‘Comfortably wild’ fish cannery turned tourist retreat for sale in northern B.C.

This photo, provided by Justine Crawford, shows the restored homes on the site of the former Cassiar Cannery near Prince Rupert, B.C.

Nearly 20 years ago Justine Crawford decided she needed more space.

What started as a desire to put some distance between herself and a troublesome neighbour took her and her future husband Mark more than 1,500 kilometres from B.C.’s South Coast, to a one-of-a-kind property they would spend years restoring.

Crawford got her first glimpse of the former Cassiar Cannery in 2006 when she was flipping through a local real estate paper in Prince Rupert and saw a black-and-white photo of five small houses on the shore of the Skeena River.

But the photo only showed a sliver of the sprawling 74-acre property and the realtor responsible for the listing was reluctant to take the couple to see the rest.

“(The photo) didn’t really show how run down everything was, or how messy it was,” Crawford told CTV News.

The five homes, which were residences for managers when the fishing cannery was operational, had deteriorated into “flop houses” with run-down exteriors and interiors that were “pretty gross,” Crawford said.

The dock where fishing boats would have come and gone for the nearly 100 years the cannery was in business was piled with debris from demolished buildings that used to constitute the bustling cannery town. Derelict boats, rusted out vehicles and heaps of scrap metal also littered the property.

But none of that mattered to the couple.

“We were hooked in 15 seconds,” Crawford said.

“It was big, and beautiful and magnificent. It was just perfect for us. I saw through all the mess. I didn’t see everything that had scared off pretty much every single other person that looked at it.”

Located roughly a half-hour drive from Prince Rupert, which has all of the essential services and businesses Crawford wanted to be able to access, the property also offered stunning scenery and immersion in a “beautiful totally unique ecosystem,” she said.

After an environmental assessment was done and the deal was closed, the pair moved onto the property despite the fact none of the homes was completely habitable.

“We slept in one, we cooked in another, and we showered in another,” Crawford said. “We just had to start putting everything back together.”

Clearing the dock using only a pickup truck and their bare hands took an entire year of working “every day, all day” Crawford said. The couple, who needed a lot of lumber, would beachcomb for logs and barter with a local sawyer. Turning the houses into cozy, colourful vacation rentals required tearing out stained carpets and tiles, removing old furniture and endless hours of elbow grease.

The do-it-yourself nature of the undertaking was in part because the pair wasn’t “afraid of hard work” but also because they had “more time than money” and getting a bank loan was a non-starter, according to Crawford.

“Oftentimes I would drive down the road in the on a dark rainy night and I’d be like, ‘How did I end up here?’” Crawford recalled.

“I think sometimes it was just fate.”

Now, the property is home to what Crawford describes as a “turnkey” tourism business that has been included on a number of “best of” lists including Destination BC’s the Top 10 Unusual Places to Overnight and a guide to the Top 40 Glamping Destinations in North America.

What was once the cannery’s company store and doctor’s office has been turned into an event space that has hosted retreats, weddings and artists in residence.

The cannery was established before the rail line was built, and one of the noteworthy amenities on the property is a train station where VIA Rail stops three times a week.

Mark died from cancer in 2021, and Crawford and their son live in one of the homes while she runs the business. She’s selling because she needs to relocate for her son’s education, and she is reluctant to leave but ready for the property to enter its next chapter.

“We saved her, and we put her back on the map,” Crawford said.

She hopes whoever ends up buying the property will keep the business running and won’t demolish what she and Mark have built. However, she also said there is untapped potential for other ventures or visions to take shape.

“I’ve had just the best time here,” Crawford said.

The Cassiar Cannery is listed by Sotheby’ International Realty, with an asking price of $9 million. Complete details about the property are available online.