NOTE: Sorry for the delay, things were very busy the last couple of days on the trip and then busier when we got home and I’ve also been sick but will be excited to share our last few days. I did the writing in Alaska but still needed to get the photos and videos prepped. Now… back to the trip!
Today we were fishing with Jayden. On Mondays guided boats are not allowed on the Kenai River. We also knew we wanted to do a float trip on the Kasilof so today was the day! Jayden‘s only 19 and he’s finishing up his first season guiding in Alaska. He and Hunter (our guide on Saturday), are lifelong friends. His mother actually babysat Hunter when Hunter was a baby, but he called Hunter the old man because Hunter is five years older than him.
We were joined today by Quinten and John from Chesapeake, Virginia. This was their first trip to Alaska and they had driven in that morning from Anchorage. We had a 7 AM report time and it’s about three hours from Anchorage so they had an early morning. They were basing their trip out of Anchorage so they had some long commute days on days they were fishing in the Kenai area.
We originally were going to do the Upper Kasilof, which we’ve never done before, but Jayden said the lower was fishing better so he asked LJ if we were good to switch. We were disappointed we wouldn’t see the upper but fishing was the main goal so we agreed to move to the lower. Normally we would leave our cars here to drive up with someone to the upper and then launch from there and then float down and then be at our cars, but instead we would launch from here float down and then get a ride back up with Jayden at the end of the day to the parking area.
We launched and were quickly on our way. This is another absolutely beautiful river. We made our way to the first stop and anchored in for today’s fishing, we would just anchor and then work our fish, not like on Saturday when we were when we would release from the anchor and buoy and then float to fight the fish. These boats are also smaller than the other boats again it was a beautiful day pretty chilly to start out back in the 30s again and quite a bit of fog .
LJ was able to send out the drone again today with this being a much different flight since the boat was not moving constantly. This made it much easier to takeoff and land and he was able to get some great views of the river plus share with Jayden where some boulders were located
While fishing we heard about a terrible tragedy that had occurred the day before in the river. We heard a father and daughter had their boat overturned. She was able to make it to shore, but he was not. Our guide had talked to another guide who said their client actually saw him floating down the river. The news story that we saw said a branch, a low hanging branch, flipped his boat. Another story said they were preparing to get out take the boat out of the river, and it flipped. The new stories didn’t say they were related, so I don’t know if that’s true or not but just how horrific that had to be. The man had on waders which the guide said are just sinkers once they fill with water. We saw the park Rangers as well as the police searching on Monday in several areas where we were fishing and all I could think was what a terrible job that has to be. LJ did let them know that he had taken the drone up and had not seen anything. I checked a few more times for any updates and the search was called off Monday afternoon. If you/d like to read more, you can do so here.
LJ hooked into a pink again. He seems to be the pink whisperer, too bad it’s not the right time to get pinks. If it were, he would limit every day. Quinten caught a steelhead trout, also not something we could eat, but a beautiful fish. He ended up with two silvers, and his dad got one. LJ got two silvers; his wife got one. (wah-wah)
Then my other fish was called a jack, which is a sexually mature but very, very small silver salmon. You can keep up to 10 of these a day, and they are still good to eat; they’re just “genetically deficient”. It sounds terrible. I was very surprised we were keeping him because I didn’t realize the story about jacks. They actually want them out of the river because they will still spawn and then pass on those genes of the small fish, so I say I got 1.1 fish since I could’ve gotten 10 of them. LJ won the day!
Jayden cleaned the fish, and then we got to see the process of hauling out these boats from the river. They built a ramp with a pulley; you bring the rope or the cable all the way down to hook up. Then typically, the truck in front of you that just hauled out will pull yours up to the top and unhook. They go on their way, and then you back in your boat trailer to get yours and continue on. Now, of course, I had questions about the logistics of if you were the last boat of the day, and it seems like it could be quite challenging with a single guide doing this on their own. Quinten and John stayed at the bottom next to the river and helped get the boat hooked up. LJ and I had already come up the hill; LJ got a good video of the boat coming up. It was apparently quite an investment to get this put in, and it was very interesting to see it utilized.
We loaded into Jayden’s vehicle to head back to our parking area. The boat and trailer are supplied to the guides, but they are responsible for having a vehicle that can tow it, so he had bought this one on Facebook Marketplace. He and Quinten enjoyed talking about vehicles they own and had owned. Jayden seemed to buy and sell several vehicles on Facebook Marketplace over his short years of driving. Quinten has a landscaping business back in Chesapeake that seems to be doing well. His dad said he has employees and does more of the bidding on jobs and management than actual work now, so he sounds quite accomplished for his 19 years. Jayden will return to Oregon in less than a week and has a job with an excavation company in the off-season; he hopes to come to Alaska and guide for about five years, save his money for a down payment towards a house in Oregon, which sounds very industrious. I hope he does well.
We went back to the house to change clothes and got ready to go out and get some dinner. We had talked about going to The Flats Bistro. Jayden also had said it was a great choice. We were on the early side. Apparently it’s recommended to always have reservations, but we were able to get a table with a great view. It’s right on a field, where there are Caribou and moose so LJ kept his eyes open but we had no sightings. He got a salad and a chicken and pasta dish. I opted for a steakhouse salad and then for dessert I chose the crème Brulé and he got a triple berry cobbler with ice cream.
Now we were ready to go out on an evening moose hunt and also go by our favorite overlook park. It was again a very calm evening out on the Cook inlet, but no moose sightings. We got a call during dinner and our launch for our fishing trip for the morning would be back back to the Pillars boat launch for the lower Kenai and it would no longer be a combo trip. It would be Silver’s only but we are excited to be going with Mindy, who we fished with back in 2015.
Thank you so much for sharing!
LikeLike