Kurt and I watched the weather to make an 8 hour run in the Jeanne Kay to do some winter boat camping. We were after shrimp and crab, and would do a little king salmon trolling on the way home. Nick and Amanda showed me how to work a shrimp trawl last summer, and it’s now one of my favorite ways to fish.

We watched the weather, especially since there’s little help close by that far from town this time of year. The barge lines and a few trappers are about the only winter boaters. The forecast called for 15 knots day one, then 10 knots days 2 and 3 of our planned trip. There were places to hide if the weather came up. Temperatures were around freezing and perfect for keeping seafood.

We left town about 7 am with a crescent moonlight. I wanted to get down to our destination before dark so we could set our pot gear and get anchored before dark.

We turned into the destination bay late in the day. I was surprised to see another boat when we turned the corner. A bigger aluminum boat with sodium lights glaring from the bow roof was anchored in a cove. I saw a man walking the beach with purpose. I was puzzled why he was anchored on the side of the channel facing the wind, then understood from experience: he was trapping. I saw him return up the beach with a cart of something – probably bait. Wow. This is some pretty remote trapping, I thought. I guessed he was after marten, wolverine and wolf. He anchored near us that night, and we saw him going from cove to cove checking his traps the next day. I wish I could have talked to him about how he was doing in this trapper’s dreamland.

We set the shrimp pots first. It was my first time setting shrimp pots. Nick gave me some general advice on where to set. Then Kurt picked a point, and we set there, using some floating line I borrowed from Chris. I only have 3 shrimp pots, and we longlined them. I grabbed a bucket of shrimp bait left at the harbor free pile last year, and I finally got to use it. I set the string out while Kurt ran the boat.

Next we set some dungeness and king crab pots up the bay. We anchored right at dark, and settled in for the night. Kurt is always the meals guy on our trips. He brought what has become a standard dinner of bison burgers, with a topping of balsamic vinegar and onion condiment he got from Coleen’s shop. Great combo.

We were up and moving at daylight on day 2. We checked all the pots first, so if we weren’t doing anything in their locations, we could move them. We started with the shrimp pots. I ran the little electric hauler Dougie gave me when he moved fulltime to Bethel, where he’d never use it. It sits on a standard Scottie downrigger mount, and although it looks kind of flimsy, it actually works fine for our scale of fishing. The puller is not going to pull a commercial king crab pot, and won’t like pulling a commercial dungeness crab pot, but it pulls our lighter “sport” gear just fine.

Up and up comes the line we borrowed from Chris. After a minute or three, we get the first 50 fathoms up, and here comes the first anchor. I take it off, and soon the first pot shows coming up from the depths. Astonishingly, we have some spot prawns in it!  The biggest I’ve ever seen. About 8 to 9 inches long!

They might not look all that big in the photo, but here’s one of them alongside the crab measuring device. The gap above the prawn is the 7 inch king crab ruler.

The next 2 pots were about the same. Not a lot in numbers, but holy cow, big shrimps!

Next we checked the crab pots. We caught quite a few tanner and king crab, but only one king crab was a keeper (a male minimum 7 inches across the body shell), and a tanner or two (male minimum 5.5 inches across the body shell). Again, my Pulitzer prize photography makes the crab look small as it’s in the bottom of a line barrel, but that’s them.

We reset pots to try for more legal sized crab, then got the shrimp trawl out and got trawling. Kurt wasn’t all that enthused about trawling – he was more about the crabbing – but he’s always game and a good skipper or deckhand whenever you need him. I got the net out of the action packer tote. The first time I tried shrimp trawling my own net with Nick and Amanda (with Charlie and Amy aboard), we snagged the net on the bottom and lost it. Amanda had a friend (who we later figured out was a mutual friend as often happens in a small city) who had a trawl he wanted to sell, and which I bought. The trawl net was from Memphis Net and Twine (where everyone I know gets their trawl nets), and their smallest net configuration, I think. The “doors” that keep the net open were much smaller than the doors on the net that I lost. And that made the new net much easier for a beginner to work, and I like it better than the net I lost.

I got reacquainted with the trawl net and its configuration. The doors on either side of the trawl net have a line that leads back to a junction – a double ended swivel eye hook- where both caribeners at the end of the door lines are attached. A ~ 10 lb cannon ball is attached at this junction as well. The tow line is tied to the other end of the double ended swivel eye hook.

When I got ready to set the net, Kurt told me to get my life jacket on. Capital idea!  Then I explained to Kurt what we’d be doing, got him lined up at the helm, then started barking out instructions for forward or neutral as I set out the net from the swim step. In the absolute wilderness, I should mention. With mountains all around. That’s why they’ll bury me here.

I payed out the two door lines, then the tow line. I asked Nick how much tow line you pay out in relation to the depth you’re fishing, and the answer was 3 or 4 to 1 – leaning towards 4 to 1. So I when I started paying out line, I regularly asked Kurt what our depth was. When I payed out enough tow line for the depth we were fishing,, I snubbed the tow line to the cleat. I asked him what our speed was. 1.7 knots, he said. That seemed faster than I remember with Joe, so I payed out a bunch more tow line. Speed, I asked?  Still 1.7 knots. Well, I thought, we’ll just keep going at this length of tow line at this depth, and see how it goes.

A half hour later, I had Kurt turn the boat around so it was heading towards the net, and that made hauling back the tow line alot easier on me and the hauler. When we got to the net, Kurt put the engine in neutral, and came to the back deck to see what we’d caught. I hauled up the net to the swim step. When I had about 2/3 of the net on the step, I saw we’d caught some sticks and some crab. Thinking that was it, I hauled the rest of the net over the step. OOOOHH!  A cod end full of shrimp!  We are shrimpers, I said!

I learned from my last trip with Joe to have a bucket ready to dump the catch into, and then reset the net and continue fishing while you sort the catch. I cut a 30 gallon pepper barrel I got somewhere in half, and drilled drain holes in the bottom and sides of it. We tossed the crab from the top of the net overboard, then lifted the cod end of the trawl net into the barrel, untied the cod end line, and dumped the catch into the barrel. Then Kurt lined up the boat to trawl new water on the opposite side of the channel, and I reset the net.

I sorted through the catch, which, while mostly shrimp, also contained small fish, small crab, and sea urchins. I sorted through the catch and returned everything that wasn’t shrimp. We caught mostly pink shrimp, with a few of the larger coon stripe shrimp. I went inside and got a cup of coffee to warm up, and soon it was time for the second haul.

After towing for about 20 minutes, we snagged on something, which stopped the boat. It’s not like you can notice you’ve stopped. You just see your speed go to 0.0 knots. Kurt turned the boat back to the net while I hauled the tow line in. When we got close to the end of the tow line, the line was tight, then it gave slack. I knew we’d freed the net.

We weren’t expecting as much on this haul since we’d had to haul in early. When we got the net up, we saw we’d done just fine. With lots more coon stripe and some spot prawns than the first tow. We got the catch into the barrel and reset the net, then I sorted the catch.

After sorting the catch, I headed inside the wheelhouse for more coffee. It was getting dark – 330 pm ish,  We wanted to check the crab pots, and move them if they were in non-productive ground. Kurt turned back to the net, and I started hauling the tow line. Nick told me that there was a “habitat change” in this location. Now I knew what he meant. The top of the net was full of rocks and some kind of sponge or coral. The cod end held a nice catch of pink, coon stripe and spot shrimp. It took us awhile to get out the rocks and other debris. Then we dumped the cod end into the barrel. Kurt headed the boat to the crab pots across the bay in the waning daylight.

We checked the pots, and no keeper king crab or tanner crab. We moved to new locations. Then we anchored in 20 feet of water, sat down in the galley, and relaxed. That was a full day. Sunrise to after sunset. A good 8 hours of fishing. Kurt served up another dinner of bison burgers, and nobody complained. Man, that’s good stuff. I figured out how to use my new In Reach. I texted Sara and others we were all anchored, and the results of our day. What an age we’re living in.

We were up at dawn on day 3. I checked the coolant and the oil, started the Yanmar,  and pulled the anchor with the. We pulled and stacked all the crab pots, catching a tanner crab. We pulled the shrimp pots, and got about half as many as the day before. The prawns were just as huge as day 2. Then we steamed for home.

Kurt was at the helm while I got to figuring out what to do with all the pink shrimp. We decided to cook them whole. I put water on to boil. When the water was steaming, I dumped in a load of pinks. Within a minute or two, shrimp started to float to the top. I dumped the pot of steaming shrimp into a colander suspended in a large bowl. I then put moved the colander full of shrimp to the sink, and returned the water to the pot on stove. I took the steaming shrimp to the back deck, put the shrimp in a bowl, and ran sea water into the bowl to cool the shrimp and halt it cooking.

I repeated this procedure the rest of the way home. I finished cooking the pink shrimp about an hour from the harbor. In the meanwhile, we also trolled for king salmon. We didn’t see a strike, but when Kurt pulled up the rods to quit fishing, we had a shaker on one of the lines.

As nightfall came, Kurt asked if I had bow lights so he could better watch for logs while cruising to Auke Bay. I did, I said. I put both bow lights on. I rarely use the lights, so this was a good opportunity to adjust them. With Kurt at the helm, I got out to the bow and adjusted the lights so they were pointed in the optimum direction.

We arrived in Auke Bay, tied up, and loaded the catch in my folding cart to take to the car. We’d move gear off the boat tomorrow. Kurt lost his truck and house keys somewhere, but he had a spare house key he could use at his residence, so I dropped him off and we’d look for the keys tomorrow. I made him take half the prawns and coon stripes and the king crab, as he tried to refuse it all. Such is the customary dance amongst Alaska best friends.

I picked Kurt up the following morning. We had had such a good trip I was confident we’d find his keys. When we got to the boat, Kurt looked aft while I looked forward. First I found his boot traction grippers. Then there they were. Right behind the fire extinguisher in the forecastle. His keys!  We were on a roll.

We hauled back barrels of line to the truck, and I got home in time to start processing the shrimp while watching the NFL semifinals.

I processed the raw coon stripe and spot prawns, but what to do with the cooked whole pink shrimp. I first removed the heads, then peeled out the meat from the tails. That worked on the larger pinks, but the smaller tails it was really hard to mush out the meats. Wow, was it a slog. I started to peel only the tails of the larger pink shrimp, and sort the tails of small shrimp to another pile to figure out what to do with them later.

All the while, I watched my Bills lose to the Chiefs. The Bills played their hearts out. They should have lost last week to the Ravens, but won. They should have won this week to the Chiefs, but lost. I remember being in my mud brick-walled, thatch-roofed house in Sierra Leone in 1988 (?), listening on Armed Forces Radio by shortwave radio, at 330 or so in the morning, to the Bills lose their first Super Bowl to the Giants on the wide-right field goal try. Then three more losing Super Bowl appearances in a row. Followed by decades of suckage. It’s good to have them back to respectability. I sure miss Paul. I’d have been calling him after the game, lamenting how close my team came to going to the show.

In the meantime, I thought about how I’d seen shrimp used in Ecuador, where they pulled out the meats, then used a blender to grind up the shells for a broth to make ceviche. I asked Sara about processing the shrimp into a paste or ceviche or something. She said what about cooking the tails with the shell on in tempura batter like they make popcorn shrimp?  Well, that was genius.

She got the tempura batter together, and the hot oil going. She battered the pink shrimp tails, dropped them in the hot oil, and I tended the fare. When they were browned on both sides, I scooped them from the oil, let them cool in a colander lined with paper towel, and we each tried them. Good!  That was an attitude changer for me. Separating the heads from tails was easy, but removing the shell from the tail was a pain in the ass, and many times, it just squashed in my fingers. Now we had an answer.

As the evening wore on, we got to divvying up the bounty with our friends. During these conversations, Sara said she wanted to try what I’d seen in Ecuador, and make some soup. I put a few quarts of the whole cooked pink shrimp in the blender, added some water, and Sara whirled it into a puree. She added mushrooms and some other stuff, and had me taste. Shrimp bisque. And really good. Now we have two dishes to make with pink shrimp that are less painful than peeling the tails.

I got shrimp and crab divided up for Sara’s staff and our friends. I vacuum packed what was left for our freezer. I told Sara I sometimes lament that I’ve given away more than I’ve kept for ourselves until I open the freezer to put our share in there and look at all the bounty that’s already in the freezer and how will we ever eat it all.

So, a memorable banner trip winter camping and lots of lessons learned.

We arrived home the evening of the opening day of a 5-day personal-use king crab fishery. One pot per vessel allowed. Limit of one crab per household. If you thought these restrictions would limit the number of participants, you would be wrong. Everybody and his brother goes out, especially this time of year when deer hunting is mostly over and salmon fishing is six months away.

The fishery is usually a group affair. Since the limit is one per household, the skipper calls friends, and each boat often has members of several households in hopes of sharing the catch. Many of us also take proxy permits for friends 65 years or older, allowing us to keep a crab for them if they can’t join.

I got my permit and a proxy permit for Jeff and Terry right away. I went with my friend Nick to check his pot. Strong winds were forecast, but luckily Nick had set his pot near town in calm waters. There were three crabs in the pot—enough for each of us. I then set my own pot near Nick’s for another chance at crab.

Later, I delivered Jeff and Terry’s crab. Jeff was thrilled. Last year, he hesitated to let me take his proxy permit, but this year, there was no argument. He even brought crab to his son Nick in Seattle, leading to a hilarious text about Jeff’s shucking skills needing improvement.

The next day, Bob, Chris M., and Kurt joined me. I set a pot Jeff had given me but didn’t check the line thoroughly. It snapped, and the pot sank. Thankfully, biodegradable twine ensures the pot will stop ghost fishing eventually. Still, it was a frustrating mistake.

On the final day, Bob, Kurt, Andrew, Sam, and Dorothy joined me. We set another pot in a promising spot. However, the pot was configured for shrimp, with covers over the crab gates. Needless to say, no crab could enter. A snail and hermit crab were the only catches, which Dorothy enjoyed examining before releasing them.

The adults on the boat know me well and weren’t surprised by the outcome. They seemed to enjoy the experience regardless, adding another story to share during our next gathering.

I went to Hawaii, island of Kauai, for my first time this past 2 weeks. I went with Sara, her sister and sister’s husband, and our two nieces and their husbands. We went to spread Sara’s younger sister Jane’s ashes, as Hawaii was her happy place.

I didn’t know what to expect, really. I thought it would be crowded beaches with tourists everywhere. Kind of like Juneau in the summer. Boy, was I wrong. Most beaches had few people, and the beach adjoining the house we rented was used by mostly local people as best we could tell.

I was immediately struck by how remote the islands are. Alaska has always seemed remote, but not this remote. We flew about as far west from Seattle as I would fly east to go to New York State, over nothing but ocean, and then there are these islands. People found these not all that long ago in human history, without GPS or even rudimentary navigation tools. Maybe they could read the stars and sun and moon to navigate. But how did they know where they were going? Amazing, really.

I was a bit tentative swimming or snorkeling in the ocean surf until we went out on a snorkel charter. I hadn’t been snorkeling since I was a kid, and hadn’t done much swimming since then, really, either. The snorkel charter gave me a good refresher for swimming and snorkeling. After that, I went down our beach to some quiet water almost every day until we left and snorkeled in an area that was not over my head anywhere I swam. I saw all kinds of beautiful tropical fish, and usually saw new ones I hadn’t seen each day. I saw sea turtles there, too. Now I had something I enjoyed doing every day, as traveling to a different beach to sit in the sun has never been my thing. Plus, I burn easy. Sara got sun most every day in the yard.

Fishing Charter

We also went on a fishing charter. We were scheduled to go on a Wednesday, but the winds were too big to go. Weather there really is sort of wind or no wind. Not rain or no rain. Or cold or warm. It’s not cold. And rains were intermittent, cooled things off a bit, and sort of not a thing for rainforest dwellers like us. We rescheduled to the following Monday, which meant half the crew couldn’t go, but decided that was best since it was the first calm day in the forecast.

We headed to a small harbor near Lihue. We went for an afternoon of fishing. We met our boat, about a 30′ charter boat with twin diesels, with the people aboard who fished in the morning, and the crew was cleaning their catch. Out of nowhere, a big shark – 6+ feet anyway, I’d guess – porpoised to eat some of the fish remains pitched over. The crew thought it was a Galapagos shark, which I’d never heard of.

The four of us boarded and soon knew we were going to have a good time because the captain and deckhand were easygoing, good friends with each other, and lots of fun. We decided to troll awhile for pelagic fish like tuna and marlin, then fish on the bottom at the end of the trip. We started trolling right as we left the harbor and fished along an uninhabited coast. The land was for sale for 80 million dollars, and we watched a George Clooney movie (The Descendants) when we got back, on the advice of the boat crew, that explained the family ownership of the land, sort of.

We trolled at about 8 knots in a swell with big squid-looking baits right at the surface. They hadn’t caught any pelagics for several weeks, but we were happy to try. Then it happened. A fish was on. I got the rod since this was my birthday charter. I got into the fighting chair and started the work yarding in the fish on the heaviest gear I’ve ever fished. After about 5 minutes, I got the fish to the boat, and the deckhand gaffed it aboard. A skipjack tuna. I had to admit, it was smaller than I thought it would be based on how hard it was to get aboard, but it was a nice fish. We trolled back towards the harbor and caught no more. We tried bottom fishing the last hour. We caught a nice gray snapper, which the crew said was among the best eating fish. We had tacos made from both fish, and both were great eating, especially with the nice avocados and other local vegetables. Sara made ceviche with the snapper as well, but I didn’t try that. I snorkeled each day the next 2 days until we left Wednesday evening.

We had an all-day layover in Seattle. Gail picked us up and we napped at her house after taking a print Sara left at Gail’s once upon a time to air freight to send to Juneau. I arranged to meet my Peace Corps friend Dan for lunch. Sara and I met him and his girlfriend and his son and had a great time.

We got home in the evening, and Kurt was there to retrieve us as always. No sleep sounder than the first one in your own bed after a long time away.

Just back from this year’s deer hunt. Nick, Amanda, and I planned to hunt the outer coast out of the tug, but the wind forecast for the next week was so severe that running the boat myself and actually getting to the hunting spots we imagined wasn’t going to happen. So, we regrouped and decided to go to our cabin in Craig. It would be their first time hunting together since Amanda was mauled by a brown bear a little over a month ago while she and Nick were hunting on Admiralty Island near Juneau. Amanda seemed fully recovered, except for some lingering recovery with her hand.

We hunted for the week, in the best week of deer hunting weather I can ever remember: clear and in the 20s°F every day. It was a little windy the first day, but we quickly learned not to hunt spots directly in the wind. I’d drop the two of them off at a spot, travel to a protected anchorage, anchor the skiff, and hunt that area myself.

The first day, they hunted a spot that is usually good, but it was windy. I went to a new area. I hunted an east-west muskeg, then moved up a north-south muskeg. I didn’t see a thing. I decided to cut back through the woods to the first muskeg, making a triangle track for the day. In a little valley with a creek sheltered from the wind, I blew the call. A doe immediately appeared, staying out of the wind. No buck followed, but at least I saw a deer. When I picked up Nick and Amanda, they said they had hiked all over the good deer spots and saw nothing because the wind was howling.

The next day, we hunted an area I don’t think I’d ever been to. I thought it would be out of the wind. We followed the same routine, with them hunting a big area and me a smaller one. It was another clear day, and we were indeed out of the wind, but the ridge that blocked the wind also blocked the morning sun, leaving the muskeg cold. I called at the beach end of the muskeg—nothing. Moving to the ridge end, I called again and heard snow crunching. It sounded like a deer was approaching behind me, but then I saw it in front. It was strange how the sound carried. A doe came within 30 yards, checked me out, and kept going. She didn’t return to later calls, and no buck showed. The partners didn’t see anything either, despite covering a lot of country.

Amanda took day three off, so Nick and I hunted together. We went to the spot I hunted on day one. I stayed with him at the first muskeg, then sent him ahead since he could cover more ground than I could on my bum hip. Midday, I heard a shot—hopefully Nick’s. I got to the beach early, pulled the boat to shore, loaded my gear, and waited. Right on time, Nick arrived with a 3-point buck’s rack poking from his pack. He had called it from timber near a muskeg. A doe came first, followed by the buck, which stopped behind a tree. Nick kept the doe coming, and when the buck emerged, he took the shot. The doe stayed with the downed buck—a behavior I hadn’t seen before. Nick dressed and skinned the deer on-site, bringing back quarters, neck, ribs, backstraps, and tenderloins. His pack was heavy, and I wondered if I could still carry one of these big bucks out myself. I was probably happier than Nick, as seeing family succeed brings me the most joy now.

The winds picked up as we returned. We battled two- to three-footers back to town. At the boat launch, the False Island docks were rolling with three-foot seas. It took both of us to tie up the boat and trailer it out. Yikes. The forecast called for even stronger winds the next day. Amanda took her day off to have lunch with an old friend in town and learn about his wolf research.

Nick and I butchered the deer the following day while Ellen took Amanda hunting on the road system. They saw no deer but plenty of tracks and had fun. That evening, we watched episodes of Alone. It was season 10, the first Amanda and Nick had seen. I’ve watched every season, but we all enjoyed it together. The Starlink I installed earlier this year was great—especially since you can turn it on and off for remote cabins like this without an annual contract. For now, at least.

Ellen invited us to dinner for deer soup, but it turned into fresh king salmon on the grill, caught by Brian and his pilot friend that day. Brian’s brother and his wife joined us, bringing their own salmon dip to complement ours. We brought salad, and together we had a fantastic meal with lots of hunting conversation.

As the winds eased, we decided to hunt a distant spot where family and friends have had success in the past. I dropped Nick and Amanda at a promising location while I hunted a secluded muskeg. The sun was out, and the winds were calm. I didn’t see any deer, but the exercise and sunshine left me feeling better than I had in a while. Nick and Amanda also saw nothing, but the beautiful weather made the deerless days more bearable. The frozen ground was easy to walk on, and the crisp temperatures in the 20s°F made for perfect hiking conditions.

On the last day, Nick and Amanda wanted to revisit the spot where Nick got his buck and then cruise beaches as the tide fell. While they hunted, I put hand troll gear on the skiff and fished one of my favorite drags. I almost landed what I think was a king salmon and released a small lingcod. At noon, I picked them up; they had seen no deer but were eager to explore the beaches. We spotted one deer that retreated into the woods before we could identify it and another doe that emerged when they used the call.

As we headed home, my fuel gauge—always reading full—deceived me. The engine quit, likely because the tank’s pickup tube wasn’t reaching the remaining fuel. After trying unsuccessfully to fix it, Amanda called Ellen, and Brian came to the rescue. We drifted near town for an hour before Brian arrived, towing us back to the dock at dusk. His preparedness and skill made the process seamless, and we couldn’t thank him enough.

The next morning, clouds rolled in after a week of sunshine. A winter storm watch was in effect for Juneau. On the way to the airport, icy roads made for a nerve-wracking drive. I fishtailed on black ice and crawled at 30 mph to make it safely. The flight home was smooth, and now I’m processing the deer Nick gave me. It’s funny—I used to give away the deer when I was their age. Hopefully, Nick and Amanda will want to join me again for more adventures.

We brought the boat back from Craig this week. We caught a 3 day window of good weather between two blows. We left Craig on Wednesday morning. Our friends Peter and Nevette from Petersburg came to town to make the journey with us.

We left Craig about 830 am and headed north to El Capitan Passage. We had fair seas all the way to Calder Bay, just past the big limestone mine, and anchored at dark, about 630 pm. Sara made a dish with moose and coleslaw for dinner.

Next morning we left just before sunrise at 630 am and headed to Rocky Pass. Sumner Strait had a small chop as we made the 4 hour trip to the pass entrance. We saw several seine and other boats anchored in the area moose hunting, but luckily did not need to pass any vessels while we transited the pass. I followed my track on the gps from my trip south with Joe in May, and was somewhat taken aback that my track at one point went right through a little rockpile island. Not sure how that happens, but I learned to trust your eyes first, and electronics second.

We got through the pass without incident, and only a marginal pucker factor. We saw a blow was coming Friday night, so we ran right until dark again, making it across Frederick Sound to a little anchorage in a bull kelp patch I found on the chart at the entrance to Pybus Bay behind an island with a single row of spruce trees. I hoped from here we could run to Juneau before the storm hit the next day. It was a calm anchorage. The skies cleared off overnight and everyone remarked at the big starry sky they say when each of us got up at some point to pee.

I was up before daylight, pulled the anchor, and we were on our way at 615 am in the false dawn light. Stephens Passage had a slight northerly chop, and we had a hard time even making 6 knots much of the day. We must have been running at exactly the wrong time for the tide, but that’s how it goes. As the day cleared out, the sun came out, the winds calmed, and we rode glassy seas.

We saw many humpback whales along the way. They looked like they were on their fall migration to Hawaii, as they were mostly moving in groups and not feeding. We got quite a breaching show by a couple of whales that were in sight of each other. One would breach, and then the other would breach. Then one would slap its pectoral fin, and then the other would do the same.

We traveled from Pybus Bay all the way to Taku Inlet before we saw a single boat. Whew. Cruise ship season is over.

As we entered Gastineau Channel, the winds had changed around to southerly and increasing, as forecast. Now we had a slight following sea chop propelling us along the last 2 hours of the trip. We made the best time of the day the last 12 miles or so to town, and got in a little ahead of my estimated arrival time. Just as we walked our gear up the ramp to the parking lot, the winds started to blow. We got home just in time.

Chris and his son in law Phil came in for a week from Mississippi and Atlanta. The first day was a blow with heavy rain, so we went to Coffman Cove to the hamburger stand. The next day was calm seas and we headed out fishing. The boys enjoyed lots of whales, as they would every day. We fished near town, and scratched 2 cohos. The boys went beach combing at the anchorage and found a 4 point antler shed and sea asparagus. The next day we landed one coho and lost 2 nice ones. I set the skate at the honey hole. At the anchorage, the boys found a fork horn shed and abundant red huckleberry.

The next morning, we checked the skate. Nothing. I was starting to sweat. Would we rally as we always had and find some fish or was the coho run over?  We rallied. It actually seemed like slow fishing, but we were hooking up on each pass around the drag. We landed seven coho and lost several others.

We reset the skate and anchored nearby. The boys went to the beach while I got dinner ready. Tonight was the salmon frames – the meat left along the backbone after filleting each side. I pan fried them in butter. The boys picked it up and weren’t real sure about it, but after a few bites, they finished their plates and had seconds.

I was up before dawn the next morning. I put the coffee on to boil, and did stretches for my hip. When the coffee was ready, I sipped coffee and saw dawn approaching. The boys were up with the sun.

We checked the skate and nothing again. It was flat calm. I asked them if they wanted to fish for chicken halibut, as now was the time with no wind, or did they want to go back for coho. Halibut was the choice.

We were soon at the chicken hole. Phillip’s first retrieve was a double!  Four fish left to catch. It took a couple hours more, but we got there. I showed them how to fillet halibut, then left them to it while I powered up to the coho drag.

An hour later we were coho fishing. We dragged to the corner, then all the way back up the drag. Nothing. We were the only boat there. I wasn’t sure if that was because charter boats came in early and got nothing, or chartering was done.

Inclement weather was coming, so we headed for the harbor. Dinner at the cabin was panko crusted halibut with potato fries and coleslaw. It was the boys first ever meal of halibut, and they were impressed.

The next day was their last day in town. I’d let the boys decide if they wanted to fish in the pouring rain, or relax. Then serendipity set it. My brother in law asked if we wanted to go see a dead whale with some scientists he was taking to collect samples. From the sounds of it, it would be a quick trip of a couple hours. But I knew better.  The boys were excited to go. I warned them it might be all day, and to dress for the weather.

We headed out with 2 veterinarians and a veterinary tech, my brother in law, and another Craig resident who was friends of the vet crew and whose father had found the whale. As we headed out, one of the vets started to give a safety briefing. We were being conscripted as volunteers on their sampling crew! Exciting.

The whale was on the beach right around the corner from where we’d been coho fishing. A 33 feet sub adult male humpback. This was my first time to see a whale up close on a beach. The first time to touch one. The long white pectoral fins. The eye. The nine foot wide tail. The pleats on the lower jaw that stretch back 3/4 of the length of the animal. The whale barnacles. The whale had not been there long, so was largely fresh.
The vets started right in on looking over the whale for signs of injury. They pointed out some marks that looked like propeller marks. I saw next to the propeller marks scraping that looked like the keel of a boat.

After the initial assessment, the vets soon had all of us helping them to cut or bag samples. My brother in law cut out a sample of the jaw and baleen. Chris took photos at the vets direction. I helped the other vet bag samples of various tissues and fluids. The other Craig resident removed an eye. We were all focused on the work as we kept working against the rising tide, but I was able to look up once in a while to acknowledge we were in the mist on a wilderness island examining a whale. In Alaska. A place that still holds my being.

As the morning turned into early afternoon, the flood tide was nearing the whale. The crew started to cut into the blubber and down to the muscle. They pulled back blocks of blubber with gaffs around the boiler room of the whale. Soon we saw it – a spot of large bruising in the muscle. Just like a deer shows after being shot or hit by a car. The whale looked to me like it didn’t die of natural causes.

When the tide had us scurried up to the tide line and the whale was mostly floating, we retreated with the gear and boarded the boat. We were able to turn the whale over now by pulling on one pectoral fin with the boat, and the vets were able to get one last sample: blow hole fluid from the top of the whale. We left the whale to rest. The island he was on has no bears. I’m not sure if the wolves on the island will eat the whale or leave it to birds, crabs, and other carrion consumers. The boys from Mississippi were almost in a trance at getting to participate in this once in a lifetime experience and had smiles a mile wide. They left the next morning with a wealth of stories to tell.

Chris and Phil are the 10th group of friends here this summer. Tom and Sarah have already confirmed their return, and my friends Al and Don are coming too. It’s been a prosperous summer and I’m ready for a few days of catch-up before trying for some deer.