Fishing and feasts in Washington, Idaho
THE fishing rod on the starboard aft side (or back corner – I was proud of myself for learning some navigation terms) of our little vessel sprang taut, like a bowstring. Our guide, Shane Moon, jumped to his feet with a quickness I didn’t expect from a guy who looks as if he could play lineman for a college football team. “OK, we’ve got one,” he said. The sun hadn’t yet shown its face in the purplish-blue sky, but it was light out, maybe 5:30 in the morning, and dozens of boats dotted a wide section of the Columbia River where it forks. I was excited. I had gotten a fish, and it was still pretty early, so I was feeling good about the prospects for the day. The question: Would I be able to keep it?
“Let’s hope it’s a king,” Moon said as he scooped it up into the net. It was not a king, or Chinook salmon. It was a fat, silvery sockeye salmon, and Moon shook his head. He cut it loose and the fish wriggled away, disappearing into the bluish-grey water. It wasn’t the first time this would happen. Washington state carefully monitors its rivers and lakes, giving constant updates on what fishermen are and are not allowed to keep, and sockeye had just been placed on the no-fish list. The catch-andretain window, I was learning, is extremely narrow. We were looking for king salmon, but it could not be wild.
Patience and acceptance were just a couple of lessons I learned during a highly instructive fishing expedition, part of a cheap getaway in Washington and Idaho that centred around the states’ spectacular natural beauty. I’d booked a “Long Weekender” package through the Hilton Honors app, which offered a 50 percent discount on Sunday night during a three-night stay. The hotel was a good home base for heading back and forth between Spokane, Washington, and Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.
My first order of business was to explore Coeur d’Alene, a small city with a cute, compact downtown area. It also has beaches – not the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of Idaho. I parked on Sherman Avenue, downtown’s main drag, and walked over to the prosaically named City Park and accompanying beach, along Lake Coeur d’Alene.
Lounging and sunbathing was the pastime of choice when I was there, but other outdoor activities are widely available: Cruises on the St Joe River are offered, as well as kayaking, parasailing and something called a SUPsquatch – a massive paddleboard that fits up to nine people. The park also hosts weekly summer concerts.
Tubbs Hill, 48 hectares of hiking trails and public park, offers a great way to stretch your legs and take in panoramic views of Coeur d’Alene and the surrounding area. I entered the trails from the back side andspent an hour or two on the hill before realising how hungry I’d gotten. Fortunately, Hudson’s Hamburgers, a no-frills spot that’s been in business for 110 years, wasn’t far away. Best of all, the simple double cheeseburger with onions, pickles and spicy mustard was everything a burger should be.
The most surprising spot for quality food in Coeur d’Alene was Daft Badger Brewing, a fun and busy brewpub smack in the middle of a residential street. They have a refreshing Blood Orange IPA that is hearty without overdoing it on the hops. It went well with a Not Your Mother’s BLT Sandwich, which added sundriedtomato mayo and provolone cheese to the classic formula.
Lest Idaho take all the glory, there was just as much good grub and quality suds on the other side of the border. The deal I found at the Wandering Table in Spokane was probably the best of my trip. The chic spot allows for a near-luxurious lunch experience for a pittance. Customers can choose three dishes that individually range from $12 to $20 on the menu for a total of $15. I had a salad of charred broccoli with drop peppers and pine nuts, a healthy portion of albacore tuna in rice wine with pickled pears and a jalapeño aioli, and two immodestly large chicken wings slathered in a sticky Vietnamese glaze. It was all quite good, and entirely too much.
Garageland on West Riverside Avenue is another good spot to grab a quick bite, in a slightly more casual setting.
With such food and natural splendor in the Spokane/Coeur d’Alene area, it does raise the question: Why did I travel so far to go fishing? I asked myself the same thing as I drove toward Grand Coulee Dam in the middle of the night.
The answer, naturally, was price. Moon offered an eighthour trip for just $200 – about half of what some guides were offering. Additionally, salmon fishing wasn’t quite as weather-dependent as fly fishing, also popular in the area – I reached out about fly-fishing lessons to a shop in Coeur d’Alene, only to have the class cancelled at the last minute because it was too windy.
By sunrise, I could see at least 50 boats on the water. Our craft was typical – four poles, a complicated downrigger system and a collection of high-tech screens and remote controls that I couldn’t begin to understand.
The downrigger system, Moon said, allows for accurate targeting of a specific depth. It looks like a miniature building crane that accompanies the fishing pole and drops a lead weight in to your preferred depth, attached with a clip to the fishing line to keep the hook at the specified number of feet below water. When a fish bites, the clip breaks free and the pole springs up.
After my initial sockeye bite, things slowed down. Still, the river was serenely beautiful. We caught a couple of more sockeyes and a Dolly Varden trout but threw them back.
Moon admitted that some people cheat, keeping illicit fish, but he stuck to the rules. “Sometimes I find myself saying, ‘Man, I never thought I’d be throwing back a 40-pound king’,” he said.