Pat Ardley was raring for adventure and the thrill of the big city when she first moved to Vancouver at age 19.
“I was excited about moving to Vancouver – so much more cosmopolitan than Winnipeg was in the middle of the Prairies,” Ardley tells the North Shore News.
But instead of being suckered in by the city’s wild glow and intoxicating sounds, Ardley soon discovered her passion lay in the idyllic – though often challenging – landscape of the British Columbia wilderness.
“My life took a real turn,” she says.
In July 1976 Ardley and her husband and partner George welcomed their first guests to their new fishing lodge located in B.C.’s secluded central coast at Rivers Inlet, the realization of several year’s already spent together occupied with outdoor adventures, odd open-air jobs, and plenty of time for falling in love.
Grizzlies, Gales and Giant Salmon: Life at a Rivers Inlet Fishing Lodge, Ardley’s memoir of her and George’s decades spent running their own little slice of paradise, was released by Harbour Publishing last month.
The book is Ardley’s first written work after more than a decade spent toiling with ideas, stories, and memories that serve as the jetty for readers to sail through her life and adventures.
At press time, it currently stands at No. 4 on the BC Bestseller list.
“I’ve never been a writer. We were too busy building the lodge,” she says with a laugh.
Ardley first met George – who would acquire the nickname “hurricane” because of his fearlessness on the water – in 1972. She had just moved to Vancouver and the two quickly became enamoured with each other.
Shortly thereafter, craving adventure and a change the pair set out for Addenbroke Island – which meant a week’s journey aboard a Coast Guard ship – to work as junior lighthouse keepers for the next year a half.
“I had no idea about the West Coast and oceans and wilderness. I had no idea about any of that,” Ardley admits.
“But going to lighthouse with George was just another step in my adventure.”
After the couple’s tenure on Addenbroke, they decided to stay in the wilderness, kicking off an adventure that would last 40 years.
Ardley and George took up odd jobs in the wilderness of B.C.’s central coast wherever they could, including working for commercial fishing boats, local fisheries, and lodges in the area.
For Ardley, her and George’s excursions on B.C.’s coastal waters posed an enticing quest, but could also be a tough sell.
“I never wanted to spend too much time on the water, I was afraid of the water,” she says when explaining her and George’s tough choices when it came to deciding to stay upstream. “And George had done logging when he was going to university, so he didn’t want to log – the only other option if we wanted to stay in the country was to have a sport fishing resort.”
Ardley and George scrimped and saved for the next few years, eventually opening Rivers Lodge in 1976.
Surrounded by abundant trees, glassy water, and plenty of wildlife, the Ardley’s spot up Rivers Inlet was their main home for decades, a place for them to raise their kids and sustain a way of life they had come to love.
Guests who booked a visit to Rivers Lodge fondly remember their times there as well, Ardley explains, adding that the salmon were always plentiful for new and experienced fishermen alike eager to make a catch.
“Some guests came as couples, some guests came as a group from a company, and then some of those guests that came with a company would re-book bringing their wife back or their kids back because they knew that we would look after them,” she says.
Times weren’t always sublime at the lodge.
Ardley and George would regularly experience 24-hour workdays to ensure the lodge was running smoothly.
There was constant cooking required to feed the sometimes 40 or so guests who were staying.
And wildlife encounters of bears, sea lions, and whales, while always special, could pose a challenge when it came to daily operations.
Ardley finally sold the lodge in 2012 after her kids had grown up and George had passed away.
She was compelled to write the book, she says, in order to tell her side of the story and share her favourite moments of a lifetime spent with the love of her life in the wilderness.
“I miss the people, I miss the wildlife, I miss the solitude of the beautiful country,” she says when asked if she yearns for the old ways up at Rivers Inlet. “I’m feeling very connected to our guests and the staff over the years.”
She now resides happily in West Vancouver.
Ardley recounts a story during their last season running the lodge when four grizzly bears climbed directly onto the float of the lodge and had a little adventure of their own around the surrounding area. But in many ways it was more like a send-off.
“It’s grizzly country, but we’ve never, never had them in 37 years, we never had them actually climb onto our float,” she says.
“To have four of them there all of a sudden we kind of looked at it as a gift of the wilderness giving back to us to say goodbye.”
