Katmai National Park.

Posted on January 17, 2019 by Rory

A couple of our best friends, Amanda, and I flew out to King Salmon and then waited for the weather to clear. That is pretty typical in this part of Alaska. When it finally cleared, we hopped on a float plane and were dropped off at Brooks Lodge. We opted to camp for $12 per night per person instead of renting a cabin for $615 per night per person! 20180806_155555 We immediately got into some fish. They were big and plentiful. They took beads, streamers, nymphs, and pretty much anything that you could drift in front of them. The river was busy with other anglers, guides, and the four of us. You could sight fish to twenty inch rainbows all day. The falls were behind me. It made me slightly nervous to look away from where a majority of the bears were feeding. Luckily, we had a crew of four, so someone was always watching out for bears. 20180807_182530 We weren’t the only ones fishing on the river. The bears were never threatening. A few sub adults would cruise by curiously and be kind of annoying. When the big bears came through, we all gave them a lot of space. The most nervous was when a mom and cubs were on our trail. We took the long way home that night.While out there, we had to check out the Valley of 10,000 Smokes. It was much more interesting than I thought that it would be. I was really glad that we did the tour. The weather was great for our whole trip. Good weather, good friends, and good fishing. It doesn’t get better than that. If you are ever in Alaska, it is worth it to go visit Brooks Falls, even if it is just a day trip.

Yakutat, AK. Day 1.

Posted on April 26, 2018 by Rory

When thinking of planning a do it yourself trip to Yakutat, there are a couple of important websites to check with. One is Bob’s blog. He will give you an honest representation of what is going on with fish in the river. It might not be what you want to hear, but it will be the truth of what he hears. The other website is the USGS water conditions. CFS is what was checking the most.

Now, I will be the first to tell you that I became obsessed with these websites for a month leading up to our trip. It didn’t matter. If the weather said it was raining, Bob said that there were no fish, and the USGS gauge wasn’t working, we were still going on this trip. In reality, the weather forecast changed every 5 minutes, Bob said that a few fish had been reported in the river, and the gauge showed that there was hardly any water in the river. Tickets were booked, boats were made ready, we were on our way.

Amanda finally got some downtime.

When we arrived at the Yakutat Airport, our boats were waiting and everything was working out. I was starting to get excited about the fishing. The Yakutat Lodge would be setting up our shuttles and providing information from their guides that had been on the water every day.

There wasn’t much snow on the ground and we were ready to get out there. After we bought beer, flies, fuel, and firewood that is. Second stop was the Situk river Fly Shop out in a WWII hangar. It was pretty cool.

We arrived at the boat launch where there are 6 elevated camping platforms free to use provided by the forest service. We arrived and were unprepared for what we found. There was still snow. More snow than we wanted to sleep on. So we got to work. This was bad for my casting muscles.

We set up our camp and I ran to the river. Amanda strolled over with a beer and took a couple of pictures.

That night we made margaritas, talked about fishing around the fire, and tried to sleep in anticipation of floating the river the next day. Day one was done and no fish were caught.

With Friends Like This

Posted on December 15, 2017 by Rory

When friends come to visit, I like to take them to do things. Like see dead whales.Or go up hills.Carve pumpkins.Make them look at tall things.Make them look at pretty things.Make them go up more hills.Make them take selfies with me.Make them like it here.I showed them some glaciers and told them that the water was cold.I guess that some people need to figure things out for themselves.

Dipnetting.

Posted on July 28, 2017 by Rory

As real Alaska residents we are allowed to put a net into the water and scoop out fish. We previously did this for Hooligan. Now it was time to do it for salmon.

ADF&G: This popular fishery takes place from late June through July in the marine waters of Cook Inlet just off the mouth of the Kenai River. Since 2003, Alaskans harvest between 130,000 and 540,000 sockeye salmon annually in this fishery.

The Kenai River is a large glacial system draining the central Kenai Peninsula. The river begins at Kenai Lake near the community of Cooper Landing and flows approximately 82 miles down to its mouth in Upper Cook Inlet, near the community of Kenai. The City of Kenai is approximately 160 highway miles south of Anchorage.

Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.20.05 AM.png

We loaded onto the boat on this rainy day and stuck our nets in the water. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.20.23 AM.png We held the nets in the water until feeling a thrashing fish. Then you quickly lift the net out of the water and into the boat. Your crew pounces on the fish (or multiple fish if you are lucky) and swiftly kills and bleeds them.

Occasionally, you get a monster! Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.20.45 AM.png

When you get home, the real work begins. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.21.17 AM.png

The (borrowed) smoker was hard at work. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.21.26 AM.png

The (new) freezer is full now!

Just Mousing Around.

Posted on July 27, 2017 by Rory

Floated a creek up north with a couple of friends. Only used mouse patterns. Had blue skies and a lot of fun. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.03.12 AM.png Life is better with dogs.Navigating the cold clear water. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.06.02 AM.png We caught lots of fish. They weren’t all this happy. Screen Shot 2017-07-26 at 9.04.12 AM.png

Fly Fishing for King Salmon.

Posted on June 20, 2017 by Rory

After the madness of Memorial Day, we headed south to the Anchor River to see if we could catch a King Salmon on a fly. The patriotism of the bald eagles were in full swing. Screen Shot 2017-06-19 at 10.11.16 PM.png The night before we fished, we got to spend some time by a campfire doing the usual things. It seemed like a good omen.

The evening was lovely.

Screen Shot 2017-06-19 at 10.11.44 PM.png The next day, we had a hook up! Hanapa’a.The eagles were vigilantly watching to see what would happen.We did it! We landed one.