Fishing Fountain Lake

Friday, September 20, 2019

Hi Blog!

After yesterday's epic drive on the Sea to Sky Highway to Whistler, we were looking for something to do close to home. We had received a number of tips about different lakes to fish. Once we checked out the stocking reports, we knew Fountain Lake was the lake for us. What we didn't know was that Fountain Lake hosts an annual Pilgrimage.

Pilgrims began making the trek to Fountain Lake in 1976. Between 40-100 Cathholic pilgrims camp at Fountain Lake, in the heart of B.C., every year for a weekend of prayer and socializing. Lucky for us, the Pilgrimage was in August.

Fountain Lake (also known as Kwotlenemo Lake by the First Nations) hosts four separate recreation site areas. A good boat launch is located on the northern end of the lake. Here is our view from the boat launch.

As Kathy shoves off, Dusty waits patiently for our return. Our weather today was the best we've had for weeks. There was a light wind blowing with temperatures in the 70's.

The Fountain Valley is located to the east of the Fraser Valley in a high plateau.

When we first set out to fish, we try to read the lake to figure out where the fish are feeding. We decided to start at the north end and let the wind carry us down to the south end.

We noticed plenty of bug activity. This little dragon fly decided to take a break on Dave's kayak.

While Fountain Lake is a BC Recreation Site, there are a number of houses on the lake shore.

As the wind pushed us done the lake, we cast toward the short and stripped the line back. Dave had the most luck, landing three nice big fat trout. Kathy was able to land one, but had two very exciting encounters with leaping trout that both managed to escape without landing in the net.

We beached the kayaks on the south shore of the lake to have lunch.

With four fish in our creels, we decided that we would call it a day and just paddle back up the east side of the lake, taking in the scenery as we paddled by. We thought this totem pole on the lake shore was pretty cool. Not to mention how fluffy the weeping willow seemed.

We've often talked about a for-ever-and-ever house along the shore of a small like. However, this tiny house may be a bit too tiny.

As we made our way back to the boat launch, the winds began to pick up. However, the boat lauch was tucked in a quiet corner of the lake.

Not bad for a day's work.

One of the local residents came by to see how we did.

After cleaning our fish and packing everything back up, we decided to follow Fountain Valley Road south until it connected back with the Lytton-Lillooet Highway. It is considered a scenic drive in the tourist brochure.

As it turns out, the Fountain Valley was part of the old River Trail, which ran up the length of the Fraser River. It was used by freight wagons and travelers bound northwards to the Cariboo goldfields. The trail through Fountain Valley climbs a steep grade from its southern end which means that we would have a steep decent back to the highway. What started out as a two lane paved road soon changed into a narrow one lane gravel trail.

Having survived our backcountry adventure, we settled into camp and began the preparations for our trout dinner. First, the veggies were cut and cooked in the grill pan.

Next, the trout were stuffed with fresh peaches and thyme and wrapped in tin foil.

After slow roasting, it was time to dig in! Bon Appetite!