Nicola Lake makes its own weather. The valley wind gets up most afternoons, hard enough that sailors and windsurfers come for it, and storms arrive fast enough to put small boats in real danger. Under all that chop is a narrow glacial trench full of
rainbow trout and
kokanee, a short drive from Merritt, that most people only see through a car window on Highway 5A.
The lake is long and thin, and easy to hold in your head. The Nicola River comes in at the north end just past Quilchena, the water runs south down the trench, and it leaves over a dam at the south end near the settlement of Nicola. The highway runs the east shore. Across from it, on the west shore, is the provincial park with the campground and the launch. That gives you four places to find: the inflow, the two shores, and the dam end.
Start on the west shore at Monck Park. The bottom drops away close to the beach, which is a hazard for swimmers and a gift for anyone with a fly rod, because that edge between the shallows and deep water is where trout feed, and here you can reach it without running half the lake in a small boat. Launch early, fish the shelf, and be back near shore before the wind comes up.
The north end is the place to look in spring. The river brings in food and moving water where it meets the lake north of Quilchena, and trout coming off winter have reason to be there. Fish it from the lake: the river above the lake is closed until July.
The east shore is the one people drive past. Pullouts along the highway give you the lake without a launch, and the same steep shoreline puts the drop-off within casting distance in places. The south end, by the dam, is the least visited and the quietest when the wind runs up the valley.
Down in the dark water live
burbot, jigged through the ice in winter and every one put back. For the trout, begin at Monck Park on a calm May morning, when the midges are coming up off the shelf.
Water and habitat
Nicola Lake is deep for an Interior lake, and its shallows are narrow. The shoal, where light reaches the bottom and weed grows, is a thin band rather than a broad flat, so trout feeding on shoal insects are concentrated along it. On the west shore near the park the drop-off comes in close; elsewhere you find it by watching the colour change from green-brown to dark. The dam controls the outflow through summer to keep water in the river for coho below, so the level changes through the year.
How to fish it
Anchor on the shelf where it starts to fall away, in water you can just see bottom in, and cast with the wind. Hang one chironomid pupa, black or green or brown, under an indicator so it sits a foot or two off the bottom, and let the chop move it. If nothing takes in twenty minutes, shorten or lengthen the leader before you change the fly; depth matters more than pattern. When the takes stop on the pupa, try a red bloodworm larva near the bottom, retrieved in short strips with long pauses. In summer, a damsel nymph worked slowly along weed edges is the fly to change to. You may fish only one fly on a line, so change patterns rather than adding a second.
Access and safety
Monck Provincial Park is on the west shore, about 22 km north of Merritt, reached from Highway 5A by 12 km of narrow paved road. It has a large campground that is reservable and busy in summer, and a concrete ramp in the day-use area. Highway 5A runs along the east shore through Quilchena with pullouts onto the water. Wind is the hazard that matters: it gets up most days, and sudden storms catch small boats a long way from shore. Keep a canoe or float tube close to the bank, and come in when whitecaps start to show. The shore drops off steeply and there are no lifeguards. The day-use area holds pit-house depressions from village sites; leave them as they are.