Halibut Frenzy!

Previously on Jim and Barb’s Adventures…….

 We were making our way to Homer Alaska to Halibut fish with our friends Rich and Susan who have a place in Ninilchik. Some of you may remember them from this 2016 post where we serendipitously met them while walking the harbor looking at boats. They are both really great people and we have kept in touch on and off over the past 8 years.

 They had asked us if we wanted to go fishing with them on Thursday so we headed there way on Wednesday telling them we would meet them at the launch. We spent the night outside of Homer at a gravel pull out. When we woke up, I had a craving for a donut. Do you know what you get when you google the words: “Homer Donuts”? The thought really did not cross my mind but made total sense as the results popped in……

 

Mmmm, donuts!

 Refining my search, I was able to find donuts at the Safeway in town. At the appointed time Rich and Susan arrived at the launch along with their friends Bob and Becky who were also joining us.  

Away we went! The water was really calm thankfully, as I have been known to get a little queasy on heavy chop.

 

On the way out we kept passing these rafts of sea otters. I took a few pictures of them through the boat window, but Rich said it he stopped, they would all dive. Keeping going, and they just ignore you.

 

Motored about 30 minutes getting to Rich’s halibut honey hole and dropped the rods using ½ a herring and a 20oz weight to get it down the 100’. It was not long before I was reeling up the first fish! Not huge, but a nice eater size fish. Or ‘but as Rich called them. Over the next few hours, we took turns reeling in fish, all about the same size. Rich and Susan just sat back and watched as Bob, Becky, Barb and I reeled the fish. They encouraged us by yelling “Reel that ‘but in” or words to that effect. Let me tell you, these things can get tiring to reel in! Sometimes just reeling that 20oz weight up 100’ is tiring, never mind a 10-20lb halibut fighting you all the way up. These things can get over 200lbs with 50-100lb’ers being fairly common. I was getting worn out just reeling in these little guys, I could not imagine a 100lb’er!

 

While waiting for fish to bite, we talked and just soaked in the scenery. We noticed this sea otter off in the distance kind of standing up in the water looking at us. It would swim a bit closer and stand up again, doing it over and over until it is just a few yards from the boat!

 

Barb and I were pretty even on both size and number of fish when I had an epiphany. I turned to her and said, “If you get the biggest one, my next blog post is going to be titled “Barb’s Big ‘But”.” She said “You wouldn’t dare: “Oh, yes I would” I replied. “Do and you’re a dead man.” Funny thing, ever since I made that statement, she did not want to reel any more fish in. Apparently, she was afraid. Very afraid. As she knows me, and know I am just dumb enough to do something like that. Many of you already know that, remembering my post titled “My Wife is a Cow”. She did reel in a few more when we knew they were smaller ones, but she did not anything to do with a big fish!

 

So, I guess maybe I should have titled this post “Barb’s not so big 'but”. I never caught the big one either, but we did end up with 8 really nice eaters and a couple of cod.

After cleaning the fish and the boat we headed back to Rich and Susan’s. I had forgotten just how beautiful their place is. Words cannot describe it. They are on a bluff a couple of hundred feet above the water with a view of miles and miles in each direction. What a gift from God.

 

Eagles land right on their lawn.

 

When was the last time you were looking down and took a picture of the top of an eagle?

 

Their house is perfect for the location with windows to take advantage of the views.

 

Oh, and their shed! They write on the walls throughout the year as a remembrance of how the fishing was and tales. Kind of like an ongoing living diary over the years. 

What an awesome place. We spent the night, in fact, two nights right there in their driveway enjoying that view.

 

The next day, Rich was taking a couple of his buddies, Royce and Seth, out, telling me he had room for one more if I wanted to come. Barb told me to go, and she and Susan would hang out together. This time we went 25 miles out to a place called “The Deep”. Arriving, Rich starts dropping the lines and within 10 seconds, had one on! He hands the rod to me, and I started cranking. I look over at Royce and Seth and they both have fish on as well. We tripled up in less than a minute!

 The action was like that most of the day. Fish, after fish, after fish. We could have limited out within an hour, we kept a few of the nicer ones but threw back most of them saving room for a few monsters if we hooked into one.

 As we were driving to another spot when I see this whale breach the water coming almost all the way out. Then it does it again. Of course, before I can grab my camera. It was a pod of Orcas. I did get some shots of them as they surfaced though.

 

We never did get the big ‘but, but we did limit out on decent fish!

 

After that we all went back to Rich and Susan’s and had a big fish fry. We were joined my Bob and Becky. Do you think I thought of taking one picture? Nope. 

Barb said she had a great day as well, going into Ninilchik and touring the town. Ninilchik is really an old Russian village with a really cool church and interesting cemetery. It was overgrown with flowers and grass with tiny paths.

The next day, we thought we’d get out of Rich and Susan’s hair for a few days. We will be here for a few weeks and too much of a good thing would spoil us. We headed off up to the Kasilof River to see if we could catch a few salmon. We parked the truck in a crowded parking lot and headed off to try a spot that Royce had told us about. It was a little further out and maybe a little less crowded. We were walking the trail, came around a corner and what do I see standing in the brush not 10 feet from us? A moose! Apparently, this moose is used to people as it just looked over its shoulder as we walked by.

 

The scenery was perfect, the fishing not so much. A few people were picking some up here and there, but we did not. I would say maybe 1 out of 10 fisher-people caught a fish.

June 21st marked the summer solstice, the longest day of sunlight for the year. Hard to tell here when it is always sunny! Here is what I found on the sunrise/sunset charts for the area...... Pretty crazy!

We fished that area two days with no luck on the salmon yet. It is still early and will happen. Just need to put our time in. If you are keeping track (and believe me I am), I am ahead on the rainbow trout, grayling and halibut, Barb is ahead on the dolly varden and of course the lake trout. Who can forget that lake trout! So, that makes me ahead? Or does it make her ahead because of that monster lake trout? I am not even going to ask the audience as I know it is rigged!

We are in the Homer area for a week or two, we will continue try for salmon, continue to hook up with Rich and Susan and continue to try top each other in the halibut and salmon categories. Who knows, maybe Barb will get a big 'but afterall!