Our Most Unbelievable Day in Alaska (so far)

It started out like any other day, we woke up looked outside trying to remember where we were. Some days require a little more early morning processing than others but I quickly remember we were in Homer. Little did we know at the time that we were going to be involved in two unbelievable events on that day. We had to wake up earlier than usual as we had an 8:00 appointment with our buddy John and his friend Henry. “John” is the same John that we visited in Sequim Washington some weeks ago. We received a call from him a couple days earlier and said he was in Denali, headed to Homer for the weekend and wanted to know where we were. We just so happened to be in Kasilof about 45 miles north of Homer trying our luck on the red salmon in the Kasilof River! We made plans to touch base in a couple days and try to get together for lunch or something.

We had arrived in Kasilof with high expectations of hitting the salmon run just right. The reports we received in Soldotna indicated that the run was strong with over 8,000 fish hitting the river in the past few days. The first thing we did was to check out a couple boondocking spots Barb had noted on her travel spreadsheet.  Located down Tustumena Lake Road just outside of Kasilof we found numerous boondocking spots that would fit small to medium sized rigs if you don’t mind a few miles of gravel. With a few campsite options in mind we headed to the Crooked Creek State Rec Area to see that the day use lot ($5/day) and campground ($15/night) about ¾ full as we walked down to the river. The banks for the river were lined with both fishermen and carcasses of fileted salmon that had been caught in the last few days. We ran back to the camper, got all of our gear ready and hit the river! In the next 3 hours we saw 3 fish landed by the fishermen around us and a lot of talk about: “You should have been here yesterday!” How can that many fish move through that fast? Well they did...... But as Dave and Sharon commented on our last blog “There's just something about standing in the middle of river, and it doesn't really matter if there is "fish on" or you are just a part of the rapids, that soothes and calms the soul."

We paid the $15 and ended up staying the night right there as we wanted to try again later that night and the next morning. A couple more hours of fishing netted the same result and we decided to pack it up and head to Homer to see if we could catch up with John! Along the way we stopped by the small town of Ninilchik to check it out. Very interesting little town.

Eagle on the post, ship in the background

This is how they get boats in and out of the water

Arriving in Homer we secured a site at Hornaday campground ($15/night small/medium rigs only) which is up on the hill overlooking the Cook Inlet. We chose this campsite over a few others on The Spit as it had a spectacular view and the internet connection was a little better and Barb had some work to do.

Our Hornaday site

The Homer Spit

After setting up we connected with John and made arrangements to get together the next day after he returned from a fishing charter. The next morning we headed to The Spit to walk the marina. We love walking the docks in marinas to look at the different boats. New, old, big small, commercial and private, you name it they had it here. This marina is also home to The Time Bandit but unfortunately it was not in port when we were in the area. We also talked to a few charters along the docks to see about going out fishing. It seems like most of them were $300-$350 per person for the all-day halibut/king salmon combo package.

John returned from his charter about 6:00pm. He caught about 8 halibut (kept 2) and a nice king. This is also when we met his friend Henry from Seattle. He has been friends with John and his wife Judith for many years and is an absolute riot! Witty, funny, and the two of them together is like watching a modern day Laurel and Hardy. Barb and I were laughing so much our faces hurt! We had dinner at a Thai place in town during which Henry said “Want to tour a Coast Guard boat tomorrow?” “Sure!” we say. Henry goes on to say that his neighbor is the mother of the captain of one of the Coast Guard ships in harbor who just returned from 6 weeks at sea and he is going to call him tomorrow to get a tour. Barb and I are thinking: Wait, you are going to call the captain of a ship out of the blue and ask him to give us a guided tour of his boat when he has just returned from 6 weeks at sea? Ya right, good luck with that!

At 8:00am we are standing out front of the secured area in front of the ship when Henry makes the call. After hanging up the phone Henry turns to us and says “We’re in, he will be right down!” (Unbelievable event #1)

Captain Passic was absolutely awesome and spent an hour touring us around the entire 225’ of the Hickory Buoy Tender. Their primary responsibility is maintenance on all the buoys in his assigned area which extends from Homer, down to Dutch Harbor and the Aleutian Islands. Secondary responsibilities include search and rescue as well as law enforcement. We saw the control room, engine room, living quarters, mess, the deck you name it. It was an awesome and incredible personal tour!

Barb, John, Captain Passic and Henry

The Control Room

The bow and boom

A weather buoy that was anchored in 13,000 feet of water

The galley

Would you believe this thing carries 92,000 gallons of fuel and has several culinary trained chefs? It was an awesome tour and an unbelievable experience.

After the tour, we said goodbye to John and Henry and headed to the marina to walk the last few docks we had missed the day before. Along the way I noticed a truck with Minnesota plates launching a beautiful Hewe’s Craft boat so we walked up and started talking to them. Ends up Rich and Susan were from Apple Valley and live up here 3 months out of the year. We were telling them how much we liked their boat and Rich says “What are you doing the rest of the day, want to go fishing?” I was so stunned that I don’t remember what I said but Barb later told me I said “Hell ya!” (This is obviously unbelievable event #2)

Within the next few minutes we had stuffed Daisy in the camper, grabbed some snacks, water,  camera and jackets and we were on the water! Rich and Susan are a great couple and this is not the first time they have picked up strangers on the dock (I know, right?). They said their kids think they are nuts but they have had some of the greatest days meeting new people and taking them fishing….and a great day we did have!

This island was full of birds!

Captain Rich and Susan

Neither Barb nor I had been Halibut fishing before. Rich drove about 12 miles out into the inlet, set anchor and within minutes I was reeling up my first halibut! The next two hours were fish after fish, as quickly as you could get the bait to the bottom they were hitting it! We were having a blast! These fish can  get up to over 400#'s but most are well under 100#'s or even 30. Most were in the 5# range which was fine for Rich and Susan as they just wanted one or two for dinner.

The Halibut set up

My very first Halibut!

Barb reeling on in!

But then I set the hook on one and it just started spooling the drag and I knew I had something! After several arm burning minutes I got this beast near the surface only to have it dive down deep again. Finally we got it to the surface again where Rich gaffed it and heaved it over the side. At 40#’s, this is by far the biggest fish I have ever caught!

My biggest fish ever!

After a few more smaller ones (called Chickens) I set the hook on another one that did not budge when I set it. I tried handing the reel to Barb but when it started spooling line out she wanted nothing to do with it! Again it took several minutes to get this thing to the top, another 40#’er!

We decided we had enough fish and went to see if we could find some whales as we had seen some spouting off in the distance. We got close to a few but let me tell you, it is harder than you think to get pictures of them. You only have seconds to see them, get the camera on them, zoom, focus and snap!

A Puffin with a mouthful of something

We headed back to the harbor, took the boat out of the water and went to the cleaning tables. Our two big ones were twice as big as anyone else's at the table. Rich quickly explained how to filet them  and headed off to clean the boat. I cleaned the two small ones when I was approached by a French tourist telling me that he was a French chef and can he clean one of my big fish. Heck ya, I will take all the help I can get! He grabbed a filet knife and went to town on the two remaining fish saying that he loves to work with Halibut but never gets to work with ones this big. After he was done I cut him off about a 4# chunk and he was happy as could be!

Rich and I with the two big ones!

The French guy helping out to my left. (I just noticed all the seagulls in the background on our camper!

Rich said, follow us back to our house we will cook one of these smaller ones up, vacuum seal the others and you can spend the night in our driveway. So that is exactly what we did!

They have an incredible place right on the bluff of the inlet with views of several volcanos.

Susan made more than a dozen of these stepping stones in their yard

Our spot for the night

We ended up with over 40#’s of fish that they said they did not want (they can catch it whenever they want) and offered to freeze and store it for us until we got back from Kodiak.  We continued to drink beer and talk until about 11:30pm before we called it a night thus ending our “Our Most Unbelievable Day in Alaska (so far)!” I don’t know if or how that could ever be topped but we are looking forward to trying!