforts of a few bucket biologists who have introduced smallmouth bass and perch into the lake. They have become dominant over the native trout I once knew. Mrs. Evans is gone too, undoubtedly to some place where her music is performed by those geniuses who created it. Her small house has been replaced by a much larger one, her little plot of land cleared and planted with lawn and garden reminiscent of suburbia.

Some things however, have not changed all that much. I’m told that the termites still hatch in September in the abundance that they always have, though I suppose there are the rises from smallmouth bass and perch among the remaining cutthroat. The resident maple and willow show their fall colours just as vividly. Somewhere in the woods behind my grandparents’ cabin, the willow grouse still search the clearings for clover. I imagine a fly fisherman drifting with the wind and using a bushy dry fly could still do very well in September, but I haven’t been back in a very long