Alaska Report

[rvanman2000]

I just returned from my adventure in Alaska....and what an adventure. With everything that happened I'm not sure where to start, but I'll just start at the beginning.

After arriving Alaska, we spent the first morning gearing up and buying the needed supplies. Hit the creek by 12:00, but the kings were real slow. Stayed at it for about 8 hrs before throwing in the towel. But I got great practice in on my technique.

Next day, hit the water early, and it is still real slow. After 7 hrs, WHAM!!!! I wasn't sure if I had on a fish or a boat! She ran on me 4 times before I wore her out and was able to net 'er. My first king. Weighing in at 36 pounds.

Went back home and processed the fillets, and grabbed some dinner. Next thing you know, I'm rolling on the ground with gut pain. Thinking it was just the curry, I went to bed to sleep it off. After a long painful night I realized it wasn't going away that easy. About 3:00 pm, I decided to get checked out so I wouldn't waste another day by not being able to fish. Being Saturday, I had no choice but to go to the ER. What luck, it was my Appendix. After some cursing under my breath, I agreed to the surgery. Doctor said I was done fishing for the rest of the trip.

So while I laid up in the hospital, my son went on the halibut charter in my place. They didn't get into any big ones (only 30-40#'s), but he caught 15 halibut. No kings though. He had a great time.

After spending 4 days in the hospital, I finally broke out. The next day the group went fishing, and decided to tag along to watch. Then I decided I didn't come all this way to watch, so I through on the waders, and jumped in. Fishing was good, lots of kings coming in. Then I got hit, and after pushing away all the people that were trying to help me hold my pole, I went to work by myself, and pulled in a beautiful 51 pounder.

After that there was no holding me back. For the short while I had left to fish, I hit it hard and was successful pulling in 2 more kings, 33 #'s, and 25 #'s. And my son was able to hook in to one and pull it in by himself.

After some sight seeing at Denali, and other places we flew back to SLC. But the adventure wasn't quite over. I noticed a flat tire while we were at the curb loading the Luggage and coolers.


What a trip!!!!
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[road]

What great story! Sorry about the hospital stay ... but it just adds to the memories. The flat tire at the end , well what can ya say <grins> at least you were home LOL.

I know you have to have some pics of that trip. Are ya gonna share? Would love to see them.
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[Hellsangler69]

I just went thru the same thing and had my appendix remove May 16 . Way to hang it out and get back to fishing . I feeling much better now , just the hospital keeps sending bills now and that is what has screwed up my fishing lately . LOL
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[rvanman2000]

It was a great trip even with the darn surgery. I guess the fish needed all the help they could get anyways!!! Here are the pics
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[Out4Trout]

[cool]Wow, what an adventure, eh? That sucks about the appendex bursting, but thank God you were not that far away from a hospital, eh? A 51 pounder, that's pretty dang cool! My biggest is only 32 pounds, but I've only been up that direction once to the Queen Charlotte Islands, B.C. Man it would have sucked if somebody had an appendex burst up there because you had to fly into the lodge we were staying at. That was a cool report. Thanks for sharing!
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[Bigfishrule]

Congrats on the the fish. Too bad about the appendix. So what type of lures where you using or were you just using roe. I'll be heading up on July 6. Hope I can catch a 50 pounder. Thanks for the report and photo's.

John
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[rvanman2000]

Mainly what I used were blue corky's. One blue on top of the line, green in the middle, and another blue underneath it. And where I was fishing you could use two hooks or a treble hook. I liked using the two hooks. But blue, purple, and green seemed to be the hot colors. Some people did well with spin-n-glows, but I learned fast that when you are combat fishing they tangle real bad. Saw a few vibrax lures catch some, but corky's by far were the best and the cheapest! Good luck
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[fonduvfishin]

Nice fish, it sounds as though all was not lost with you being able to get back at it and enjoy the rest of the trip. I'm curious have they upped the limit on King's? Is that the Kenai you were on? Oh, and one more question: Was is too early for any other species of salmon?
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[rvanman2000]

No this wasn't the Kenai, we were up on the Susitna on the mouth of Willow Creek and Montana Creek. The limit for kings was still 5. The only salmon running that high that early on were kings. We had plans of fishing for Reds on the Kenai when we went down for our charter out of Homer, but those plans got ruined. So all we went after were the kings. I really wanted to get some reds too, but if I had to choose one or the other, I think it would still be the kings.
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[svpdgcar]

[#505000]Bwahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaa........ six months of listening to you plan and you end up doing very little fishing and a whole lot of sitting around in the hospital. Not to laugh at your misery Ryan but that is funny!!!!! [/#505000]
[#505000][/#505000]
[#505000]Oh well, I'm glad you were able to get some fishing in, now you're back we need to go chase kitties again.[/#505000]
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[rvanman2000]

I did still get 6-7 days of fishing in. But on top of it all, the water was so high fishing was real hard anyways. I talked to people that have live there for many years, and they had never seen the water reach these levels that they are at right now.
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[bassfinder]

Wow sounds like an adventure. Way to tough it out. Thanks for posting the pics.
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