Share a funny moment / incident that you had with friends / family experiencing the great outdoors of the Terrace region.

Well, it was a nice summer day, fishing on the Skeena River with my brother and father. I had my two dogs with me that day: Dala (white husky/lab who was about 9 at the time) and Bond (goofy white lab who was about 4).

It was right in the heart of Chinook season and we were on the Skeena, just below the confluence of the Kalum River. The fishing was just as hot as the sun that day. Within minutes of us tying up the jet boat and getting our rods in the water, my bro had a big one on...I mean it was a big honkin’ classic Skeena River King salmon. He fought it for quite a while on the beach, but the fish was giving him a run for his money and not to mention, he was almost spooled. We didn’t have a choice, we needed to follow the fish if we were to recover all of the line that this fish was taking with it. So, without missing a beat, my dad hops in the boat, fires it up and says “get in quick, we gotta go...HURRY!” So,  we jump in, my brother with flailing rod in hand, me with my gear, my wise dog Dala, whose been through this a few times in her day and....”wait, DAD! Bond’s not in the boat!”. “He’ll be fine, we’ll come back for him.  WE GOTTA GO NOW!” my dad yells over the sound of the engine.

Little did my dad know, Bond, being an orphan because his mother died when he was way too young to leave the litter, has serious separation anxiety. He wasn’t having any of it. As I frantically call Bond towards the boat as it pulls away, he starts yelping a yelp I didn’t even know existed! My dad says, “Don’t worry about it Julia, he’ll go back to shore and we’ll pick him up in a few minutes”. Yeah right. As this giant Chinook is dragging us all over the Skeena River like a cat after a mouse, Bond is right behind the boat, swimming...the whole time. For those of you who haven’t experienced that section of the river, it’s big, swirly, full of log jams and bustling with people that time of year. For what seemed like an eternity, this howling dog is swimming behind the jet boat, my brother is fighting this super feisty fish, my dad is driving the boat, my other dog Dala is just getting in the way and I’m standing there helpless and frantic. Finally after about 10 minutes of this chaos, my brother hands off the rod to me and awkwardly fishes Bond out of the River before he gets sucked into the outboard and gets himself killed. Once we were all a big happy family again, we go back on shore (a couple km downstream of where it all began) and landed the fish that caused this whole mess in the first place! It was a beautiful Chinook salmon. As the fish was being cleaned, both dogs were lapping up the fish guts. Yeah, that’s right, fish guts. Their favorite! All’s well that ends well. Bond is now 10 years old and he’s always the first one in the boat!

Has living in the Terrace area changed your life in any way?

Having been raised here in Terrace, it’s naturally home and therefore I have a vested interest in helping to make it a better place to live. I feel very fortunate to have such a deep connection to place here in Terrace—it’s a relationship that I have never experienced anywhere else. This sense of place can be credited to the fact that we have relatively intact wild salmon ecosystems, wild spaces, wild people and diverse cultures. But mostly, I think it’s the salmon. They truly are the back bone to our communities here in the north.  I feel like I have a responsibility, living here in Terrace and on the mighty Skeena River, to give back and ensure that there are always wild salmon in our streams, rivers and ocean. I think it’s important to make certain that our kids and grandkids will also have the opportunity to have the same sense of place that I have. So, to answer your question: has living in Terrace changed my life? It’s shaped my life. It’s shaped who I am, what I value, how I live, and what I do. I can’t imagine myself working in salmon conservation if I grew up, in say, Toronto. Not that there is anything wrong with Toronto... Actually, I take that back. It’s not as awesome as Terrace!