It was Opening Day of Alabama's Football Season and I Went Fishing

Never before have I positioned myself to be without TV and radio on the first day of Alabama's football season, but never before had I spent that first day in Alaska! There were fish to catch and my buddy (and former XO), Jim Fitzgerald was in town and this was our first and last chance of the season to go fishing together. I know my football fan friends are still a little shocked, but know that Alabama helped me out by scheduling Kent State in the first game. I mean, if they can't handle Kent State easily, it is going to be a long painful season (you Auburn fans know what I am talking about - you should have gone fishing, too). 
Fishing trips start at the butt crack of dawn and this one was no different. Carlie and I rode to the Homer spit with Jim, Mindy, and Hannah, and first stop was breakfast at the Boardwalk Bakery, where we also picked up our lunches for the trip. We had coffee, biscuits, paninies and a lot of talk about an over reaching corrupt federal government that is going to steal our fish.  Homer's entire economy is being threatened by federal regulation that will limit numbers of privately caught Halibut drastically while increasing the commercial limits.  It sounds a little like the raid on the guitar company that made the news - the government appears to be applying different rules to different people based on politics.
Since I was missing football, all that political talk got me fired up  - or maybe it was the three cups of coffee, but I was ready to go.  We headed from the bakery down to North Country Charters, whose office is right beside the Time Bandit offices. That was sort of cool, but if North Country called themselves "the Deadliest Charter," I was considering fishing from the shore - my daughter was going on this boat after all!
They did not call themselves that and in fact, we were in very good hands. Our Captain was Eric Lehm and we went out on the Storm Petrel.  Eric is a first generation American, whose parents are both German. I knew when he told us that bit of personal information that we were good to go. I am sure my buddy Ingo would see this as an answered prayer for our safety and for a good trip.
Eric took us down to the boat and gave us the safety brief. I paid close attention because those of you who follow my blog know that some kind of story always breaks out around me and I didn't want it to be one that resembled Gilligan's Island or I Shouldn't be Alive (Jay Allen's second favorite show behind Finding Bigfoot). After laying my hands on the inflatable life raft, I was more confident and ready to get going.
We started out of the harbor and stopped before we had even gone a football field away.  Just to show off, Eric caught our bait for the day.  He handed out poles and we all pulled in a couple of Alaska wall-eyed pollock (fish sticks).  We literally pulled these in as fast as we could cast. I see the pictures you people from the lower 48 post and I know we pulled in more fish than most of you do in a full day before we even started really fishing. Us native Alaskans (yes, I am native - I bought a Subaru for goodness sake) fish at break-neck speed and need our huge coolers for fish, not beer! We fish a little differently up here and looking at those fish that I would have been proud of myself in my pre-Alaska days and realizing those were only bait, I got fired up yet again! This was going to be awesome!
We started our drive out to the fishing hole and saw a humpback whale showing out just as we left.  That is why I don't believe in wild life cruises. All those wild life like to eat fish and if you go after the fish, you will see the wild life. If you want to find the Southern people where ever you live, go to where they serve biscuits and gravy - same principle.
To further make my point, we saw dozens of Sea Lions also. They were laid up sorry and making quite a ruckus, but they were all fat of fish. And not to be left out, we saw seals, puffins, otters and eagles, all sharing in the great bounty of nature that God provided.
The drive out to the first fishing hole was pretty long. We were all pretty entertained just exchanging stories and catching up. In addition to the five Fitzgeralds and Benefields, another fisher person named Judy came with us.  At the point where we were completely caught up with the eleven years since we were last neighbors with the Fitzgeralds and knew Judy and Eric's complete life history, I was beginning to have visions of Chevy Chase at the Grand Canyon.   I know people make fun of Sarah Palin for saying she could see Russia, but we drove for such a long time that people would have made fun of us for saying we could see Alaska! We were out there!
It was time for us to stop cruising the Russian shore and share in the bounty with all the other wildlife, so we got to fishing.  Captain Eric told us we would go for the big Halibut first. It went just as he said, the first two fish we caught were the biggest.  Jim caught the first and biggest of the day, but my competitive nature requires me to point out that we let Jim have the first fish because this is his last chance to fish this year.  If we were going to catch only one fish, we wanted Jim to catch it. Next time, though, I will crawl over his back to get that big one! And Carlie will crawl over my back - it gets pretty competitive out there!.
We (Jim and Mindy) caught a couple of really big fish at the first site, but things eventually started to slow down. We pulled up a huge Starfish that was an absolute marvel of nature, but as it neared the surface, it realized there had been a misunderstanding and it released our bait and went back into the ocean.  As the fishing slowed down, Eric told us some stories of the sea. The otter floating by our boat reminded him of one story that he had witnessed just the night before. There was another otter floating around doing his thing, when BAM! A killer whale came up and ate him.  That would have been quite a show, but I had just watched Soul Surfer and I didn't want to be part of any story that included, "BAM! The big sea animal ate him!"
So, not wanting to leave with only two fish and a few stories, we cranked up and left the first site and motored out to a fishing hole that was really hopping. We all ate lunch while Eric took us to the new site and that was good, because we were going to need all that energy.
As soon as Eric killed the engine, we started bringing in Halibut. Every Halibut you reel in from the bottom of the ocean feels like Moby Dick! And the later in the day it gets, the bigger you expect each fish to be when you get them to the top.  We went from two fish to our limit in about an hour and a half. We were all pulling in Halibut and started to be selective about the size of fish we kept. Back to my previous fish story, fishing in Alaska is really like NASCAR, but fishing in Alaska doesn't get rained out (at least not in Homer).
I have to praise some of the catcher people on our boat. Mindy Fitzgerald brought up some really big fish and despite sound effects that might be better suited to women's tennis, she is an awesome catcher person. Carlie and Hannah also did a great job of bringing in their fish. Hannah had one that fought her for about twenty minutes and we thought sure was going to be a record. It ended up having some old fishing line attached to it, which made it doubly hard to get to the surface, but Hannah did. Carlie refuses to let anybody help her pull in fish and I was scolded the one time I tried. Our team did awesome! It was a good thing everybody was so independent because there were a couple of times that there were four fish on the line at once.
With out limit of Halibut in the box, we started the long drive back to Homer. If you doubt that Halibut fishing is hard work, I would like to point out that everybody in my party feel asleep on the way back. We were smoked!
As we left those Halibut rich waters, I pointed out the most amazing cloud formation I had ever seen to the rest of our boat. There was the perfect form of a giant wolf on top of the mountain in the background. The wolf's head, face, legs, and tail were all visible and it was perfectly postured in a sitting position on the top of the mountain as if he was watching us leave and maybe was watching over us the whole time.  Whatever was watching over us on God's behalf did keep us safe. God also blessed us with a good day of fishing.
When we got back into the harbor area, we had to huddle to determine how much to tip our captain - I recommend you figure this out before you go so you don't have to text your wife and tell her to bring you some cash to the pier. I usually plan better than that, but I goobered it up this time and Cammie bailed me out and delivered the cash.   I think we tipped an acceptable amount for a successful trip, but I am not sure if we tipped as generously as Judy did. She and the captain were both single and I think she might have thought he was sort of cute and that probably influenced her tip formula. Cute did not influence mine - we were not out on the sea that long that I found our bearded captain cute.
When we got to the pier, the balance of Benefields and Fitzgeralds met us there and so did Charlie, the Halibut filet master. He hauled our catch to the North Country Charter Office where we took pictures and so did some tourists who were just passing by. What a foul to take your picture with somebody else's fish and claim them as your own.  We did not know these picture poachers - they weren't on the boat with us and we had never seen them before, but somewhere on the internet, they are claiming our catch as theirs! Of course, I think I did almost accidentally roll Eric's fish into our count, but we had Charlie there to keep us honest on the numbers.

When Charlie started preparing our fish, another wave of tourists happened upon us.  I had no idea fileting fish was such a tourist draw, but I did share with Charlie my experience in Valdez with the French speaking tourists. I also told him that I could tell he was a pro because he got all our fish prepared without showing any butt crack - something I still have not accomplished. 
These Alaska fishing towns have a lot of great services provided. After Charlie got our fish cut up, we had it hauled over to Coal Point to have it packaged and frozen for a small fee. We were too smoked to do this ourselves and the Halibut is just too valuable to be trusted to amateurs like us.  We dropped it off at 1600 on Saturday and picked up our fish 0800 on Sunday. What a great deal!
With our fish at the processing plant, we needed to find some fish that had already been through the processing plant and the deep fryer. After a long day, what better place could we eat than the Happy Face Restaurant. No kidding, their logo was a big yellow smiley face.   Despite the happy logo, some of our little people were not so happy. I am not going to name the child, but I have to tell you that I thoroughly enjoyed the complete melt down that occurred when we said grace before one of our little people was ready. We had to pray over our food again just for him!  That is going to be a great story when he grows up!
With our bellies full, the Benefields were ready to call it a day. The Fitzgeralds had to drive back to Eagle River Saturday and I did not envy them -I fell asleep before 8 pm and was not fit to drive. The Fitzgeralds also had to go buy a freezer early Sunday so when we got their fish home, they could keep them frozen. What a great problem to have when you have more fish than freezer space. We had just enough freezer space for all of our fish.
I can't wait to eat all that fish and refill the freezer next year!  As soon as Alabama releases its 2012 football schedule, I will know when we will be going back to Homer to get our Halibut! Thankfully, they kept up their end of the bargain this year with a 48-7 win over Kent State, but don't worry football fan friends, I will be in front of the TV next week to see Alabama take on Penn State - in front of the TV eating fried Halibut!

A Benefield Fish Story (Fish Stories are a little longer)

Taking leave in Alaska is like having a gift card to your five favorite stores, but only enough time to hit one or two of them. We wanted to do some fishing on our leave because the Salmon were running and we had space in our freezer.

We started our fishing adventures on the Deshka River, but it was just dad going out on this trip with his buddy, Mike, and his new boat. We spent three and a half hours looking for fish on that river and then in about 10 minutes, we pulled in five nice Silver Salmon.  Mike caught three as fast as he could cast and I caught two before we had to leave. When it gets going, Fishing in Alaska is more like NASCAR than it is fishing in the rest of the world.  I was hooked and now my priority became getting my kids their first fish.

So, in search of those first fish, we all loaded up in the Beast (our 84 Suburban) and drove to Hope, Alaska. The pink Salmon at Hope come in so thick at high tide that you can walk on them.  I got all my kids set up to fish, but they were still learning and not able to keep their lines in the water on their own. As a matter of fact, James hooked his own hat before I got my line wet.  Because we made a bad decision to bring our dog, Bella, Cammie was not able to help me much with the kids and I became a little frustrated with all the coaching and line tying because we weren’t pulling in any fish. I had to put the rubber fish back on James’ line for safety and had to re-tie Carlie and Jay Allen’s lines about half a dozen times. This was not going to be productive, so I made everybody responsible for their own lines and tangles, etc.  The big kids really responded well and we all got down to serious fishing.  I pulled two pretty large Pink (Humpy) Salmon out of the water before we left.  Carlie caught one fish that was in need of CPR (I actually caught it by hand and pulled the hook out of it), but she caught a live fish just the same. The boys lost interest in catching fish and wanted to whack the fish we caught in the head. Carlie wanted to fillet the two healthy ones, but I let her do one after I showed her how to fillet them.  I never thought about how much experience I had as a fisherman, but it occurred to me as I was trying to teach Carlie how to fillet those salmon that I had caught more fish in Alaska than I had caught in the entire rest of my life  - and I had only caught six.  Again, my kids were going to quickly pass me as experts in this area just like ice skating, snow skiing, snow boarding, and ice hockey. 

After we got warmed up at Hope, our next stop was Valdez, Alaska. In what may be the boldest decision our family has made in planning any vacation, we decided to take a charter boat out to catch Silver Salmon with all five Benefields (no Bella the dog, though).  We debated long and hard about whether our kids, especially James, could make it all day on a boat without a bad attitude or small disaster (like Exxon had a Valdez a few years ago), but we assumed that risk and went for it.  We threw together a plan and headed to Valdez ready to fish.

The drive to Valdez is one of the most beautiful in the world.  It is breath-taking every mile of the way and the frost heaves make the drive like a carnival roller coaster.  The Lucky Van was dragging her bumper and bottoming out every time we got over 50 mph, but we made it.  The shocks are not worn out, but there were not up to carrying a combat loaded family of five to vacation on this stretch of road.  The kids loved all the bouncing, but I was concerned we might blow a shock or a tire out in the middle of Alaska where there was no cell phone service and the bears and moose refuse to help change a tire.

After arriving safely in Valdez, we reported to the Eagles Rest RV Park to unload. As soon as we unloaded our van (think Beverly Hillbillies truck x 2), we went to Allsion’s Point to warm up our fishing muscles.  Jay Allen and Carlie both caught fish and snagged a few more. I made them throw back the snagged fish based on my understanding of the fishing regs, but I was wrong and heard about it the next day. You can keep fish snagged in saltwater, but not in fresh water (where I had fished previously).  Jay Allen may be the best in the world at snagging fish in the tail – he snagged six that way and landed four of them during our time in Valdez.  Allison point was good fishing, but even more entertaining than that was watching the Sea Lion and Seals eat dinner just a few feet from where we were fishing.  They tell me that the bears are also entertaining when they show there up to eat, but I am thankful to take their word for that. 

Before it got too late, we had to get back and eat dinner and go to bed so we could be up early for our charter.  We decided to eat at the Valdez Halibut House and were braced for a very expensive and mediocre meal, but we were wrong. The food was excellent and very reasonable!  We had Halibut and Cheeseburgers and milkshakes – perfect vacation food.  It was all amazingly good and the kids all declared they wanted to return there for dinner the following night.

Back at the Eagle’s Rest, we went through at our normal bedtime routine where kids were wild, lives were threatened, voices were raised, and feelings were hurt.  That did not bode well for a family committed to getting up at the butt-crack of dawn the next morning, but just like the first day of school, the excitement of the adventure propelled everybody to wake up on time where proper rest could not.

We headed down to the dock and found the Enough Said in slip E-8.  From the name of the boat, you would think the folks who owned it had been in the van with us on the drive down.   When Captain Mark saw three little kids getting ready to board his boat, he looked more than a little nervous. I didn't help his confidence by asking if we were the only ones on the charter.  He said yes, and I said, “That is probably best. Most people can’t spend a whole day with us.”  So off we set in miserable weather with three young children and two adults who hadn't caught ten fish in their lives between them. 
Captain Mark was half of our guide team and his wife, Admiral Geri was the other (he would say better) half.  They did a great job of making the kids understand the importance of following the rules and listening to all the commands from the crew (including their parents).  But, the biggest test would be how many fish we came home with.

So, off we went to a spot called the shower stall because of a beautiful water fall that looked like a shower stall for people 300 feet tall.  As soon as we got lines in the water, boogity-boogity-boogity, the NASCAR paced fishing started.  I pulled in the first fish of the day and then Carlie and Jay Allen pulled in the next two fish.  Cammie pulled in the next fish and then declared that was the first fish she had caught in her life. I had not realized that before we left, so we were all going to leave Valdez having caught more fish than we had caught in the rest of our lives. 

Carlie caught the most lbs of fish!

The limit for Silver Salmon was six per person in the area we were fishing and even at a NASCAR pace, it takes a while to catch 30 fish.  With four complete rookies and one unskilled novice, the Enough Said crew actually helped us catch 31 fish.  Because all salmon are not created equal, we threw back the one pink salmon that was caught so we could catch all Silvers or maybe even land a King Salmon.  And we did catch all Silvers and one was actually the second largest Silver caught in Valdez all day. Cammie won second prize in the fish derby that day and has the T-shirt to prove it. She also won some nice gift certificates, two of which have already been redeemed for fishing lures and chocolate. 

First fish of the day!

10.82 lbs and second place for the day.

I have to say I am proud of my kids for fishing all day in the rain without complaint. It was cold and it was windy, but my kids were focused and unfazed. I can’t promise that they would have done as well if the fish weren't biting, but the fish were biting so it doesn't matter.

Jay Allen put some Taekwondo on this one.

First of many fish!

Mark and Geri took good care of us even after we got off the boat as they had a skilled fish preparer named Corey waiting to cut up our fish. Corey was an absolute expert with that fillet knife. He prepared those thirty fish in less time than it took me to fillet four fish and he did it flawlessly.  He prepared fillets, steaks, and some bellies for smoking. Cammie and I were thoroughly impressed with his ability, but the kids were more interested in feeding the fish guts, heads, and tails to the birds. Corey threw the fish scraps to our kids and they threw them to the birds. They acted like that was as much fun as catching the fish and all the other folks preparing their fish were very entertained by our children.

But more important than the scraps, were the wheel barrel full of fish dinners for the Benefields. How in the world would we get all that packaged and frozen before it started going bad?  Luckily, as Geri said earlier, this was not her first rodeo and she had the answer – EZ-Freeze.  The EZ-Freeze people took our wheel barrel of fish and weighed it, packaged it, and froze it all for us.

After all the fishing, we were ready for dinner and decided to try another restaurant in Valdez called the Harbor Café. I am convinced that there is not a bad meal served in this little town. We had seafood chowder and more halibut for dinner and again, it was reasonably priced and excellent. 

With full bellies and a full day out on the boat, nobody had to be threatened or yelled at or have their feelings hurt to go to bed that night. At least, I don’t remember any of that happened, but I fell asleep at about 8:30 pm dead smoked.  Anyway, the next morning, our people were ready for more adventures.

EZ Freeze had our fish ready by 0900 the next morning, but when we got there to pick it up, we had another challenge. I don’t know about you, but I had no idea how much fish we had caught until we started trying to pack it in our coolers.  I now know that one lb of fish requires one quart in a cooler, so we were about 60 quarts short of cooler space when we showed up to get our fish back from EZ-Freeze.  So, off to Safeway to buy a 70 quart cooler and a smaller Styrofoam cooler in case we weren’t done fishing (and we weren’t).

So loaded down with frozen fish, we headed boogity-boogity-boogity back to Allison point to catch some Humpys (Pink Salmon).  The big kids could not fish enough. They had the fever and I loved watching how well they were doing.  We hauled in eight Humpys in a cold drizzle before Cammie threw a caution flag on us because somehow, she and James were in the van freezing while the rest of us were in the rain fishing.  I could have stayed out there all day watching the sea lion, the seals, and our big kids all bringing in the fish. I know people in the lower 48 like to go to the beach and get sunburned and get sand in their butt-cracks, but this seemed to be a much better deal for me, even with the rain.  Probably our best family vacation ever.

So, as the big kids kept on fishing, I started filleting our catch there on the rocks. There was an amazed group of French speaking tourists watching the sea lion, the seal, and the Benefields.  Without me knowing it, they became completely fascinated with me preparing those fish. I wish I could tell you that I did it just like Corey did the day prior, but that would be a lie. I was much slower, the fillets got a little boogered up, and more importantly, Corey did all of his work without showing any butt crack. Cammie reports that I did not and the French speaking tourists have the photographs to prove it. I can only say that at least there is evidence I had no sand in my butt crack or I would feel like a hypocrite.

After all that fishing, it was time to head home to Eagle River. Cammie and the kids ganged up on me and forced me to go back to town for dinner at the Halibut House.  That was 20 extra miles added to our six hour drive and I protested strongly by asking, “are you sure?”  So, we headed back for more Halibut, cheeseburgers, and milkshakes – a happy ending to our best vacation.

Now, all that was left was to haul our catch home on the six hour long roller coaster ride. The shocks were not up to hauling us before we added 150 lbs of fish and coolers to the load, so it was a wee bit bumpy and bouncy on the way home. I had a lot of energy drinks to make sure I stayed alert because it was so late as we headed home that it was actually getting dark (that doesn’t often happen in the summer in Alaska). To add to the thrill of the roller coaster, there were all kinds of wildlife out on the road on our drive home.   We dodged a half dozen moose and an owl, but we failed to dodge a porcupine and a bear. I straddled the porcupine and hoped for the best, but the thump on the bottom of the van did not sound good for the thorny little guy. I asked Cammie if the porcupines were a protected species, but not long after we rolled the porcupine, we came upon the bear.

This bear was not the kind that goes in the woods, but the kind who turns on his lights and asks for your license. So, if getting my butt crack photographed was not enough fame for one day, now I was going to be on Alaska State Troopers. When Trooper Baker asked me if I knew why he pulled me over, I really thought there were about three good reasons to pull me over, but none of those were right. I know some of you won’t believe this, but he pulled me over for changing lanes without a signal in a part of the road where the right lane ended.  I was never going to guess that one.  He did not pull me over for speeding or driving on the shoulder or passing in a parking lot (past offenses that I have been busted for but have never repeated).  Trooper Baker went on to say that he had been following me for several miles and I had been crossing the yellow line in different spots in the road. I said, “Yeah, the spots with porcupines and moose in the road.  The yellow line doesn’t dent my car as much as the wildlife does.”  Well, I really didn’t say that, but I sort of thought it. In reality, the Trooper was very polite and I think he was just playing the odds that anybody on the road at 0130 in the morning was up to no good. When I rolled down the window and the smell of fish and fishing gear poured out and overwhelmed him and he saw three sleeping children, he completely bought our story.  Unlike Louisiana, it is possible to get pulled over in Alaska without getting a ticket or getting insulted by the State Trooper. The Alaska State Troopers will even congratulate you on all the fish you caught! 

Trooper Baker could have probably ticketed us for having too much fun on vacation, but he decided not to, and we were thankful.  As a matter of fact, we were thankful for every minute of our Valdez getaway and all the people God let us meet (even the camera happy French speaking people).  We can’t wait for next summer’s vacation trip to Valdez. You will see us bouncing down the road in the Lucky Van with new shocks and pulling a trailer full of coolers, probably heading to slip E-8, Enough Said.