Alaska 2022

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My first time seeing noctilucent clouds! Ice crystals in the stratosphere glow near the boundary of day/night and can only be seen when in Earth's shadow looking towards the lighter horizon.

​Fishing at Whaler's Cove Lodge in Angoon, Alaska has become a family tradition over the past decade. This year the trip was supposed to offer four days of fishing, but mother nature and some poor logistics ensured this trip was like no other.  My brother-in-law Colin also joined us my dad's friend Charlie for this epic adventure. We arrived in Juneau without a hitch, and even without COVID from the flights.

Bored out of our gourds.

So *this* is Alaska??

Thick clouds and rain settled-in the Juneau area the morning of our floatplane departure to Angoon for our first day of fishing. Such weather conditions prevented visual-only flights from leaving and more importantly landing.  We were stuck at the Ward Air hangar, hopeful we'd be able to leave by mid-afternoon. The fish-delivery boat had taken our luggage back to Angoon that morning, so I only had the clothes I was wearing, and a camera to keep me company. The folks at the lodge also needed our planes to get home and catch connecting flights. But the weather did not cooperate and by 4pm we were all scrambling to find lodging in Juneau for one more night.  Thanks to a few brief tweet convos with NWS Juneau, I knew we wouldn't be flying out the next morning until mid-afternoon at the earliest, but we arrived at the Ward Air hangar at 7am just in case a miracle opened a window for us to get to Angoon on what should have been our second day of fishing. The science was correct and the planes weren't able to depart for quite some time. 

Meanwhile, back at the WC Lodge, staff were determined to get their current guests back to Juneau and get us to the lodge should the flights not be able to depart once again. In years past this would have been accomplished by WCL renting a sight-seeing catamaran for the 3hr, 90mile trip up Chatham Strait. However, due to COVID, many of the catamaran options were understaffed or undergoing maintenance which prevented WCL from procuring their services. WCL solution was to cram the guests onto the 6 fastest fishing boats in the fleet and make the run themselves while hoping for calm seas. Those boats left at 8am and were headed to Juneau. We expected we'd have to take those boats back too, but, just when the odds seemed impossible, the clouds opened and we were able to FLY out of Juneau and make it to Angoon within 35 minutes of take-off.  We landed in a sunny oasis of perfect weather and glassy waters on what should have been Day 2 of our fishing. Since the fishing boats and captains were still in Juneau, we could do nothing but enjoy the weather and sun by exploring the shoreline and kayaking. After 30hrs of being stuck in an airplane hangar the fresh air and clear skies were a great way to forget that half of our fishing days were gone. ​

When we did get to go fishing, Captain Kevin was great as always. We caught our four halibut in relative short order the first day, but salmon were tough to find. The silvers just weren't in yet, a remnant of the drought years three and four years ago. Our second and last day of fishing had us brave rough seas. We missed our halibut limit due to throwing back some smaller keepers that we thought would get bigger as the day progressed. But alas, seas sickness and fatigue overtook half the crew (Colin & Charlie) and our day ended with a paultry catch. In the end we each ended up taking home 35lbs of processed fish. Usually our three day trips surpasses 100lbs each. But, oh, the memories. 

The best parts of the trip? 

• Seeing Colin catch his first Halibut, salmon and rockfish. 
• Seeing noctilucent clouds flying to Juneau. 
• Seeing amazing glaciers and atmospheric phenomena on flight back to Sacramento.
• Kayaking in the bay. 
• Seeing a sealion destroy salmon in the harbor. 
• Getting to spend time with my pops and Colin.
• Not getting COVID.

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