Arrival day – got to our flat in Porto. It’s a block or two up from the Duoro River. Really cool place. There’s a non-descript (to me, anyway) door on this line of shops at street level. You enter the door code to get into the building. Then a staircase and a little elevator that goes up 5 floors. When we got to the 4th floor, our room was the only one, right out of the elevator. We entered the door code and in we came to a cool apartment. One bedroom, one bath, a nice compact kitchen alongside a living room with a couch and TV. We had a very narrow veranda out the window doors looking down the hill and could see the river at the end of the narrow street. I think the verandas are made for people to smoke on, as not really wide enough to even put a chair out there, but maybe. The place reminds of one of my favorite shows,Doc Marten, on PBS.

Day 1. Walked across the river to the Port district. Had tapas for lunch there. Walked back. I think about 2.8 miles total walk.

Day 2. Went to Afruada fishing village. Had great dorado and robalo fish, grilled over charcoal. These are either different species, or much smaller ages than dorado and robalo in the Pacific. Nice museum there of the history of the place. The town was a bunch of apartment buildings that were about 3 stories. Women of the village still wear a type of apron as a sort of everyday uniform while walking around their town. We walked from there back to Port district. About 3.5 miles. Then took an uber home.

Day 3. Walked up to the market in the middle of town. Had the 8 canned seafood sampler on crackers. Great idea for a Juneau business. We put in almost 7 miles today walking!  Didn’t seem like it. And maybe wasn’t. Not sure if the GPS tracker works exactly right for measuring distance.

Day 4. Walked up to our new hotel, where we met  another state senators and his spouse. Sara and the wife went walking around while I yakked with the senator until our rooms were ready for occupation. Eventually the third member of the state delegation – another senator – and his wife arrived. When Sara returned, our room was ready and we napped til dinner. Dinner was at a high end place a couple blocks from the hotel. I had a Portuguese dish called a francesinha, which is sort of a sandwich of cured meats encased in cheese with a weak tomato sauce and an egg on top. Very disappointing. I didn’t finish half of it, which never happens with me. The appetizers of octopus salad and a sort of shrimp cake were good, so not like I went away hungry. I think I was expecting the francesinha to be more savory or sweet or spicy or something, but it was very bland. Even the cheese was bland.  I was going to order my old standby of fried cod, but thought I better try the local dish.

Day 5. Toured a family owned fish processor Soguima in Guimaraes, Portugal. They do lots of products with salt cod and octopus, and also do some products with Alaska pollock and other species. After the tour, they fed us a pile of different dishes with their products. They have a chef on staff that works in a food laboratory as far as I could tell. Then an hour and a half ride to the sea again to Vigo. Only saw one bird at the fish plant, and just chickens near houses otherwise, along the way. Not sure why, as there’s lots of trees and vegetation?  Just another pleasant day here.

Interesting hearing the marketing staff talk about the current poor market conditions for Alaska salmon from the “glut” of wild salmon on the market, and issues with Russia salmon and China processing. When I mentioned that much of our fish went to China for processing, I was told it was just pink and chum salmon because those two species didn’t command a price on the market to justify paying for processing in Alaska. It made me realize we are still marketing what we catch, instead of catching for the market. Pink salmon, in particular, can garner good retail prices if it’s handled to achieve high quality, instead of high quantity. We proved that when we were selling pink fillets, and Yakobi Fisheries is proving it again now with their high quality pink salmon fillet sales. The fishing mentality of catching as many fish as possible at some baseline acceptable quality standard for which the fish can be made into some low value product works some years and others it doesn’t, based on catches by similar methods of the same species in other parts of the Pacific and other market forces. If fishermen caught the fish to meet a quality standard that would garner a higher price point, they could earn more money on fewer fish, but that will never happen. It’s just not in most fishermen’s wheelhouse to do more than catch.  And it’s why the market – especially the US domestic market – is wide open for fishermen and processors that do want to produce high quality pink salmon fillets and direct market them to niche markets.

Day 6. Attended the big seafood show CONXEMAR in Vigo, Spain.  I felt a little under dressed in my brand new green coveralls with green Carhart shirt until a sophisticated woman I’d guess was in her early 60’s – apparently well known in the cod seafood market and dressed to the nines like she could be attending the academy awards – stopped in to the ASMI booth. An ASMI rep introduced us, and she commented on how great my “look” was. That made my whole day. I learned a lot at the show, seeing all the products represented, and listening to the ASMI executives talk to other seafood representatives about issues in the salmon market, in particular, about things I’d never think about, such as increased bank interest rates.

Late in the afternoon we visited a surimi plant, Pescanova, in town. Great tour. The plant produces crab stick, baby eels, and a breaded “crab claw” from surimi, and sells most of it’s product solely in Spain. They use surimi made from Alaska pollock for much of their production. We sampled some surimi “noodles” that were like fettuchini noodles, along with some “baby eel” and both were very good. Later in the week, though, Sara ordered an octopus dish that both of us agreed was not octopus, but surimi, and it was very average.

Day 7. Toured a shellfish farm and processor in Galacia owned by four generations of a family, Jose Mª Daporta Leiro e Hijos S.L. in Cambados, Spain. They do their oyster culture by gluing 3 oysters on spot on ropes, and unlike anything I’ve seen anywhere in Alaska. Interesting. Then we had a 12 course meal at a restaurant run by the oyster plant family relatives. Fantastic shellfish, fish, and one chicken dish. Global warming is slowing killing the oysters on the farms, and causing the farmers to move more towards mussels. Higher ocean temperatures combined with increased rains causing a higher influx of freshwater to the inlet are a one-two punch in killing the oysters.

Day 8. Had a multi-course dinner again today after touring Santiago. Just as we were to sit down, Tom and Sarah Morgan stuck their head in the window!  I’d given up hope we’d actually find each other in Santiago, but there we were. They came in and ate with us. The dinner included oysters, shrimp, mussels, roast octopus, fish, gooseneck barnacles, and tuna. I may have forgotten one or two others.

Day 9. Headed from Vigo back to Porto. Stopped at Gimares for a tour with Manuel from the company that starts with S that we toured earlier in the week. Another huge lunch with so many different plates of seafood. His sister Zita joined us. She is 7 years younger than her brother, and we had an interesting conversation about her time spent in Mozambique working for the company business there. They raise crocodiles and cattle. The leather of the crocs is shipped to Europe and the meat is sold locally. We never got to talking about the cattle.

Rest of trip: Took train to Lisbon for a few days. Lots of spectacular sculptures and old buildings at this very strategic location. Not my thing really, but very impressive in person, I must say. Took train back to Porto and stayed at the city centre Holiday Inn overnight. Very nice staff, but hotel rooms somewhat noisy through the walls from doors closing, etc. Another major first world problem to fix.

The hotel is located on a cool pedestrian strip with restaurants and a little shopping mall with a nice grocery store. We had dinner at the first restaurant we came to a block away because the smell coming from it was so good. I had pork ribs and Sara pork tenderloins. Bock stout is a very good beer.

We spent the night at the Heathrow airport hotel. Most comfortable bed of the trip. Had I not been with Sara, I’d have slept in the airport and had a miserable overnight like I always do.

So, lasting impressions of Portugal and Spain were lots of tatoos, mostly on the younger folks. Cigarette smoking is still a thing over all ages. The “Mediterranean Diet”, if that’s what it is, of cured meats and cheese and seafood and olives and olive oil and fruits and wine seems to work. As I observed in my only other trip to Europe (to Iceland), I noticed a lot less obesity here than in the US (or my household………).

I did the physical therapy exercises faithfully each day for my hip bursitis. I might go to bed with a sore hip in the evening, but each morning I would wake up and have it a little better than the day before.   Almost a new lease on life, as they say. I was getting pretty scared it would never get back to good for hunting and firewood cutting and other labors of love.

My Keen boots finally gave up the ghost. My right foot started hurting a few days into the trip. I couldn’t figure out why. I’d hiked miles and miles in these boots, and so that didn’t strike me as the problem at first. Seemed like the foot neuroma was coming back, and I remembered that it was caused by a cramped toe box on my cross country ski boots. The only other foot ware I had with me were my Crocs. I switched to wearing them full time and determined my boots WERE the problem. So, many miles in Crocs and black socks later, the neuroma turned around. I left the boots on the step of the hotel at the Lisbon train station in case someone with size 16s and narrower feet needed a fresh pair of wheels, as the boots were still in decent shape.   With all the miles we walked on the trip – and alot of it uphill – I’m itching to get down to Craig for deer hunting and salal berry picking.

We’ll also remember the Hamas attacks in Israel and know that, like Afghanistan and Iraq,  this is not going to end well. There can be no military solution there. It would have happened already if there were.

Traveling back from these trips, I reflect with gratitude how lucky I am to get to do them. I don’t feel like I’ve “earned it” or “deserve it”. Most people will never get to do these things, simply because they were born in a less prosperous country or different life or health or family situation here in the states. We’re also luckier than so many of our friends, who because of genetics or their environment or being in the wrong place at the wrong time, or just plain fate, didn’t live to older age and retirement and have the time they always looked forward to to do these things.

Jesse was in town for 3 days of fishing. A perfect trip length I think, although we can’t run down to Tenakee. Jesse was my last out of town guest for the summer.

We caught seven coho the first day, and five the second. And none today, the third!  My first fish skunk day this summer. And we fished for miles and miles. Had several hits that released the line from the downrigger, but no fish. Only saw about 3 fish caught all day by the many boats we passed.

This was the third straight trip (and fourth trip overall as the first trainee was Jesse’s wife Hanni) of training the crew on the first few fish caught how to properly bleed them in water, clean the fish, then chill and later fillet them. I then turned them loose to take care of their fish the rest of the trip. Wow, has that been a good move. I can see the crew improve with each day, gain confidence in their fish butchering skills, and increasingly understand the importance of all the simple, but necessary, steps to make great fish for themselves.

We spent both nights at the Funter Bay dock. The first night a Prince of Wales Islander couple offered us some cooked dungeness crab. They must know I can’t catch legal crabs. These looked kinda small and feminine, but how can you be sure when they are already cooked.

Jesse took the punt to the beach on the second night to check out the remains of some buildings. A sailboat I recognized from Harris Harbor in Juneau tied up to us later that night, operated by a couple more elderly than me. When I got up in the middle of the night, I saw their bow was pointed into the bay, with only the stern tied up. I wasn’t sure if they did this on purpose to take the numerous cruise ship wakes head on, or if they had just not tied up their boat properly. Later when I got up to go again, the boat was along the dock again, so I thought maybe I was seeing things. The next time I got up to go – yes, I have an appointment with the urologist next week – the boat was pointed out again, and the lone late-20’s something guy in the small sailboat in front of us was coming down the dock in bare feet and pulling the couple’s sailboat back alongside the dock. This is when I realized it wasn’t tied up right, and I jumped out in my bare feet and helped him tie up their boat. The couple never roused. Maybe the comforts of old age like poor hearing are something to look forward to.

I set the halibut skate three times. Once with “can’t miss” octopus, which did miss and bait was gone. The other two times the skate was baited with fish heads. Our honey hole has soured, so time to find a new set.

We used the salmon remains after filleting to really load up the crab pot. I finally got a full day+ soak, instead of just overnight, and most of the pots in the bay that were there earlier in the summer were gone. When we pulled the pot this morning, we had a keeper!  And a second that was a 1/16 inch too small, but at least it was a male. And a couple females that looked remarkably similar to the crab offered us by the Prince of Waler. That single keeper was our only keeper of any kind for the day, and ended up being our highlight reel!

Today, we fished the mouth of Funter Bay for nothing. Then steamed north and fished Cordwood Creek almost to Point Retreat for nothing. Then fished Hand Trollers Cove for nothing. Thank goodness for one dungeness crab in the morning!

I’ll hope to take the West Africans and Ukranians for a trip or two before the cohos run out, which I hope hasn’t happened already. Funny how one day of catching nothing sends all kinds of gloom and doom prognostications into your conversations, only to be replaced by it’s the best run ever the next day when the fish come to the net one after another. I do love this place.

Tom, and his 14 year old grandson Jasper, aka String Cheese, or “The Cheese” for short, arrived after midnight. Tom, his wife Sarah, and I have known each other since we arrived in Oklahoma together in August 1986 to train as fish farming extension agents for the Peace Corps. Following training, we were posted near each other in eastern Sierra Leone in West Africa. They are family. Their daughter, the Cheese’s mother, is my Goddaughter.The Cheese earned his nickname last year from his love of string cheese as one of about 5 foods he eats, the others being Ritz Crackers, pasta, apple sauce and popcorn.

The forecast from last week changed quite a bit last night, and now a blow was coming, so no hurry to get out our first day, as we were fishing close to town. I let the boys sleep in.

Michelle said they caught lots of cohos on the back side of Douglas Island during the last day of the local salmon derby the day before, and there seemed like an unusually large number of resident (not charter) boats out there, but we didn’t see much catching going on. We caught a couple pink salmon and a shaker king salmon, and one nice coho for the day. We came back to Auke Bay, and hoped to sneak down to Funter Bay tomorrow, fishing our way down from Point Retreat.

On day two, we didn’t go to Funter Bay. The gauge at Naked Island already showed a good bit of wind, and I didn’t think it would fishable out there. So, we set a skate for halibut by Coghlin Island, then fished behind Douglas Island again, down and back to Pt Hilda. We had a nice one on and lost it near Hilda, then got a big coho off Middle Point. That was it. Didn’t see much going on in the other boats, and many were picking up and moving. Tom is on the fish cleaning now, and I showed him how to fillet the cleaned fish, as well, when we got home. We freeze the portions, and eat the frames left over from the fillets for dinner.

There were no fish on the skate. I realized I’d set on a mud bottom, so I was not surprised we had nothing – I need to find rock or sand to set on as Brian told me. As we came into the harbor,  people getting off work jammed the nearby boat launch ramp, heading out to check their king crab pots. Personal use king crab fishing is open near town for a week – a long time around here – with a 3 crab per household limit – also a high number. I’m not setting our pot because I just can’t seem to catch them.

The weather calls for a blow of 30 knots tomorrow, so we may or may not be able to fish behind Douglas Island. It depends on how east of south the wind direction is for the southern end of Douglas Island to block the wind or not for fishing from George Rock down to Middle Point. I realized today Tom and The Cheese don’t leave til Saturday morning, so we still have a chance to make an overnight Thur-Fri to Funter Bay, even if we don’t get out tomorrow, and the weather looks good for those days.

It blew as expected on Wednesday, and the boys were happy for a relaxing day by the woodstove, eating and yaking.

We left early on Thursday morning. Kurt said he’d caught fish at Hand Trollers Cove on Tuesday, so we tried there first on our way to Lynn Canal. The left over winds from Wednesday were supposed to lay most of the way down by the afternoon. We got 3 fish by noon, and then peaked around the corner at Point Retreat, and the seas looked fair. So we went down to Cordwood Creek to fish. We caught two cohos fishing north to south on the drag. When we got to the end, I didn’t turn around because there was too much kelp and wind to deal with to back tack through it, so we picked up our gear and continued on down to Funter Bay.

We put the gear back in at Funter Bay and had good fishing for several hours, catching 6 coho. We set the halibut skate in the honey hole in Funter Bay, then continued on into the dock. Now Cheese was also cleaning fish, after Grandpa taught him, and he was eager to participate. Don’t see that too often in teenagers now. He liked his technology, but he could put it down. Many can’t. They were doing well bleeding, cleaning and chilling the fish as we caught them. Just like I’d taught them. These are lifetime skills The Cheese can hone through practice. That made me happy.

We tied up to the dock in Funter Bay opposite the Gambler, a well kept ~ 50 foot steel troller that might be a freezer boat, as it sounded like a generator was quietly running onboard. Later, the Shelly J and Lucy Lou, two smaller trollers, tied up. The captains of the Lucy Lou and Gambler and the crew member on the Lucy Lou sat down on the dock next to the window of the Shelly J, where the captain was sitting, and held court over beers. I learned so much during those sessions when I power trolled, and I miss the kinship with the other fishermen.

On Friday, I heard the Gambler fire up at first light. There was a chill in the air. The first such chill I’ve felt this summer. Fall is on the way. I put on water for coffee, did my yoga stretching that is working wonders for my nagging hip flexor, returned the cushions to the helm seat that make up my bed on the galley table, and fired up the Jeanne Kay. Tom was soon up, and we eagerly headed to check the skate, where I’d caught halibut both times I’d set there this summer. I felt a little too eager, though, and wasn’t so confident in a catch this time as I’d used pink salmon body portions for bait, but not salmon heads. Pink salmon is pretty soft, so easier for a fish to steal off the circle hook without getting caught. And that was the case this time. Both hooks were bare. No halibut.  I will use heads next time. We put out the anchor, and tried fishing for halibut for a couple hours through the low tide change, and no luck, so back to salmon fishing.

We headed up to Cordwood, where there were many boats. One boat in particular, right in front of us, was catching fish one after another. It looked like they had a similar color hootchie to the one I had on one of our two rods. I put a white King Kandy cut plug on the other. We could not get a strike. We fished north to the top of the drag, almost to False Pt Retreat. and most of the boats were still fishing the southern end of the Cordwood drag, so we turned around. We got a fish on the turn. Finally. A nice coho on the King Kandy. We continued all the way down to the other boats, where we saw catching going on, but we got nothing on the back tack. I put a cop car (half black and half white) King Kandy cut plug to replace the hootchie. I turned north again, and we got another coho. This time a big fish on the cop car lure. So big we weighed it – 15 lbs. That’s bigger than the average sized king salmon now. We got a third nice fish, and called it a day. The boys picked up the gear and finished cleaning and icing the fish while I throttled up for the ride home.

Their final afternoon boat ride home was glorious. With sunny skies and flat seas and humpback whales in Saginaw Channel.  When the boys put all the fish away, The Cheese retired below for a nap, and Tom sat alone on the back deck, taking it all in.

Time to clear out the freezer of blueberries today with a heavy rain and a blow coming. Rain starting now, and the blow added in tomorrow and Sunday.

I made 4 pies and 33 half pints of jam with the berries, some that I picked 3 years ago, I think.  Berries really stand up well in the freezer, even if the vacuum seal breaks.

I love the Pomona Pectin I got from David at Rainbow Foods for making jam. I first remember using it at my second job for Fish and Game about 1990 in Sand Point, making salmonberry jam. The salmonberry patch behind the Sand Point harbor was the finest I’ve seen to this day.

Pomona seems pretty foolproof for setting up. I used it to make rhubarb jelly earlier in the summer when I was having trouble with traditional pectins, and it worked great, so I ordered a case of the pectin from David so I’d have it through the winter.

For the pie filling, I used flour to thicken and sugar to taste, poured into 9 inch store-bought pie crusts. Yep. Store bought crusts. Organic, even. I’m not Martha Stewart.