Liscombe Fish Ladder

Yesterday Jeff and I finally made it to the Liscombe Fish Ladder!

We tried once before, but it is at the end of a really overgrown bush road (about 3.6 km’s off the highway near the Liscombe Lodge) that would be flooded in many places for most of the year.

If you go, only take a vehicle that you don’t made getting scratched up as the branches of the enclosing trees reach out to scratch your vehicle as you pass by. Alternatively, you can take the hike in from the Liscombe Lodge.

To be honest, lately I’ve been leery of Jeff’s off-road excursions since we’ve crossed a mountain in my car, sometimes on two wheels I swear, on 1 foot thick ice covered roads through no man’s land, and through creeks. But this one turned out to be worth it!

So, what is a Fish Ladder you ask. Well it is the result of man interfering with a river to make it easier for fish, in this case salmon, to get up the river to spawn. The river is equipped with man-made steps so the fish can jump its way upstream.

Here you can see the series of steps that were put in:

Photo from the same spot looking behind us:

The river is divided into two paths. One way has the fish ladder, and this is what the other way looks like. I wonder if this is the natural river, and the steps were blasted out of the rock for an alternative route.

It starts calmly enough:

And then drops here:

Did you see that suspension bridge in the distance?

My first time on a suspension bridge!

It was really windy, and it was really moving! But I found if I held on to the cables on either side when I stepped, it didn’t sway so much. Otherwise, with each step it swayed in the direction of my stride.

It did cross my mind that it was a little unusual there were no signs at all. No danger signs, no warnings, absolutely nothing. When is the last time you went to a place with no signs? I just hoped that didn’t indicate the bridge was really old and abandoned 88| but the lumber didn’t look that old.

Near the suspension bridge was a really huge culvert pipe that looks like it must have been used to divert the water while they were building the fish ladder. This was the only stretch of it remaining though, so it was hard to piece together exactly how it was used, or when.

Here is the suspension bridge and stairs closer up:

From the bridge, the view upstream:

And downstream where the water rejoins the water from the fish ladder route:

Bottom of the abandoned tunnel/culvert/pipe thingey:

Here’s a better view of the fish ladder from down stream: