Alaska Fishing

Gone Fishin

This has been a trip I have dreamed of going on for years! Austin’s Aunt Jamie and Uncle Dan have gone to Alaska during the summer for fishing trips and we have seen their videos and pictures and listened to their stories. Well, Austin’s mom retired this year and we decided to make a group trip and head for Alaska. Since Austin’s Uncle Dan has a lot of knowledge in the fishing world, he organized the timing of our trip to make sure the Salmon would be running with good numbers.

Once we came up with our dates Dan contacted a guide service and also asked around about accommodations. We ended up booking 5 of our fishing trips through Mark Glassmaker and then booked our accommodations with Stillwater Chalets. The chalets were comfortable cabins with small kitchens to prepare meals. Like last time, we booked our flight with Alaska Air and we were able to use miles for a free flight. This was one of the first times I have flown out of Redding and I loved it! Not having to drive 2 hours to Sacramento at 0300 AM was amazing! Not to mention, when we got home we had a short ride to our house with all our fish!

After traveling to Alaska we landed in Anchorage and booked a hotel room for the night at Captain Cook Hotel which was perfectly located downtown. We were able to get our car and check into the hotel with no problems. With such an awesome location we were able to walk around the downtown and find a great spot for dinner. The beautiful flowers and green grass was refreshing since where we live the summers are so hot that everything dies off.

We ate dinner at Flat top. After dinner we were walking home and heard a band playing at Humpys. We stopped in for a drink and listened to the band. After a song or two we were really enjoying ourselves and ended up dancing the night away. This time of year in Alaska the sun doesn’t set until almost midnight! As we were dancing and having a great time with family we had no idea how late it was since the sun hadn’t set yet. Eventually we walked ourselves back to the hotel and retired for the night.

The next day we ate breakfast at our hotel and then headed to a sports store that Austin wanted to check out. While we were there Austin checked out some packs and I found a great new brand of hunting pants called Fjall Raven. After our stop we headed to Soldotna where we were staying. The drive is beautiful and pass through a few small towns. One town that I would love explore more was Cooper Landing. This has a lot of hiking trails and the scenery is beautiful. While we were driving by we stopped in at the brewery and ate a sandwich from a food truck and enjoyed a cold beer.

A few miles down the road we pulled off and took a small hike down towards the water for some breathtaking views.

It took us about 2.5 hours to make the drive down to Soldotna. When we arrived it was about 3 pm and we checked into our chalet. The owners were very welcoming and luckily ours was ready an hour early and they let us unpack and get settled. After unloading we headed to Kenai because we heard it was the last day for dipnetting. Dipnetting is something only locals are allowed to do. Here is some information on dipnetting in case you're curious.

We walked the beach and watched the locals net salmon. After that we headed back to town and grabbed groceries and our fishing license for the week. The fishing license is only 45$ for the week and since the king salmon weren’t running we didn’t need a stamp for that.

Since there were 5 couples and we were staying in our chalets for 7 nights we each were assigned to a dinner night and then had 2 nights for everyone to be on their own. Well, we signed up for the first night so after grabbing groceries we headed back to start cooking. Once everyone got there and got checked in, dinner was ready and we enjoyed ourselves on the balcony eating and drinking and getting excited for the first day of fishing.

Day 1

Well, Sunday was our first guided trip and we were going out for Sockeye Salmon on the Kenai River. We had an early wake up call and had to be at the boat dock at 0430 am for boat pick up. Since there were 10 of us we split up between two boats and two guides. We took instructions and put our waders on and before we knew it we were reeling in salmon one after the next. The limit was 3 per person per day. With Dan doing the research about the run he had rearranged the dates. Well, he was right, this year on the Kenai they were seeing unbelievable numbers and our limit even increased from 3 a day to 6 a day by the end of our week. Within an hour we had 30 fish in the boats and were limited. None of us imagined it would be such a short trip but we loved every second of it.

After getting back we took our salmon filets to Ed's Kasilof Seafood which is a fish processor in Soldotna. Well, now we had the rest of the day to enjoy ourselves, explore, nap, and meet for dinner. We ended up keeping a few filets and made dinner for the group with some of the fresh caught salmon!

DAY 2

Today was the halibut trip out of Ninlichik. This was about a 40 minute drive. We checked in the night before and since we have a large group they broke us up into a 6 pack in the am and a 4 pack starting at 1100. Austin and I were part of the 4 group for the afternoon so we got to sleep in. The first group got up and out of the chalets and headed out to sea. We got to the town and headed to the boat ramp. We got on the boat and met our captain

After getting launched by the tractor we were off to sea. About 1/2 mile out our captain stopped our boat and explained he was having motor issues and sadly we had to return back to shore. Since the four of us had the rest of the day ahead of us we chose to head to Homer since we were already half way there. We spent a few hours exploring the Spit and eating fish and chips.

We stopped into a bar called, The Salty Dawg, and had a margarita and enjoyed the atmosphere.

We headed back home and listened to the other group share stories from their halibut trip over a good homemade dinner. After dinner those of us who were unable to catch fish today talked some of the others into heading down to the public dock and spend the evening fishing for salmon.

All ten of us ended up going and we all caught our limits! We spent some time processing the fish and then headed back to the chalets for a night cap on the balcony.

DAY 3

Well, today we were lucky enough to get rescheduled for our halibut trip. We got the same later time slot so we slept in after our long evening catching fish and got ready for our trip! We were about 20 minutes down the road when we got a phone call from the company saying that due to weather we had to be cancelled. We were all bummed but understood that this is part of the fishing game. We headed back and decided to go out for a hike.

We walked a trail close by and watched the cross country team practicing. After our walk we grabbed lunch at St. Elias Brewery. After a good lunch we headed back and put our gear on to catch more salmon! The nice thing about brining your own rods and waders is being able to fish the river from any public access point! After catching our limits again we cleaned up our fish and headed to Senior Panchos for dinner. We had a great dinner out at a local Mexican restaurant. After dinner we headed back to the chalet and enjoyed the evening together.

DAY 4

This was our fly out day! Dan had it booked through Air West. It was a 40 minute drive up past Kenai. We got to take a float plane out of the lake across the bay and land on the Kustatan River.

This trip we got to fish for silver salmon. On the Kenai the silvers aren’t running yet so we are fishing for sockeye salmon which was part of the fun learning to catch a different species of salmon from a different location. This limit is also 3 fish per person.

Here is a little viedo of our take off! It was such a unique experience and the landing was even better!

Here are some pictures of the views of the ocean that we flew over and of our landing strip!

We all caught our limits and enjoyed our lunch in the beautiful wilderness.

We got some beautiful silvers and had a great day on the river!

Afterwards we got to run the river on the boats and then get picked up by our float plane.

Here is a video of our landing! What an unreal experience the entire day ended up being!

On our way home we stopped in Kenai at a local bar called Kenai Joes that came highly recommended and enjoyed some spirits. This bar is known for great cocktails especially the old fashioned and whiskey sour. The bartender definitely did a great job making our drinks and we enjoyed them while talking about our amazing day!

After we got back we enjoyed taco salad and margaritas back at the chalets for a group dinner.

DAY 5

Today we had the same excursion as Day 1. We were on the Kenai River fishing for sockeye salmon. Looking back we realized we could have done this day on the docks at our pace but prior to this trip we didn't realize how great the fishing was going to be. Long story short, we enjoyed another day on the Kenai landing limits of sockeye.

All smiles all day! After getting our limits we had the rest of the day to explore, eat, and relax! We had a big day ahead of us for our final day!

Day 6

Our trip to Seward for ocean fishing! We were soo excited for this trip! We had to be at the dock at 6 and it was a 2.5 hour drive. So that meant an early wake up call the day before we left. We rallied and made it happen. Once we got there we got to see the town of Seward and walk down to the dock where we met our captain. We lucked out with a nice captain who worked hard to help us get rigged up for fishing all day! We had a breathtaking boat ride out to see for about an hour.

We got to see icebergs, orcas, seals, and ducks. It was a sight worth seeing! Once we got out to sea we were fishing for halibut and rock fish. We all caught our limit of halibut (2) and limits of rock fish. Sea fishing was one of my favorites parts of the trip!

The sun started coming out and warming us up as the day went on.

After we got all the fish processed we headed back for Soldotna to finish packing and get our fish from the processors for our early morning take off to head to the airport. Since we were unable to have time for this fish to get vacuumed sealed and flash froze we had to improvise by packaging in ziplock and freezing in our freezer overnight.

DAY 7

In the morning we packed up all the fish in our fish boxes and headed for the airport. We dropped our car off at our friends house in Anchorage who were generous enough to let us borrow it the entire week!

Once we got to the airport it was chaos! So many people trying to get checked in and it was very unorganized as far as which line was for what. We got checked in at a kiosk and then waited in another long line to get our bags and fish boarded. Once we finished with this we eventually got to our gate and was able to get some food and wait to board. The flight home went quickly and we were so thankful to have flown out of Redding and have just a short drive home to end this amazing travel week!