I'll be making my first camping trip to Spencer Spit on Lopez Island in July. I've heard that the crabbing can be pretty good up there but haven't heard much about fishing in the immediate area. Does anyone have any tips on the clamming, crabbing or fishing there ??

Plenty of crab all around that island. We usually crab right outside fisherman's bay simply because we moor our boat in the bay - I'm sure there are crab in the bays on the Spencer Spit side as well. Don't know anything about clamming there - never seen anyone do it. As for fishing, most guys travel around the south end of San Juan Island to fish the west side off of cattle point, salmon bank, eagle point, lime kiln, etc. Others fish along the west shore of Lopez just south of Fisherman's Bay.

Salty,
Thanks for the reply. I won't have my salmon boat with me and will be confined to my livingston and the area near the campground. It should be interesting pulling pots in a 8 ft dinghy!

thanks again,
Ringo

Ringo,
Crabbing was excellent in Lopez sound despite the fact there where thousands of commercial pots out when I arrived on the 30th. The ferry captian seemed to be enjoying himself running them over in Thatcher pass.

Fishing was slow but givin time you should be able to jig up a hog @ Thatcher! Just don't get caught out in Rosario in an 8ft boat

Ton of bait on the west end of the island but not many fish. We only scratched out one small bm, 28"'s, the one day I fished out there.

If you go clamming you don't need to dig a deep hole as they're in the top four inches or so.

Good Luck!

Just returned from my camping trip at Spencer Spit and here's the scoop. This is a beautiful campground with great campsites and the sites have way more privacy than you usually get at a State Park. Here's the bad part. It was a nine minute walk (45% incline!)from the beach to our campsite. Back and forth, up and down, man I need a vacation from this vacation! There is a dirt road to the beach that you can use for launching a car top boat but no place to park and no way to turn around if you have a trailer.
Of course you don't find this out until it's too late because the sign at the top of the road doesn't tell you this. I walked it beforehand because I was driving the Winnebago and don't like these kinds of suprises.

The beach is LOADED with clams. I mean these things are so plentiful they squirt you in the side of the head as you stroll along the beach. Red tide closure was in effect so we couldn't harvest any. Bummer.

We crabbed on wednesday and got 2 limits of dungy's and three rock crab for a most excellent feast. I was the only one crabbing which really suprised me because I had heard how good it was supposed to be.

Nice park, but probably my one and only visit. The ferry ride from Anacortes to Lopez for 32 feet of motorhome, 2 adults and 2 kids was $156.

Ringo