This summer I had the opportunity to fulfill a life long dream, fishing in Alaska. My youngest brother will be leaving on his mission to Chile this fall so my Dad thought it would be great to have an action packed adventure before he leaves us for two years. So, we enlisted all of the brothers with the exception of one (Joe), both brother in laws, and one of my Dad's business associates. It was a week I will never forget!
To say that our travel arrangements were a little fragmented is a small understatement. My brother Spencer and I had a direct flight to Anchorage and had almost 12 hours to kill before the rest of the crew arrived. As it turns out one of our brothers (Garry, pictured above) lives in Fairbanks and we hooked up with him to do some fishing north of Anchorage on the Euklutna River. That experience in and of it self was worth the trip. Spence and I made it up to the River an hour or so before Garry got there and we did a little walking around. In about an hour we saw four different bears (Black Bears).After a little confusion we finally hooked up and within minutes of getting to the river we were on fish. Spencer and I were a little taken back as we saw these 40+ pound fish swimming past us. However, Garry who has become quite skilled at fishing in Alaska had one on in no time. It was quite a sight to watch Garry fight this 50+ pound fish down stream. It was like watching a river runs through it. One second he was there the next he was gone. About a half hour later he came walking up with this whopper.
As you can imagine I was pretty pumped. We had been in Alaska less than 3 hours and we had already caught an amazing King Salmon. Unfortunately, we didn't have any of the cameras with us when we caught this giant on the river.
Around 1:00am the rest of the crew arrived and we loaded up the cars and headed to the Kenai Peninsula. My brother Garry's father in law lives in a small town about an hour north of homer. We drove through the rest of the night to get to our cabin. However, we didn't spend a lot of time there. We quickly unloaded our gear and were off to do some fishing. Due to the overall size of our group we needed to break up into teams. Team one went halibut fishing that first day. Those of us who made up team two took off to find some stream fishing. As it turned out Spencer and I got a lucky tip from an old timer at Sportsman's Warehouse in Anchorage. And we nailed the kings in that River!!Once we got on the river it didn't take long before we were into the fish. My brother in law Carl had the honor of being the first to hook into one of these monsters. It was awesome, we all sort of fanned out and were working different holes. I came around the corner just has he was landing his first King!
My brother Spencer was the next hook into one of these behemoths. It was a lot of fun. We had gone through a bit of a drought. We were not hooking into the big kings for quite some time. We were catching a lot of what they call Jack Kings. Which are basically juvenile king salmon that for whatever reason run a year or two before they are sexually mature. Anyway, we were fishing a hole where we could see 15 or so kings and suddenly Spencer had one take his spinner. Now, I must also mention that Spencer and I were fishing for these monsters with tiny mepps spinners on four foot ugly sticks with 6 pound test. It was sporting to say the least.
This was the first time we hooked one of these big dogs on the small tackle and we tried to horse them a little to much and made a couple of rookie mistakes. His first hook up ended with three of us trying to coral the fish. Nevertheless, we underestimated the overall power of these fish and he took us into some brush and broke the line. As you can imagine Spencer was feeling a little dejected. He was distraught, it was like watching that 180-class buck trot off after your arrow flies over his back.
As luck would have it didn't take long and he was hooked up again. Above is Spencer with his first landed king. What a day! To be honest I was beginning to feel a little left out. I had already caught about a dozen or so Jack Kings but I hadn't yet hooked up with one of the big dogs. Spencer gave me shot in a whole by him where we could see several. It was literally a matter of seconds and it was on.
As I mentioned before Spencer and I were fishing with some very light tackle. It would take us about 20 minutes of playing the fish before they would tire enough for us to land them. In this area the river was catch and release only for the Kings.
My very first King. It was quite a feeling. I have had the opportunity to do a lot of cool stuff in the outdoors. Taking bears, elk, and all sorts of animals with primitive weapons and I must say that catching a king on six pound test ranks up there.
The next day it was team two who had the opportunity to go halibut fishing. So, we loaded up and headed out. I will be honest. This was probably my least favorite time of the trip. Halibut fishing is a little boring. Drop a big baited hook to the bottom of the sea floor and wait for it to be gobbled up. The fishing was a little slow and we only hooked up with a few. 
Here is Spencer with the two little chickens (small halibut) that he caught. I do need to say though, that halibut is the best eating fish there is. It is so darn tasty that I will have to do it again just to get some to take home. 
The last day of the trip all of us loaded up and headed to the Russian River. We hiked a few miles down to the falls. There was a lot of talk at the trail head that we might have the chance to see some bears. All of us were excited at the chance to see a real life brown bear. And as it turned out some of us did in deed have that chance. A few minutes later Garry and Spencer saw me and walked down to where I was at. As we were standing there looking at the salmon some movement across the river caught my eye. As I looked up I was thrilled to see two full grown brown bear cubs. It is hard to describe the feeling I had. I always thought that it would be scary. But it was anything but. We just settled down and watched as they worked there was past us.
This is where they popped out at. At this point they are probably about 25 yards down river from us. The cubs were oblivious that we were around. All they wanted to do was get some fish.
Their Mama was so relaxed. I don't know if she saw us but I am sure she smelled us. She woofed at them and they all went up the mountain. In a matter of seconds the cubs were back and passed within just feet of where we were at. The picture below was taken as they walked by. Just to put it in perspective I wasn't zoomed in at all in that shot. It really felt like we could have put out our hand and touched them. (Luckily, there is a narrow deep and fast flowing river between us.)
On our way back to Anchorage we stopped at Portage Glacier. The lake had lots of icebergs floating in it. If you look way up towards the back of the lack the glacier feeds the lake and the icebergs are from the ice calving.
Just off the road from Portage Glacier there was another glacier that has a trail up to it. So, we thought we better get up close and personal with a real life glacier.
Well, this is just a glimpse of all that took place. We had a great time and I can promise you that I will be back. I felt like I was right at home in the wilds of Alaska!
