Here Fishy, Fishy, Fishy!

How do you try to bring back some of that 70% drop in visitors to the Northwest due to the sinking of the Queen of the North? If you’re part of tourismprincerupert, the key to salvaging the season may be to reel in some fishermen!

The local tourist office is offering up a number of prizes in a month long fishing derby designed to bring visitors down Highway 16 and into Prince Rupert. They are using some of the $450,000 provided by the provincial government after the ferry sinking, that money designed to try and find ways to bring tourists to the area despite the cutbacks in ferry service due to the sinking.

With tourist numbers down quite a bit this year, it’s hoped that the lure of coho salmon and a large bounty on the biggest one to be found, will help to put some cash into the pockets of local charter operators, hotel owners and restaurateurs to name a few.

The Daily News had the full story in its Monday edition!

WESTERN CANADA INVITED TO FISH FOR $160,000
By James Vassallo
The Daily News
Monday, July 10, 2006
Pages One and Three

Northern Tourism organizations have hung-up the Gone Fishin’ sign, but that’s not indication they’re giving up on this year’s visitor season.

Instead, they’ve launched Western Canada’s largest non-invitational salmon derby to be held in the waters around Prince Rupert over a six-week period. Prizes are worth over $160,000.

“On my recent visit to Prince Rupert, I was impressed with the world class scenery and variety of attractions available for visitors to the area,” said Olga Ilich, Tourism, Sport and the Arts Minister.

“I hope the people of from B. C. and beyond will come to Prince Rupert – not only for this significant fishing derby, but also to stay and experience some of the 160 other community events and festivals taking place across Northern B. C. this summer.”

The derby gets underway three weeks from today on August 1, and runs through September 15.

A top prize of $100,000 will be awarded for the biggest coho, with $40,000 for second and a number of other weekly prizes.

“This has been expressly tailored not just for bringing the regular clientele but for bringing families as well,” said Bruce Wishart, Tourism Prince Rupert executive director.

“You’ll see a large prize there for the largest coho by a female angler, a couple of prizes for under 18’s – if we can convince people in –Northeastern B. C. and Northern Alberta to bring their families with them we’ve won something over the long term.”

The initiative is a result of a number of stakeholder sessions held after the sinking of the Queen of the North in hopes of creating a plan to recapture some of the huge losses businesses throughout the region are experiencing.

“When the ferry sank within a few days we determined we had to replace that independent traveler going on the ferry,” said Wishart.

The capacity wasn’t there to bring that many people by airline and rail was a bit of a hard sell.

“The one visitor that we have that doesn’t rely on any other form of transportation, that drives the highway 16 corridor and drives back is the sporting fisherman.”

With existing capacity present aboard vessels operating on the North Coast during the coho run, the two needs were married and the massive event was born.

“We conservatively estimated that we have 80 full-time charter operators and that they can take four people in a boat. That puts over 15,000 people out on the water (between August 1 and September 15),” he said.

That’s not taking into account the sports fisherman in Prince Rupert and across Northern British Columbia that have their own boats and gear.

“We said that we wouldn’t be surprised to see 30,000 people and honestly I wouldn’t be surprised to see more.”

Contest rules and regulations for the event can be found at http://www.tourismprincerupert.com/ beginning July 15.

The Northern Fund Management Committee was created as a result of $450,000 provided to the Northern Tourism Region by the Ministry of Tourism, Sport and the Arts. Las week, it was announced the funds would be used to create the ‘Northern Summer Signature Series’ (a marketing campaign for the North’s arts and cultural festivals, The Queen Charlotte’s Campaign ( a direct marketing initiative to combat the perception that the QCI’s are inaccessible since the ferry sinking) and the hiring of two Regional Visitor Centre Counsellors in Prince George.