Tag Archives: Inside Passage

Alaska, Fishing, lodge life

The Return of Yes Bay Johnny

As the title of this post suggests, our resident ghost has made another appearance! It has the lodge buzzing. So what happened is that the cook was making a bowl of beer batter. As it was sitting there (on a dry surface with no one within the immediate area) it launched itself right off the counter in full view of him and one of the server girls! It was like an invisible hand just up and swiped it right off. It made a huge mess on the floor, and it was a real pain in the ass to clean up as it happened about ten minutes before lunchtime. The only thing we can imagine that happened is that Yes Bay Johnny didn’t approve of the Coors Light the cook was using to make the batter! Maybe that was his way of saying use a better beer next time!

I asked the boss some questions about Yes Bay Johnny after it happened. As an amateur ghost hunter I like to know about these things. He told me that about 5-6 times a year things like that happen with no rational explanation. It’s always some kind of poltergeist-type phenomena, no actual full-bodied apparitions have ever been sighted. He also says that these things usually happen in the months of January, February and March when the lodge is closed, but can happen any time of the year. If I stayed here in the off season I’d be trying to catch some EVPs or maybe would set some cameras up in the kitchen or hallways. I bet someone would catch something of interest if they were persistent!

The same day of the ghost incident, our dishwasher Devan caught the first dock salmon of the season! It was a huge pink, and I guess they have finally arrived in the bay. He’s been fishing for weeks to catch one and it finally happened for him. He’s not the only one who has been fishing for these fish, people have been casting lures off the dock for weeks trying for them. I happened to be standing right next to him on the dock when it went down. It must have been waiting right up under the dock because he caught it only about a yard away from where he was casting in the water.

It was a hard fight with a lot of runs, but he finally tired it out and brought it up on the dock. Ty the dog was there as he always is when someone is fishing and I had to hold him back so Devan could fight and land the fish without dog interference. Devan let the fish go, something he took a lot of flack for. I thought it was a good thing to do from a karma standpoint. It’s not like we are lacking for salmon around here!

Ty wishes he could get ahold of that salmon!

On the same day as both the ghost incident and the dock salmon catching, I got tipped 100 bucks by some really awesome guests we had who came from Kansas! It was an older gentleman and his three sons. They were handing out bills to everyone and I got one kicked to me. This is the first time this has happened, usually guests tip out the house at the end of their stay and it gets divided up among us all. Getting it in person was really special though. I took it as a sign to buy some of the expensive lures that caught the dock salmon! They are called Blue Fox Pixees and run about 10 bucks apiece. I ordered 3 off of Amazon and they should be here in a week or two. I hope to get into some dock salmon action here soon!

In other fishing news, the guest who caught the monster 102 lb halibut last week caught an even bigger one the very next day! As it was on the day I publish this blog I didn’t include it in last week’s post but it’ll go in this one. The monster weighed in at 117 lbs! This guest had the super fish luck. He and his son went home with around 180 lbs of halibut, salmon and rock cod fillets! He got his money’s worth of fish on this trip, that’s for sure.

The halibut king so far this season!

I went out this week fishing with Captain Jimmy and his wife Erin who works in the office. Last week I didn’t go out and I deeply regretted not doing so. This past week I was really starting to go stir-crazy from being cooped up here all the time. Getting away from the lodge even for a few hours really does good things for my head. I spend my days in about a 200 yard area and it is just unnatural. I was really starting to get cabin fever!

We had a pretty good day. I caught my first silver-grey (a type of rock cod that is supposedly good eating) and my first pink salmon. I also caught a couple of chicken halibut, both were around 7 lbs each. Erin caught a huge goldeneye rockfish that we had to throw back unfortunately, only Alaskan residents can keep them. It was a pretty decent day fishing, it was overcast and drizzly but the winds & sea stayed down for the most part.

Two firsts in one day makes for a good fishing trip!

We had a really weird catch come to the dock this week. Some guests brought in a wolf-eel! It was a big, ugly sucker around 4 feet in length. It looked like something you’d find in the deepest parts of the ocean with its smushed-up face. We processed it out and the meat looked quite good actually. One guy said it reminded him of perch, I thought it looked like flounder. I’d definitely try some if offered. I know in California people eat the monkey-faced eel, I hear it tastes like cod or haddock. Actually there are places that serve it as fish & chips and people can’t tell the difference. Eels are just long fish I suppose!

Definitely the weirdest looking creature I’ve seen pulled out of the ocean here.

I just realized this week I’m at about 1/3 of the way through my stint here. While some days are better than others, time seems to be moving at a glacial pace. I really enjoy my job, but being stuck at the dock for 12 hours a day really is wearing on me. Being a landlubber ain’t my bag, man. I suppose I have to pay my dues as I’m sure all the skippers have at some point. It just makes it clear for me that I’ve got to get my Captain’s Licence to really be where I want in this racket. It’s not that hard really, the main thing I need is 1500 hours of boat driving time and around 1200 dollars in fees. Plus I have to take physicals and drug tests. Whenever I can get it it’ll open up a whole new world for me. At least I know what I need to focus on for the future. Until then, I’ll just have to continue grinding away at the dockmonkey life. Anyways, that’s it for this week’s installment. I’ll holla at ya’ll next week!

Standard
Alaska, Fishing

Say What? HALIBUT!

So usually I work on a post all week and aim to publish on Fridays, but there’s gonna be a special edition of Tales of the Dogfish today. It was a great day, I finally got my Alaskan halibut! Actually, I caught my limit of two, which was the two biggest of the three in the featured image of this post. To catch seventy-five pounds worth of halibut is a pretty good thing to accomplish before noon!

As I’ve stated before, Tuesdays are my days off. Last week I wanted to go halibut fishing but instead we had to go salmon trolling per boss’s orders. Last night I put in my request to go out again and permission was granted by the lead captain who oversees that kind of thing. This morning, I got to sleep in until a glorious 6:30. Captain Nick, who was my captain for the day, told me to meet him down at the dock at 7:30, so at the stated time I went down there to meet him. We headed out to sea and went in a different direction than I went last week. This time, we were free to go halibut fishing and stay out as long as I wanted, so I was stoked! The day was perfect, t-shirt weather but slightly overcast, and the water was smooth as glass.

A pretty morning out on the Inside Passage.

Our destination for the day was a place called The Meadow. It was a place that has been good for big halibut lately. We got situated and made our drops. After only about 15-20 minutes of bounce-balling, Nick got a bite, and he landed a nice 10 lb halibut. We chunked it in the box and kept on fishing. After a bit, I got a big takedown and I tried to set the hook a little too soon. Unfortunately, I farmed the fish. It had some weight to it, I bet it was a big one!

Shots from either direction at the halibut hole. Nothing but beautiful scenery everywhere you looked.

Undaunted, I set back down in the same spot. Soon afterwards, I felt another tug and reeled in what’s called a yelloweye. These fish are very similar to what we know as canary rockfish down in California. Goldeneye are huge rockfish, and this one was probably eighteen inches long and around ten pounds. They are illegal to keep however, and since I brought it up from 300 feet it had barotrauma.

Barotrauma occurs when you catch a fish at depth and when you bring it to the surface the swim bladder bulges out of its mouth. It can’t swim back down due to the air expansion in its swim bladder. What you have to do is hurredly attach a release clip to a downrigger ball and the other end to a special kind of hook in the fish’s mouth. Then you lower the fish back down to depth. When the hook on the release is pulled upward where you want the fish to be, the fish slides right on off and is good to go. I didn’t take a pic as we wanted to get the fish back down as quickly as possible. It didn’t come back up so mission successful!

After the rescue mission was completed, we shifted position about another three hundred yards over. The current started whipping up along with the winds, so it was hard to keep my line straight up and down. Captain Nick did an excellent job in holding station however. Not long after we switched to this new spot, I felt a lurch on my line and this time I set the hook properly. I could tell I had a real beast on my hands from the massive pull. There was a big fish on, it could only be a halibut! It was a hard fight, but eventually I brought a big ‘ol ‘but to the surface. It was a two hook rig so I had a small pollock on the top hook and the halibut took the bottom hook. It was a twofer! I was so stoked to catch my first Alaskan Pacfic halibut. It was 41 inches and 30 lbs. a nice fish for sure.

After this, we fished that spot a little longer in hopes of catching another big hali, but no dice. There was another spot about a quarter mile away called ‘The Trash Hole’ that has a reputation for holding good halibut. We motored on over there and I dropped my line. The bottom seemed pretty snaggy and I almost got hung up a couple of times. Then, I felt like I hit a snag. Suddenly, the snag pulled back! I mean, it really wrenched my arm, this was a big fish. I could tell right away that this one was bigger than my first. This fish was one hell of a fighter! It went on two really good runs, pulling drag like crazy. My arm was still wore out from the first fish, and it was super difficult to hoist up this second one. Nick thought that it was a 70 lber the way it was fighting!

My arm was starting to feel like it was about to give out when the leader came into view. It was another twofer! A big rockfish called a quillback (another illegal fish) was on the top hook. It made it really difficult for Nick to sink the gaff hook into the jaw of the halibut. He reached down and nearly fell out of the boat getting ahold of that beast. Finally he wrenched it over the side and it was a big slab of fish! We measured it and this one turned out to be 45 inches and 45 lbs. I’ve been watching guests catch ones this size since I’ve been here, and it was awesome to finally land one for myself!

It took two hands to hold up this big ‘ol boy!

As the limit for halibut is two a day up here, I was done halibut fishing. I had the option to go do some salmon trolling, but as the salmon haven’t really arrived in big numbers yet I was content to end the day. I still wanted to get back in time to do laundry and relax a little bit. My arm was completely shot anyway! I still have bruises from my hip all the way to my belly button from the rod butt digging in. Nick suggested we go check out this cool waterfall on the way back and that sounded like a good idea to me.

On the way there we saw some animal swimming along, we got close and it was a freakin’ deer! The channel was probably a mile wide at this point, who knows why in the hell a deer would attempt such a crossing. Probably the same kind of thinking that causes them to jump out in front of cars on a deserted stretch of road. Who knows what thoughts lie in deer’s heads?

Why did the deer cross the Inside Passage? To get to the other side, of course!

After a short cruise, we came across the waterfall. It was actually two waterfalls in one! Nick had actually never seen it before either, so it was a neat experience for the both of us. It was definitely worth the detour to go check out.

Views of the waterfalls. They entered into a scenic little bay that’d be a great place to anchor up, drink some beers and spend the night.

After we checked out the waterfalls, it was time to head on in. When we got back, the crew congratulated me on finally catching my first Alaskan halibut, it was nice. I pitched in and helped process them out. So that’s my day! I couldn’t have asked for a better one all things considered. When you’ve got perfect conditions, great fishing, and picture-postcard scenery everywhere you look, it is a blessing. Hopefully there are more days of great fishing ahead!

Now THAT’s what I call a box of fillets! Thirty-eight pounds worth of prime Alaskan halibut. At around 30 dollars a pound that’s worth big money!
Standard