Well, it’s 10:00 in the morning on my third trip.  I got back from the second trip and got everything taken care of for the house build and the fish taken care of and the clothes put awy. The contractor arrived and put up the border of the foundation forms. Then, it turns out the pad isn’t level enough for the job, so we have to get more D1 in. They said they couldn’t start on the foundation until we get it leveled, so bang. I have Sunday off til Monday afternoon.

I got up at 3am and headed out to my spot at 3:30, arriving a little over 2 hours later. I got my first fish shortly later.  I continued down the drag and back. I got the first fish on the herring aid king spoon, and remember my brother in law remarking at a picnic the day before that he had been fishing with the same spoon, and when he saw the kings feeding on some small feed – I think they are just-hatched herring fry – he switched to a coho killer, which is the same color as the king spoon, but about half the width. I switched to that as I started my second pass down the drag and boom. I got another one. Then I caught a shaker and lost another fish right under the boat. After no more fish on the return tack, I put on another, larger, same colored spoon – a Loony Spoon – that I bought a handful of at Harri’s in Juneau. They were priced lower than the other colors, so maybe the herring aide color doesn’t work as well there. Got two more fish on it, and lost another.

I notice that not only the charter boats, but also local boats, don’t have much patience for a spot. A local boat came in and went half way up the drag one way, and off he goes. One thing I do concede is that I’m not in a hurry for a reason – because I’m retired. Others may only have the day to fish, then have to go back to work tomorrow, so they are anxious to get something while the weekend is here.

I anchored behind the little island, as the wind was blowing into the usual cove I anchor in. I’d spliced on a thimble to the anchor line for the spare anchor and chain, and tossed the anchor over. I made coffee for the thermos for first thing into the morning, and listened to the college world series and the Stanley Cup games on the satellite radio app.

I was up at 3 am, plugged in the starlink, and saw I had a voicemail. Listening to it I say “Uh Oh”… My contractor was cancelling his morning concrete pour at another site due to the heavy rain, so he’d be over to work on our lot in the morning! I pull the anchor and …. D’OH!… the new thimble I spliced in is too wide to go through the chute on the bow roller. Dang it.

I tie off the anchor line I have in, muscle the chain over the chute til the thimble clears, and then continue hauling. The anchor is full of kelp when it clears the water and won’t come up over the anchor roller.  I stop again, clove hitch the chain on the anchor post, and clear the kelp with the pike pole. Then get the anchor all in, and away we go.

I fish the drag towards town. I lose one, but no time to keep fishing at the turnaround. Still lots of feed here, and I think it would be another good day of fishing if I could stay, but gotta go. There will be more days.  All of them good.

It’s lumpy on the way home with the wind. And pouring buckets of rain. I bucked the tide for the first hour, so it takes 30 minutes longer to get back than usual.

I get the fish I kept into the freezer. My dirt guy shows up, and away we go on the foundation. A short but great outing.

Took off for my second fishing trip this year. My contractor said he’d start the foundation in about a week, and the weather forecast looked great. That was my cue to take off for several days fishing.

I went to my favorite drag on inside waters and tried for the afternoon and into the evening. I had one nice halibut up to the boat but couldn’t manage to gaff it aboard with my new shoulder, and it shook the hook. I anchored in the familiar cove and tuned in to a Mariners game.

Next morning I was up about 330 am and out fishing by 4. I trolled all the way down the coast of Lulu Island and around the corner and no bites. I decided to keep going into the channel between Lulu and Noyes, and whamo. First a king salmon, and a while later, a chicken halibut. I went up the drag and back again, but no more fish. I decided to cross over to Noyes and fish my way to the outer coast like I did the first trip.

I put my fishing gear down when I got past Steamboat Bay and started trolling my way to the outside coast. Unlike last trip, there was not much going on on the inside drag. I didn’t even catch a ling cod, which plagued me the first trip. While I like eating them, I can keep one per day, and when they get on the trolling gear, they will ride it all day without you knowing they are on there. That’s what makes the electric downriggers so nice- I check my line alot more often now.

I turned the corner to the outside waters to test the swell, and decided it was doable. I got two more kings out there in short order, and was anchored back at the little anchorage on the inside early in the afternoon. I have care of the fish I kept, do some little projects on the boat, and drink lots more coffee. Although there’s no cell service out there, that’s not an issue in 2026. Starlink is here. For the same subscription I was paying for Sirius XM radio,  I can listen to the Mariners game in the early afternoon, then the NBA or NHL finals in the evenings. I listen to ball games all day out fishing and really like that. I’m in by 8 pm. I could hear the resident whale come into the cove after I got in my bunk and read another few pages of Hand Troller. Bedtime is early when I’m on my own.

The next morning I wanted to call my cousins in Texas, just to say:  “Houston: We Have a Problem.”  I hung the anchor. I was only in 25 feet of water, and could see the end of the anchor chain down there descending into the kelp. I tied the anchor line off to the sampson post and tried moving every which way around the anchor with the boat, on a short leash and a longer leash. It wouldn’t budge. So, I conceded I’d need to cut the line. Luckily, the former owner of the tug had outfitted it with everything, from tools to a spare anchor, and, just as important, I actually knew where the spare anchor was on the boat. I got the spare gear out of the lazerette, rigged up the spare anchor and chain, and got them to the bow. Then I gathered a couple beach-combed buoys from the roof, and threw on a crab buoy with my name and address on it. I ran a length of ground line through the buoys and tied the line ends together, leaving a tag line to tie to the anchor line.

I let out some slack to the anchor line, tied it off again to the post. In the slack anchor line behind the post, I tied in a figure 8 loop, then tied the string of buoys to the loop, and cut the anchor line behind the loop.   I tied the remaining anchor line to the spare anchor, threw the buoys overboard, and drifted away. You always want to have an anchor ready in case you get into trouble (I’m good at that).

I’ll ask a couple of the young fishermen I know in town who might be divers if they use this this anchorage and might recover the anchor for me. It wouldn’t be worth paying a diver to run all the way out there just to retrieve it versus buying another set up.

I cruised the 10 minutes to the outside. It was about 5 am now, and the swell was not too bad, so I figured I’d still get an hour or two of fishing this area to myself.

I hooked a nice fish about an hour later by a couple wash rocks that I rarely see charter boats fishing near. For some reason, this seems to be where I catch most of my fish this year. Not sure why. The rod was bent full over, and almost felt like I had a kelp ball, except for the occasional tug. Well, I’ve got another halibut on.

I’m fairly close to the surf bashing into the wash rocks, but my drift looks safe enough to stay in the deep for now. The fish comes in slowly but surely, as halibut will do. The fish stayed deep the whole time. When I finally see the flasher, I can’t make out a halibut down there. Just as the flasher is about to break the surface right next to the boat, one of the nicest kings I’ve caught in a long time cartwheels out of the water a few rod lengths away. DANG!  That ain’t no halibut!  I work the king to the boat and try time after time to lift the rod as high as I can and direct the nice king into the net with one arm, but can’t quite get it in the net held down there by the other arm. Luckily, the hooks on the cop car king kandy plug never caught in the net to pull it out of the fish. I finally get the king into the net and sigh with relief in the swell. What a day, already.

I think: thank goodness I took the time to shorten the leader from the flasher to the lure a tad last evening. Yesterday, the longer leader made it hard to work the smaller kings and hold the rod high enough with one arm and still be able to reach down with the net with the other arm to net the fish. I shorted the leader by about 16 inches, and that was just enough, I think, to make a difference today, especially out here on the outside in the swell.

The swell was getting bigger out there, so I returned to the anchorage at about 1030 am, where I now have a mooring buoy!  The great thing about a mooring buoy is you just tie up to it. No need to set an anchor and retrieve it in the morning. I have an electric capstan that I haul the anchor with, so it’s not as hard to haul as it would be by hand, but still some work every morning.

I have an anchor alarm that sounds if the boat moves more than a certain distance measured by GPS, so if the anchor ever did break free while I’m tied off to the anchor line, the alarm would wake me in plenty of time to take action. It’s even calmer in here today than yesterday, so it’ll be really nice to sleep here again tonight and then get after it in the morning.

One thing I notice fishing in the swell alone that might make me catch more fish than in calm seas or with a crew is that I have to really pay attention to keep the boat on course, and try to stay in water deep enough to keep the gear from getting too near the bottom (although that doesn’t always matter), as this area has both rockfish and ling cod.   I still go too shallow a little bit once in a while so that the gear gets near the bottom, and this isn’t all bad, as a few rockfish or ling cod is fine. But not every tack!  I can’t take my eyes off my course or depth very often like I can in calm waters, so maybe I catch better when fishing is a little challenging. It sure will be nice when I have crew to check the lines, as that’s always an adventure in the swell with no steering in the back.

Back at the anchorage, I take care of the fish I kept, then just enjoy the day for a while. It’s sunny and pretty calm with a breeze – a satisfying part of the day when the fish are taken care of.

I then get going to fix the door going to the stern that broke where the hinges that seized were attached. I decide to be a maverick and go hinge-free. I put a rope handle on the top, and put barrel bolt latches on either side to keep the door in place. Works for me. What a beautiful day in this cove, and I have Whale TV to stream all day.

The resident humpback whale here has a feeding behavior I’ve not seen before. It blows bubbles in the shallows like the one we’ve seen in Kelly Cove. But this one arches his back – just from his tail to his dorsal fin (and not at the dorsal fin like they do when diving). The technique reminds me those pictures of a fox jumping high into the air with its back arched and coming down into the snow to catch a vole it hears underneath. I don’t know if the whale’s mouth was right in the bottom, but it must have been close if not, since he (I think it’s a he) was only in 10 or 15 ft of water. It’s interesting all the different ways the whales do things in different places to make a living, adapting to the type of feed and where they’re feeding on it. This whale seems like he specializes in feeding in this cove, and it will be neat if I see the same whale again here next year, if both of us make it through the winter. The whale has a bunch of bumps the size of silver dollars on its sides that I’ve never seen before on other whales. It also has a little white spot on the back of his dorsal fin. So, he should be easy to recognize. I wonder if he’ll remember me. I bet he does.

The whale feeds all around the cove, all afternoon. He seems accustomed to the boat and me and that we pose him no threat. He comes up within feet of the boat without alarm.   No alarm to him, anyway. It always alarms me. If I’m sitting at the helm with the door open and a 40 foot mammal surfaces with a thundering exhale a few feet from you, that’s, like, the definition of alarm. He may get used to me being there, bobbing in the Pacific, but it never gets routine for me. What a place I live in.

I’m up and going by 330am on day 4, and so nice to just untie from the buoys without having to haul the anchor. The swell on the outside is as calm as it’s been the past few days, and I have the area all to myself for a few hours. I fish the king kandy for a couple passes with no action. So I switch to the herring aide color spoon, and BANG- fish on – right at the wash rocks again. Just as the first charter boats arrive. I land the fish and all the doubts I’ve had – Are the fish not here on this tide? Do I have the wrong lure on? Should I be fishing deeper? – just about everyday that I fish for an hour or two without a bite – evaporates.   Even though the charter boats that passed saw me catching a fish, they go to their spot, mooch for a bit, then leave in short order. Maybe they got word from other boats where the fish are biting. They they roar away at 20+ kts through the swell, pushed by their twin 300 hp outboards. Me- I go 6 kts, so I’m going nowhere in a hurry. And luckily, I’m not in a hurry. Dang. It’s great not to be in a hurry. I’ll fish here for hours and probably finally catch a king if I stay long enough. That’s all I want.

Our house builder Eric texted this morning. He’s ready to start on the foundation. So time to run to town. I need to move the skiff from where I left it parked so he can get to the building pad, and I want to be there for any other assistance he might need. I make my plan for the day: I’ll fish here on the  outside for a few more passes. Then I’ll move to my favorite inside drag at the tide change at about 11 am, and troll it just the one direction towards home.

I catch no more kings on the outside, and head to the inside drag. I put the gear down near, and fish towards town. I round the point and fish up the coast. It’s just about tide change now. Then whamo. Fish on. The rod is bent full over and throbbing, so it’s not another kelp monster on there. I take the rod from the holder and work the fish.   I’m sure – sure I think – this has to be a halibut, but I have some doubts now after getting fooled by the king on the outside.   It’s nice to be back on the inside in calm waters, so I only have to worry about the fish, and not keeping my balance, too. When I can finally see the flasher, I see that this time, it is, indeed, a halibut. And a nice one. A 50 lber. With the little spoon hook in its mouth.

After losing the halibut that was a little smaller than this one and my first day, I decide to try a different tactic: the landing net. I guess that this fish will JUST fit.   I make several attempts to get it in the net. A couple times it swims right into the net, but not quite over half way so it will fall into the net, and then it gets away.   On the 3rd or 4th try, it tips into the net. And I can’t believe that little hook held the big halibut. I set the fishing rod down, and reach down and grab the rim of the net with both hands and haul it over the rail and onto the back deck. Wowser.

I conk the fish, run the wash bucket line through the gills and out the mouth, cut the gills, then flop the halibut back over the side and tie the line in my hand off to the cleat to tow the fish and let it bleed well. I go forward and put the boat in gear and point it towards the deep, then put the line back out.

The boat makes a circle back towards where I caught the halibut to try that stretch again. I get the downrigger down to 70 feet, close the bail on the reel, put the rod back into the rod holder, then walk forward to the helm. I’m well off the beach circling back to the weedline where the drag is along the shore. I glance at the back deck camera….FISH ON!  I put the gear in neutral and hurry back to grab the rod. Definitely a king salmon this time. Way out here in the deep.

I land this one much more easily, and put the gear back down and repeat the process. I pass the spot one more time and get another fish on!  This time, it’s a shaker. I put the gear down for a 4th pass. Nothing showing this time past the spot, and I continue trolling myl way up to the anchorage cove. When I get near the cove,  I think about the clatter of coho and king salmon that Bob P and I had here last year. How still full of life he was, despite his failing health. And how we had fish coming over the rail one after the other right here. I pull the gear to head for home, wondering how Bob could be gone 6 months later. There’s a little rockfish on the hook. No wonder I had no more strikes. But not going to make a sucker pass and try again.

I point the boat for town, run the RPMs up to cruising speed, click on the auto pilot, and return to the back deck. I clean the king salmon, then fillet the halibut. After watching a few videos, I’m getting a bit better at filleting halibut. It’s also nice to have freshly sharpened knives that my sister in law took to Northern Knives in Anchorage for me on her last trip to Anchorage a week ago.

When I get the 4th fillet off the halibut and into the rinse water, I grab the halibut and toss it overboard……with my wash bucket line still dangling from its mouth. I quickly back track to get it, but it has sunk before I get there.

As I cruise home, I check online to see if there’s anyone in town selling an anchor…. there is!  I can’t tell from the photo how big it is, so I ask the seller if he knows the weight. But then I scroll to other photos and see 13 kg stamped on the shank. I look up what size boat that anchor would work for, and it’s a match. He seller then mentions he also has some chain. For the same price, I ask?  He adds $25 to the price. Still a great deal – and convenient, right here in town – at $150!  I’ll be by to see it when I get back, I text him.

When I get home, I get all the day’s catch taken care of on the tailgate of the truck at the cabin. I take the fish scraps and toss them down the slope to the beach. Soon, seemingly out of nowwhere, a dozen eagles swoop in. Along with a couple crows. My neighbor has them trained well from his fish scraps from fishing and meat scraps from his taxidermy work.  As I get back up to the house, I remember: the anchor!  I tell the seller I’ll be right out. I find the cash bag, count out $150, fold it up, and put it in the chest pocket of my overalls and jump in the car.

I meet the seller in Klawock, hand him the wad of cash, and he helps me put the anchor and chain into the Leaf.   When I return home, I see a fiver on the floor… uh oh. Did that fall out of the bag or the wad of cash for the anchor?  I immediately text the seller to ask if the money I gave him was $5 short. It was!  He said he thought HE’D dropped it somewhere himself!  I’ll be out with it tomorrow, I tell him.

It’s my eldest niece’s birthday today, my wife reminds me. The niece is in town from Anchorage for a week, and her mom and dad had her out fishing today. They passed me on the way in and sent a photo of a nice king she caught. I remember I have a jar of salal jam on the shelf, so take that for her birthday gift. My Alaskan nieces appreciate home made stuff like this as they grew up eating it and now do it themselves. And the maple syrup I send them annually from Pat and Sean in Bolivar.

I run over to drop off the jam, and my niece is just getting back from a hike with her dogs. I go inside and talk with all of them about their day fishing and my fishing trip. I luck out that they haven’t eaten yet, and they of course invite me to the table with them. Fresh white king salmon caught by my niece this afternoon and salad. A storybook ending.

The regular session was done, and Sara let me leave for Craig while she returned to work to work on the gasline. Everything in Craig was as I left it. Seemed like I’d only been gone a weekend. I plugged in the refrigerator and freezer. The boat was in good shape. My clothes were moldy, though, so need to better control for humidity next winter. I used those bags you put in your car for humidity, but they had used all their crystals so two bags was not enough.

The first few days back in town were spent doing errands and getting things lined up for Eric to build the house. I filled out the paper work at the utility company for bringing the Nissan Leaf to Craig. I’m already loving having a car here. Most of my driving is around town or to Klawock to the store or Hollis to the ferry, so great for an electric car. The electric cost per mile for charging the car here pencils out to an equivalent gasoline cost of about $2.75 a gallon.

Next, I had to complete paperwork for transferring my hand troll permit. I printed out the form at the library, then walked next door to city hall to get the form notorized, then back to the library to get the completed form scanned and emailed to the buyer. The librarian grew up with my nieces, went to Spain and lived and worked there for 10? years,  coming home summers to deckhand with her dad on his troller. She came home for good a few years ago to run the library. It was good to catch up with her.

After that, I needed to move the boat to another slip in the harbor. I’m hot berthing right now until I’m up on the waitlist for a permanent stall. The owner of the slip I was in was returning, so the harbor master had me move the boat to the other side of the finger. By luck, the owner of the boat next to me is a good friend, and that’s always nice to keep an eye out on each other’s boat.

I’d sent down the car full of stores – nuts, raisins, mayo, balsamic vinegar, olive oil, etc., and I brought down my favorite Costco cheese, butter, and some venison sausasge with me on the jet. I also picked up some avocados in Ketchikan before getting on the ferry with the car to Hollis. Ripe avocados are my secret to making a creamy concoction smoothie with protein ice cream mix, ice cubes, coconut milk and water.  I stopped at the store after moving the boat to pick up the remainder of my now simple diet- salad greens, onion, peppers and eggs at the store here. I’ve got canned venison, halibut, smoked salmon, kelp pickles and kelp relish in stock from last summer and fall, and fresh fish for the summer starts now to round out my diet.

I offloaded the groceries and jumped in the truck. I needed to get my boat at Lew’s lot in Hollis, where I left it last winter for the welder there to put on a new rear wall on the wheelhouse to replace the wrecked canvas that had been there. I dropped off a few things Lew asked me to look for in Juneau – a free new vice that Jeff gave me, and a pair of sneakers I got at the thrift store to wear with his waders. Then I hooked up the boat and returned to Craig. The welder mentioned there was an issue with gas fumes in the wheelhouse, and now that the wheelhouse was airtight, it was overwhelming. When I got back to Craig, I pumped out the fuel tank with a cool cordless Milwaukee fuel transfer pump Brian loaned me into two of his fuel barrels, and got the tank out. Could be the tank has some kind of leaks, but the tank was full and I don’t see any place it’s weeping nor fuel in the bilge. I did see the vent hose was bent over and the outside of the hose was degraded, so maybe it’s just bad hoses. The University of You Tube says it could be either causing the fumes. I’ll deal with that later.

Next I got the builder here one day and we measured and painted the corners of the house on the lot, and talked about what needed to be done with water and sewer and electric pipes dug in under the foundation. The next day I had Chuck, the dirt guy, come over and talk about it. It was all a little confusing for me, so I got them both here the next morning. Turns out the two of them came to the island at the same time, started working for the same contractor, then made their own company and built houses for years together till Chuck spun off and started a fishing lodge. It was great to hear old friends telling stories about their fishing and hunting trips together. Turns out the initial dirt work is simple. Chuck just got a new (to him) cruiser boat and wanted to take his wife out on a trip, so we’d get to the dirt work when he got back. That was my cue for a shakedown trip on the tug.

After the cursory look at the tug, I got down to business getting ready for the season. I wiped down the surfaces, some of which had a moldy film. The only winter casualty was an add-on sprayer I put on the galley sink. The plastic gasket on the sprayer broke and was not replaceable. I the hose to the store and luckily matched the fittings to a stainless steel replacement hose. Turns out my spayer hose is the same size as that for a shower head hose. I replaced the hose on the sink, and we’re back in business. I checked the fuel and water levels. I noted I needed to change the fuel filter and do the annual spring maintenance lubing of the seals on the head. Luckily, an oil change was still 50 hours away. I checked the drip on the shaft packing. I mounted a downrigger and checked that it worked. Outside the boat I thought: I gotta get some crap off this boat. I’ll get the shrimp pots off to start, and one of the 2 coolers. And get the pile of crew boots off the boat so there’s room to sit down around the galley table. As Kurt says, you should always have something in your hand on the walk back to your car from the boat that you’re taking off the boat.  I’ll get the stuff off after this trip.

I headed out early the next day. I headed for my familiar king and coho drag to start. My neighbor caught a couple kings there a few days ago, and my Brian said he’d seen whales there, which meant there was feed. Everything ran fine on the boat as I headed out. I looked with satisfaction on the upgrades I’d made since buying the boat. Moving the autopilot from below decks to the helm above deck, with a beautiful wood cover that Bob custom made for it. The DC powered 4 USB port. The camera and monitor to see the fishing rods and crew on the back deck. Replacing the incandescent light bulbs with flourescent bulbs. Moving the stereo from the galley steps to overhead in the helm so it is in easy reach. Adding the Starlink, so we’re never out of cell coverage. Adding the switch to isolate the cabin batteries from the starting battery, so, as long as I remember to switch it at night or when I leave the boat, the boat should always start and not have the batteries go dead if something is left turned on. Adding the circuit to feed the small freezer on the back. Adding the electric downriggers last year. Adding the new crank up and down pedestal for the galley table, that also serves as my bed when I have crew on board (that still needs some work)  And, when I went to cook dinner later, seeing the long handled pan my cousin gave me that was hand made by her cousin but never used where it lived then, but is now used regularly as it’s perfect for a boat galley. Crap, I sure like our boat.

I got the fishing gear down well ahead of the drag, out in the deep, in case anything went wrong. I started out fishing a flasher and a spoon, using the combination that was money last year. I fished down the drag and caught nothing, so changed to a cop car king kandy plug on the tack back. Then I changed out the flasher. And so it went for the day. Back and forth. Feed showed here and there, but not alot of it. There were a few whales I seemed to recognize from last year by their dorsal fins. But no kings. Just one rockfish I planned to have for dinner. I anchored in a new spot at the other end of the drag, just to check it out, as the winds were favorable for trying it. The bottom seemed to hold well after I dropped the anchor, so I launched the punt, put on the electric outboard, and motored to shore to beach comb. The EP Carry electric outboard was another upgrade I made to the boat. The outboard weighs under 20 lbs, and so easy to put and off the punt. It has a little separate lightweight lithium rechargeable battery for power. Mount the outboard, plug in the battery, turn the throttle at the end of the tiller, and away you go. I especially like it for non-boaters who use the punt. Little gas outboards can be finnicky to start, even for an expert. But for a novice, it’s daunting. I didn’t want someone to go to the beach without me and not be able to start a gas outboard – not that they couldn’t just row back, of course. This electric outboard will supposedly run an hour or more on the battery, but I’ve yet to find out the exact range as I’ve never run it that long. I recharge the battery from the tug inverter when we’re running the tug engine. The other cool thing about the outboard is that it’s made by a one man (I think) business in Washington state.

I explore the little island. I’m surprised to see game trails, as it’s so small I doubt a deer would live there fulltime. So what made the trails, I think, as I see no deer scat. I get a decent little hike in in the woods of the interior of the island, but the coastline is too steep and rocky to walk. As I come round back to the boat, I finally do see some old deer scat, so that explains what made the trails. When I spill back down to the beach, I spot a nice bleached otter skull to add to my collection. It’s my only beach find.

Back on the tug, I settle in for the night. I take out the book Hand Troller, by Mike McConnell. Like Francis Caldwell’s Pacific Troller, and Mike’s other book, Bear Tales and Deer Trails, and all the books by Wayne Short, it’s a book I’ve read over and over. It’s mostly about hand trolling in lower Chatham Strait, mainly. It’s not a how-to book. It’s a book about life as a hand troller, in the 1970’s to 1980’s, I’d guess. It was everything I’d ever wanted to do. And still want to. I just don’t have to do it for a living anymore. But the addiction remains, and always will. The flourescent lights sure are nice to ready by.

I get up the next morning and my lower back is killing me. Now what?  I think. Crap, I’m getting older by the day. These bunks have always been comfortable for me and everyone else that’s slept here. I slowly get moving, take some ibuprofen, and eventually it goes away, mostly. Maybe I need a better pillow, especially when I’m reading. I also have been feeling my sciatica coming back. That I can surely point back to not swimming as of late. And that’s not going to change for awhile, as the pool is broken here in Craig. So, more to deal with as my body ages. The new hip and newer shoulder, however, are both good.

I head to check the 2 hook skate I set the evening before. I pull it and have caught a nice chicken halibut, but it was eaten up by the sand fleas, so I shake it off. Dang, it’s nasty what these tiny critters can do to a fish on a groundline. I thought for sure I’d set in a rocky area like Brian taught me, but I obviously did not. Dang it.

I reported to Brian I’d caught no kings the day before where I was, and he said to try out towards the outside coast a little further. So, I made a pass up and down where I was first. I caught nothing and did not see the whales or feed. So I pulled the gear up for the relatively short run to the new spot. This area was a favorite of our late friend George who lived right down the road. There’s an inside, mostly protected part of this area I can fish most days, but I’d only ever caught one king there – with Kurt on our trip here from Juneau a few years ago. On the rare days there’s not a big ocean swell, I can go around the corner to a drag that’s around a subsurface reef where I have caught a few fish, but I’m only willing to fish there if I’m not going to get thrown around all day in the swell.

I put the gear down in a bay on the inside of the area, and fish my way towards the outer coastline. There are a couple charter boats fishing there, but they soon leave. I continue out of the bay and work my way to the distant point that is a border between the inner protected waters and unprotected big ocean. Anytime I get the lure near a rockpile down 50 to 70 feet, I get a ling cod. I love ling cod, but can only keep one a day, so the rest of the time they’re kind of a pain because they will get on the lure and just ride behind the boat without pulling the line out of the release on the downrigger wire. So, you can have one on there for a long while without knowing it. You learn to check your when you troll by a shallow rockpile. Not long after I leave the bay, I get a fish on. The first king of the year.  Until you catch one, you wonder if you’ve got the wrong lure on, or the wrong color flasher, or you’re at the wrong depth, or your boat is making a noise, or your fishing the wrong spot. All that angst disappears when you see your rod tip bouncing with a fish on, then land that first fish. Then, everything is blue sky with a light breeze and 60 degrees. No one else was fishing near me. The charter boats seem like they are under so much pressure to catch fish that they rarely spend time somewhere if they don’t catch a fish within 30 minutes. They may have 4 clients they are trying to get a king for. Me, I’m here for several days, so not in a hurry. In addition, I can’t run to some distant hot bite I hear about with twin 300 outboards cruising at 25 knots. I cruise at 6 kts. And like it.  So I’m much more patient.

I work my way down to the point and whamo. King number 2 on the line. I land the beautiful king. That’s it for the day, so I head to a nearby anchorage to test it for wind and bottom. While it’s a protected anchorage, it’s still exposed somewhat to the northeast, and since it’s so close to the open ocean, there may be a swell in there. As I idle into the little cove and I’m looking for bottom, I see hordes or juvenile fish – either salmon or herring, I guess – right up to the surface. I get into the little cove and tuck myself up behind a kelp bed and idle there for a few minutes to test for the swell. This will work. I drop the hook. As I’m taking care of my catch, a full size humpback whale comes into the cove. I’m in about 27 feet of water, with 100 to 200 yards of water between me and the beach. The whale comes in behind me, feeding on the small fish I saw coming in. Boy, I realized this is one of the things I missed over the winter. It never gets old. Then, the whale surfaces and cruises right behind the boat, casually just under the surface. I think I see it turn a tad to the side and look up at me. I say hello there to the whale. It’s the first time I’ve been able to see a humpback whale just under the surface from the boat like this. The closeness of the whale to me, the lighting, and water color were all just right. Wowser.

I was intending on going to the beach again to explore, but not with a 40 foot, 80 thousand pound mammal that’s alot bigger than my 12 foot punt between me and the beach. I start on boat chores until the whale leaves the cove, then head to the beach. I see some canine tracks in the sand and wonder if a wolf has been to the beach, but then see Xtratuff tracks a short distance later and realize someone had been here with their dog. I do see some mink tracks later, and tracks made by a blacktail deer doe and her fawn. I find a beautiful shot of 1 inch blue steel line, complete with spliced eyes in the end. Looks like it fell off a commercial boat. It looked like it was wrapped around some beach wood and maybe buried in the sand, so I left it for the walk back. I walk up into the tree line, looking for any treasures that might have blown up in there. I work my way around the woods til I get above the end of the sand in the beach, where the rocky shoreline starts, and drop back down to the beach. I find a cool little snail shell that I put in my pocket. When I get to the shot of line, I lift on it to see how bad it’s buried, and find it lifts right out!  What a find. This will make a great tow line if I ever need one. I put the coil over my shoulder and hike back to the punt. Luckily, the whale has not returned to the cove yet, and I motor back to the boat, put the found line on the bow of the tug, then offload myself on the swim step, take off the outboard and mount it back on the stern rail of the tug, then rig the lines that I use from the back deck of the boat to fold the tug up and on its side on the swimstep.  The whale returns to the cove to look for more baitfish a short time later. I get on the group call that I have with my siblings every two weeks, and marvel at 2026 communications between any two people anywhere on earth now with the Starlink.

My back was a little better when I got up on Day 3, but not great. The sunrise is spectacular. I put the gear out at the point, and fish back to the bay and back to the point and even around the corner to the reef drag, as the swell wasn’t too bad, and caught a big black rockfish. Only one charter boat was fishing near the point. Not much feed around. I catch a a couple ling cod after the rockpiles.

I went back to my inside drag and fished my way towards town. Not much going on there either as I didn’t get a strike. The weather was so nice. The temperature was in the 80s!  And fair winds.  I decided to run the two hours to another favorite king salmon drag. The trip includes going to the outer coast before getting to the bay I will fish, so the seas need to be decent for the last 30 minutes or so of the run, where you run into the big ocean swell or waves, if they’re there. I hoped to fish the bay that evening and the next morning at first light. I’ve been there before when charter boats show up that mooch, and it’s not a place where boats can troll if the moochers come in and sit on the drag you’re trying to troll. I don’t often go there during lodge season because it’s a long run for me, and if I get run out of there by charter boats, it’s a long run back.

I arrive a couple hours later at about 530 pm. Steve, the Librarian’s father, is anchored in the back of bay in his troller. He’s likely out dinglebaring for ling cod, something he does in the spring when trolling for salmon opportunities are limited. He is about my age and a highliner in the fleet. He and Brian grew up together in Wrangell. He was one of the first boats I went out on commercial trolling when I worked for ADFG, and Steve showed me what it’s like to do something you are born to do, even though he could use his degree to be a teacher or his experience as an apprentice to be an electrician. My trips with him also taught me the respect full time commercial fishermen and women deserve. No paid days off. Nobody paying for your health insurance if your spouse isn’t in a job that provides that. Just hard work feeding your fishing addiction and feeding the world and yourself. It’s a commonality among fishermen of all types all around the world, I’ve found. Whether they fish in million dollar seiners or in a sailed canoe in Madagascar. It’s who they are, and what they do. They’ll work a second or third job if they have to to keep keep fishing. And always hoping their kids will do something more secure. With a better income. But understanding if they follow in their footsteps. Much like a farmer, I suspect.

Nobody is fishing in the bay. I put the gear out in the swell and soon get behind the point into protected waters. I see feed on the sounder. That’s encouraging. And a few murrelletes and rhinocerous aukelets. I catch a king in about 30 minutes. Then lost what felt like a nice one.  Then got a second king to the net that was nicer than the first one. Well, that was worth the trip!  Hope they’re still here in the morning. I motor around behind the island where I like to anchor. There’s a swell coming in from two directions on either side of the island. I cautiously tuck myself right up next to the island, inside the kelp patch there, and the swell seems doable, so I drop anchor in about 20 feet of water after checking the tide book to know I’ll have enough water under the boat overnight.

I’m up early the next morning. A spectacular sunrise as I drop the gear in at 345 am, hoping to catch some fish before a charter fleet might show up. I catch a nice king near the tide change around 8 am, and luckily, only a few charter guys came in, tried their luck, and moved on. I fish til noon and catch a few shakers, but no keepers. I was surprised I couldn’t catch a second keeper with good signs of feed, but that’s fishing. Chuck said he’d be back today from his boat trip, so I headed to town a little after noon for the 3 hour run to town. A great 4 day shakedown trip for me getting to know the boat again, getting all the systems tuned how I want them, and a good start on this year’s fish supply.

I’ve always cut down my old Xtratuffs to make slip-on (sort of) ankle boots when the time came for a new pair of Xtratuffs. But I found myself without an old pair worth cutting down, so started looking for a set of ready made rubber ankle boots. Xtratuff makes their regular boots in size 15, but not their ankle boots (that I could find). I found a pair of another brand on Amazon in size 15, so decided to give them a try.

The internet has been a godsend for people like me. Once your feet get past size 14 (and really, past size 12 in many instances), you’re not gonna find your size in local store (even if the shoe company makes them in that size). Western Auto in Juneau and Log Cabin in Craig, though, are always worth a look for Xtrafuffs, since they do stock large sizes for fishermen.

The pair I ordered on Amazon did not show up on time. Then, the shipping information went incognito when I tried to track them enroute. I waited long past the time Amazon said I could get a refund. Finally, I gave up, and asked for a refund.  And of course, then the boots showed up.

I tried them on and was happy enough with the fit. I told Amazon I’d got the boots and wanted to pay. Amazon replied that I could not now pay since I got a full refund already. They did not, however, say I had to return the boots, but said keep them!  I took a screenshot of that for future reference, and started wearing them as my go-to shoe because spring time was here and the snow was gone.

The boots had some nice straps on the heel to pull them on. I’ve added these to my cut off Xtratuffs in the past, using parachute cord for the strap, but those straps always eventually tore through the hole I burned through to tie on the cord. These web straps were dandy for the first few times I used them. Then one side pulled out. Then the other.

With years of failed pull-on strap attempts under my belt, I thought I’d try a rivet repair this time. I held the free end of a rivet mandrel in some locking pliers, heated up the end of the mandrel with the torch, then used it to burn holes through the boot rubber and through the web strap.  I pushed a rivet from the inside of the boot to the outside so the flat part of the rivet would be against my ankle, then threaded the boot strap on the outside of the boot, over the mandrel head.

After trial and error, I learned I needed a washer on the inside of the boot, so the rivet wouldn’t pull through, and on the outside, so the strap wouldn’t pull off.

I worked the rivet gun to crank the rivet on. There was a a piece of mandrel poking out the inside of the rivet, and I used the bench grinder to remove it.

Done.

Trick.

Went to move the tractor and the battery didn’t have enough juice to charge it. Of course, I left the bucket down at just the right spot where I couldn’t open the hood far enough to get to the battery and swap it out. It was about half the size of a car battery, so I assumed it was a 6 Volt battery like I have on the boat for house batteries.

I got an extension cord and wheeled the battery charger over. The charger was 12 volt only, but I figured if I put it on the low amerage setting it would be fine.  I hooked the clips to the battery, but just to make sure, I looked up on my phone if it was okay to charge a 6 V battery with a 12 V charger. It is not. I saw the various ways of stepping down the 12 V charger to 6 volts, including powering a 6 V light in line before hooking up to the battery to be charged. Or charging two 6 volt batteries at the same time hooked up in series. I had neither items to do this.

So, I asked as many friends as I could think of if they had one. The older model chargers, like the garage-saled one I had at our cabin once upon a time, had a switch for 6 or 12 volt charging, but most modern chargers do not. Most everyone said the same thing – I used to have one, but it died, and the new one is only 12 V.

So, this morning, I thought I’d cruise the free piles that are out with the sunny weather to see if any were being given away, along with a set of 13 sneakers for a friend in Craig to use for his wading boots, and a bench vise he also needs. Yesterday, I went to the kelp beach  out North Douglas to get some kelp for the rhubarb patch. I normally go in the fall, but wasn’t here last fall, and with the weather so nice, I hoped the trail would be snow-free and I could get down there with minimal risk of falling on my new shoulder.

I saw some old friends on the way, and talked to them a good while. I find myself enjoying this more and more as I get older. Probably because I spend so much time alone not going to a job. And I sometimes feel like I linger too long talking. Like the listeners want to move on. Oh well. Old age here we come.

When I got to the kelp, it was dry. Really dry. The fall kelp is usually wet, and a pack-full is heavy. Really heavy. I anticipated taking partial pack loads up with the new shoulder. But, the kelp was so light I was able to fill the pack, put one shoulder strap of the pack over my good shoulder, with the pack strap at an 45 degree angle across my back so that the pack dangled off my opposite butt cheek below the good shoulder for support, and up the 1/2 mile hill to the car I trudged.

On the way home, there was a free pile along the road. Something caught my eye. Some small windows. I must have seen the aluminum frame or something. I figured it was probably a trailer window or similar, but thought I better turn around and look on the outside chance they were boat windows, as I need one for the skiff in Craig. I turned around 50 yards past the pile and back tracked  As soon as I saw the manual windshield wiper on the window, I knew it was for a boat!  I stopped at Bob’s house on the way home, and we discussed how I could install it when I got down to Craig. NICE!

So that’s what had me out looking for other treasures today. During COVID, people all over town put out free piles when they couldn’t have garage sales. They must have seen some value in this, as this practice has continued. Way more free piles than garage sales, it seems.

I cruised Douglas and downtown, and no luck, so I headed for the Valley. I stopped in at Western Auto to see what they had for new chargers. My friend Rich was on his way in. He asked me what I was there for. A 6 Volt charger I said. He had one!  I’d be out in an hour, when he’d be done with his chores and back home and I finished cruising free piles in the Valley.

After no luck with the Valley free piles, I picked up the charger, and headed home. When I hooked up the charger, nothing was working. (Turns out, I later discovererd, the reason it wasn’t working was because it wasn’t plugged in to the outlet in the garage at the opposite end of the extension cord.)  I thought maybe it was a positive ground system or something for this old tractor. So I looked it up online. It said my tractor was “powered by a 12 volt battery”. What?  I looked all over the battery in there as best I could. And there was printed, along with the other markings. In plain sight. Clear as day. 12 V. I put my own charger back on the battery. You can’t fix stupid.

I also learned another lesson yesterday. How to split wood when you’re down to one good shoulder. I can’t remember if it was my Dad, or the Ingalls boys and their Dad, but I learned to split the hardwoods of the Allegany Mountains of northern Appalachia with a “sledge and a wedge”. That’s how we split wood then. Long before power splitters were common.  Or maybe long before we could afford them.

Later, when my brother and I left the nest. my Dad got a used wood splitter when he started selling wood to pay for the expense of getting the wood for the house, or to trade to Dave Sisson for a new sale.  But, I still split by hand when I’d return home. The constant bending over to muscle the rounds up on the splitter just seemed annoying. There was no rhythum in it for me. When you split by hand, you analyze each piece to see where to strike it so as to perhaps split around a knot, or take all the sides off the round before splitting it down the middle. There’s also the satisfaction of the thwack on the wood, and the sounds of the wood splitting apart.

As I got older, I learned how to split wood with a splitting maul and have used one of those ever since.  But a guy needs to keeps some wedges around when felling trees and splitting wood. Sometimes, a wedge will split a round when a maul will not. Or if you manage to stick the maul in the wood and need a split from the sledge and wedge to get it out.

I found my wedge in my chain saw tools bucket. For a hammer, I thought I’d try a drill hammer, which is basically a miniature sledge hammer with a short handle, made to swing with one arm. It was not taxing to hold the wedge with my new shoulder.  I held the wedge with my new shoulder hand, and lightly tapped it into the wood with the drill hammer held in the good hand.  A few whacks and the wood split.  This was gonna work. I soon learned to choke up on the handle to swing when you are setting the wedge in the round, and then move the grip further down the handle as the wedge moves into the wood.

I could initially split about 4 rounds a session before my good arm got tired. I was soon up to double that after a few days.  Just like I’ve always done, I’ll do a few sessions a day to drag the chore out to maximize my outside time, get some strength back in the rest of my body, and maybe get my weight loss moving again. I’ve plateued here with my weight for several months at about 50 to 60 lbs lost, after I stopped getting good workouts with the bum shoulder.  Plus, my good shoulder is not going to ruin itself.

It sure feels good to be back in business and spending more time outside.  It’s an instant positive mood improver.

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I found a Nissan Leaf in Haines that looked good for us to take down to our cabin for a car to drive around town. I took the ferry on a glorious day up Lynn Canal, and there were orcas right in Auke Bay on our way north. The seller met me at the ferry terminal in Haines to test drive the car. I’m very familiar with these cars now – there’s about nothing that goes wrong. I asked, of course, what the battery capacity was before I went up, and it was 12 bars strong out of a possible 12 bars – as good as it gets for driving range.  I knew if the steering was tight, and the wheels didn’t wobble, and the brakes didn’t screech, that there wasn’t not much more that could be wrong with it, and that I’d buy it. So, I got in, and said we’d drive the few miles to town, and if it all looked good before we got there,  I’d take it, and we’d go to the bank to deposit my check and sign over the title. And that’s what happened.

On our conversation on the way in, it turns out the seller used to work at the troll salmon buying scow in Lisanski, but after my time fishing out there. She did know my boat, Dutch Master, as I sold it to a local fisherman in Pelican. The owner of the scow she worked for was a story in and of itself. When I came home from the Peace Corps in 1989, the first job I had lined up was a 2 week position at Hidden Falls Hatchery feeding chum salmon fry. I remembered the RA at UAF, Bob something, who I would check my hunting guns in and out of the dorm safe as required by UAF rules at the time, owned a bed and breakfast in Haines. So, I contacted Bob to ask if I could park my car there while I went over to Sitka for this short term job.  Bob said I could!

When I got to the B and B, I met the woman running the place for Bob, and parked the car. I told the woman my story and she said she had recently met a missionary through her church in Michigan who worked in Sierra Leone…..I’d literally had lunch with the guy a few months earlier!

Fast forward 10? years. I’m living in Kodiak, and have a job interview with ADFG in Juneau. I have one friend from UAF here – Val – and she says I can stay at her place. When I arrive, there’s a woman there, also staying with Val, that is a teacher friend from Pelican in town for a meeting. I immediately recognize her from somewhere, but can’t place her. About 2 hours later, it hits me: : she’s the woman from the B and B in Haines!  She then remembered, too.

Fast forward another 5 years or more. I’m now married, and got Sara to let me buy a boat and permit and go commercial salmon trolling. I fish my first summer opening out of Cross Sound, and head to the fish buying station in Lisianski – called Shoreline. I pull alongside to tie up. Who do I throw my tie-up line to but the same woman from Haines and Val’s!  She and her husband had bought the scow and now ran it in the summer!!  Such is this place.

So, back to the Haines adventure this week. After boring the young seller to death with all my stories, I buy the car, drop her off at work, and go drink coffee with Roy til it’s time to leave for the ferry. I can’t get the car on the ferry that day because the 2 EV vehicle quota for the trip is already met. Luckily, there’s a spot open on the next sailing on Friday, and the seller said she would put it on the ferry for me then.

The agent helping me to get the reservation found out I bought the car from the ADFG employee, and she said she used to work for ADFG for 20 years before the ferry job. Then I remembered her – Ron and I would call in to her with our Chilkat River subsistence salmon catches for our permits. Such is this place.

When I got home later, I texted my friend who retired from ADFG in Haines and moved home to Hawaii. I told him I met his former coworker at the ferry. Then he said my late buddy’s widow from Juneau had just left there after a stay with him and his wife. Such is this place.

I parkd the car at the ferry so the seller could put it on the ferry on Friday, and think – I’ll take the binder from the glove box with the owner’s manual and papers to read on the ferry ride home. As we head back down Lynn Canal, I settle in with a fresh thermos of coffee and open up the binder. There’s a letter from Nissan to the original owner…. and who might that have been?  Our former next door neighbor in Juneau!  We still remember when he and his wife got the car new!   He’d sold the car to his son, who moved to Haines, and the son sold it to the person I bought it from!  Wow. Such is this place.

The seller in Haines bought a new EV with a longer range so she could get to Whitehorse – or Haines Junction at least, where there’s a charging station. This was precisely the same reason for the seller of the Leaf we bought in Skagway a few years ago  – he’d bought a newer car with longer range to get to Whitehorse.

This Leaf will have plenty of range to get us around Craig and Klawock, and should have range enough to get to the ferry and back in Hollis. It won’t have enough range to get to Thorne Bay or Coffman Cove and back, and there are no public chargers on Prince of Wales Island yet. I only go to these towns a few times a year, and can use the truck for that. For deer hunting, I’ll be using the truck wherever I go on the POW road system, as this car is not for driving on logging roads.

We bought the car for $5000 and it will cost another $700? to ferry it down to Ketchikan and over to Hollis. With fuel prices at about $5.40 there, it will be cheaper to run than a gas vehicle, even with the higher electric rates in Craig versus Juneau, so we can stick it to the man. Our electric company there even pays us a $500 incentive rebate once I get the car there.

I also bought a never-used, brand new Excalibur 9 dehydrator this week on Craigslist here. It’s the most deluxe model – with a timer AND temperature control. The person I bought it from said the fan worked, but that it didn’t heat up, and she didn’t want to mess with it. I’m not sure if she checked to see if it was under warranty, but maybe she did, and found out – like I did – that it’s hard to get a hold of anyone there…. AND the part the unit needs is out of stock. Which might be because everyone else who bought the same unit had the same problem. It was the only part on their site that was out of stock.

She was asking $60 (the units are $200-$240 plus shipping new), and I offered her $20, explaining that if I couldn’t fix the unit,  I could still use the trays and racks to stage second batches for my same size model dehydrator in Craig. She readily accepted. What else are you going to do with a broken dehydrator you can’t get parts for. She was happy for me to take it off her hands.

I got on You Tube and started troubleshooting. I tested the wiring with a multimenter, and found that it wasn’t the fuse – a common heating failure cause in dehydrators. It was, indeed, the out of stock thermostat that was to blame.  I tried to order a similar thermostat from Excalibur’s site for the same size unit that does not have a timer, and would change the wiring to make it work. That thermostat they did have in stock. It was  $40 for the thermostat (which weighs nothing) …. and  $197 for UPS shipping. If you live here, you know that my UPS shipping quote is not a misprint.

I then tried to get a hold of someone there to see if they would ship it by USPS mail, which should cost about $20. The person or AI on the chat function was no help but gave me a number to call. When I called and was on hold for awhile, I hung up.

I then started trying to figure out how else I could make it work. I looked into 110 V thermostats for things like toaster ovens or heating systems (stove and clothes dryer thermostats are common, but are 220V. They might work, but that’s above my skill level)….Then I thought: I have a bad toaster oven in the garage to go to recycle. I took out the temperature control thermostat from the toaster oven. I had to cut and splice some wires, drill new holes to mount it, etc in the guts of the dehydrator…. but it worked!  And heat at full blast looks like it comes up to 165 F – same as it’s supposed to with the stock thermostat !.  The shaft that holds the knob for the temperature control is far shorter for the toaster oven thermostat than the stock thermostat,  so the female housing on the knob wasn’t long enough to reach it. I found some vacuum hose in the garage that goes over the shaft tight, and that works like a dream.  Easy!

So, two rounds of STICKING IT TO THE MAN. What a week!!!!