Bainbridge vs Vashon Island Sea Run Cutthroat

speedbird

Life of the Party
Let’s say someone’s girlfriend wants to do an island retreat for a weekend and let’s say they’re also okay with you bringing a rod and fishing for a little bit. They’ve suggested cabins in Bainbridge island and Vashon island, both places with beaches you’ve considered fishing out of, which would you choose for the better shot at cutthroat this time of year?

Hypothetically speaking, an answer in DMs to prevent either of the islands being flooded by people is welcome as well.
 
I live on Bainbridge and have fished its beaches a bunch over the last 10 years and I drive a ways every week in winter to do 99%+ of my SRC fishing. That said, if you are going to fish the mid/north sound in winter, this is the better side of the sound to do it. It might pay off hitting a spot or two. Don’t plan on numbers though. If I have an hour or two to kill in winter, I consider 1-2 fish a big success searching them out over a number of beaches this time of year and it gets even tougher starting around mid January. Can’t help with Vashon!
 
A few weeks from now Vashon sometimes cranks out pretty respectable resident coho fishing, though, frankly, easier from a boat/kayak than from shore, the timing is iffy though in general better than SRC fishing IMHO. Generally the more miserable the weather the better for that kind of fishing. And if any Northerly is blowing, you might as well take @Matt B advice + Vashon bakery, Vashon troll hunt and hike Maury Marine park from the top down and skip the fishing altogether...Plus keep an eye on Orca network, sometimes Pt Robinson has some really good shore-based sightings. On a bell clear Northerly day, Rainier views are awesome from there.

If that itinerary somehow makes your relationship worse, she's not the one. (You're welcome for the unsolicited relationship advice Speedbird. Pretty much the only way you can screw this up is to go full monolog on the smelter-based histories of Vashon and how that became Maury Marine park and how basically it is a sort of superfund site as you are walking back up the hill...)

One time, waiting for the ferry, I saw a guy walking down the hill on Vashon wearing a giant Stetson hat, a custom print button down American flag shirt, blue jeans, a knotted kerchief around his neck and cowboy boots. He was carrying and smoking a conventional cigarette. Seeing that guy on Vashon is rarer than seeing an Orca off Pt Robinson...the only explanation that made sense to me was this was a kinky cosplay and/or Community Theater thing.
 
Snapdragon is the bakery on Vashon that we are required to stop at every time we are over there and it is very very good. They close at like 2 or 3 though so don’t screw up and wait too long.
 
My vote would be the further south you can go, the better the fishing is likely to be.
I’ve only fished salmon off the beaches on Vashon, but back in the day we used to catch some beautiful big cutts fishing off it out of our boat. I’ll never forget watching a school of about five nice cutts fighting each other to inhale a trolled cut plug firecracker herring in the shallow water behind the boat.
That was a different era and I wouldn’t use herring now but that memory has been etched in my mind for nearly 50 years now.
Good luck and have a great trip.
SF
 
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