Idaho Blue Goose

  The Idaho Snow Goose season was in full swing. I was working hard to get everyone involved in some of the hunts. It seemed each day in March the birds responded better to decoys.
  My nephew, Luke, had gone on a hunt in Feb to be greeted with a long day of dark to dark hunting for only a couple of geese.
  "I think it'd be worth your time to come now," I told Luke over the phone. It was like twisting someones arm to put money in their bank account... "I'll be there," Luke quickly responded.
  I also text'd another young man who is bitten badly by the hunting bug, Colton.
  "I'll be there for sure," He text'd back, and early the next morning his truck rolled into my driveway.
    A quick stop by the Parma fuel and handy mart and we were off to the field.
  Luke arrived at the field with his Uncle Jim, and special needs cousin, Kyle.
  The geese were roaring in the ponds behind us, usually a good omen.
  We raced through the early morning decoy set up and had things ready to go come daylight.
  I was really hoping to have a flock or two decoy. It is one thing to shoot a single or a pair, but the thrill of snow goose hunting is to have a flock drop from the bright blue stratosphere, and into the decoys.
  The morning dragged by without much excitement. We shot at a few birds but still no flocks.
  "Ok boys," I said, "it is getting close to prime decoy time."
  The field we hunt is between feeding grounds and resting area ponds. From about noon to three is prime time. The feeding birds are trickling to their resting area ponds. It seems there are always a few flocks that have not fed enough in the morning and are willing to check out our corn field on the way over.
"Peep!" I heard a snow goose from some distance away.
  "I hear one," I said to the boys, " look around and see where it is."
  "High, way up high above us," I said as soon as I saw the little white dots above us.
"They are locked on our decoys and coming in," I tried to conceal my excitement. "Sit back and enjoy the show."
  "Hey, is that a blue? Luke asked.
  "It is!" Coloton replied. Colton has the best eyes of the group. I could hardly tell they were birds, but as they dropped near we could all see the blue colored bird with a bright white neck and head.
  We have to be very careful that it is a blue goose and not an immature speckle belly, as the season is closed on specks.
  All through the morning we had talked about a blue goose. As many snows as I've seen shot in Idaho, I had never seen a real blue. We have harvested quite a few young snows which have a lot of grey feathers, but a real blue has the pure white head and neck.
  As the birds dropped and dropped from their incredibly high elevation the boys discussed how they were locked on the blue.
  We all enjoyed watching the dark bird in the flock of white.
  The birds were in range now. "Take them this time?" whispered the boys.
  "No, let's let them make one more pass to be sure they are in good range," I whispered back.
  It is so hard to keep letting snow geese circle again and again. Many times we wait for that one more circle only to have the birds fly away never to be seen again.
  Hunting Canada Geese the birds drop into the decoys in one or two passes and try to land. Not so with the snows, around and around without loosing very much elevation.
  The snows made a big circle around the blind and the decoy spread.  "Ok guys, this time. Take them when they come over this time," I whispered as gun barrels poked out the top of the blind.
  "Remember to shoot your lanes," I commented as I always do just before we lunge out of the blind to shoot into a flock.
  Shooting the lane in front of each hunter seems easy, but is,  in fact, very difficult.
  In a flock of birds there will always be one that stands out. It is usually the one that is the closest to the blind, or very large.  Your eyes are just drawn to that one bird. If a group of hunters do not force themselves to shoot the birds in front of them, closest or not, we find everyone shoots at the one that draws the eye and all the others escape untouched.
  "Now! Take them!" I shouted, while rising to shoot.  I picked a bird on my far end of the flock and promptly missed all my shots at it.
  Jim was faring better on his end of the flock, dropping a few geese.
  "Got it! Got it! Got it!" shouted Colton and Luke.
  "We got the blue!"They shouted, as they raced out of the blind to retrieve the bird.
  I had forgotten all about that blue goose.  It had come in the center of the flock right in front of Luke and Colton. Those boys concentrated their shots at it and we had the first real blue goose any of us had ever seen.
  Pictures were snapped over and over. The smiles were huge on those two guys faces. I have to admit I was sure proud of them as well.
  "Great shooting guys," I told them over and over.
  We harvested a few more snows that day, but that blue was certainly the highlight of the day, if not the season.
  Now there is talk of getting it mounted. Luke and Colton might have to take turns hanging it on their walls just to be fair.  I am very confident that both of the boys it that blue at the same time. It really is a shared treasure.

                                                   Our first blue goose

 

Jim, Kyle, and Luke

 

First Snow Goose at 95

  I called my folks house to speak to my Dad.
  "How about coming with me for a snow goose hunt?" I asked. 
  I received the reply I expected... "When? What time in the morning?"
  In all of my hunting years one solid thing I have counted on is the immediate willingness of my Dad going with me.
   "Let's do it Monday,"  I said to both he and my mom.  "No can do on Monday," my mom replied over the top of Dad's immediate "yes" reply.  "Have a doctor's appointment on Monday. But... Tuesday looks open for him," I could hear my mom reading off the wall calendar.
  When one gets old life doesn't center around a work schedule, but rather, a doctor's appointment calender. In their 80's and 90's there seems to always be some tuning up to do on the old bodies, eyes, ears, muscles... something.
  I picked up Dad at 5:30, and he had his stuff in a pile waiting. Just like every other time, I have never had to wait on him getting ready. 
  I have to laugh, in my mid 50's I find it hard to get up and going, I can not imagine at 95.
  We drove to Wayne's farm to set up in the dark.
  "I have never shot a snow goose," Dad informed me on the way. I knew I had taken him last year but had forgotten that he had not shot a white goose.
  "Maybe we can change that today," I said, as we bounced into the little dirt lane leading to the corn field we were hunting.
   I parked the truck and found my way to the blind by head lamp. The ducks and geese were greeting the morning full bore! In the ponds next to Wayne's farm the birds were almost deafening.
  "Man, listen to those geese roar," I commented to Dad.
  Many times I have wondered how many morning my Dad and I have shared the waking of a new day by listening to waterfowl greet the same early dawn. 
  I think back to my youth. Dad was so good about taking my brother and I on hunting and fishing trips.
  As I matured my love for the outdoors grew with my age. I loved the early mornings and found myself  spending most of them with my Dad.
  Daylight was breaking the Eastern sky, and even a blind person would have known by the ever increasing roar of snow and speckle belly geese in the ponds.
  "Ok Dad, it's shooting time, let's get some shells in the guns," I told him as I raced getting the sound system and the moving decoys going.
  Daylight came with a biting chill in the air. Dad's hands were so cold he could hardly get shells stuffed into his gun.
  The old blood vessels just don't work like they used to. I can remember most of my hunting life of how warm Dad's hand were. My brother and I would be freezing, he would slip off his toasty warm gloves and place them onto our little hands, giving us instant warmth. Now it is my turn to do the same for him.
  "Here comes a single snow goose," I whispered to Dad, "This will be your bird."
  The goose sailed right into the decoy for a great shot.
  "Ok, get it now!" I told Dad.
  He shot and the bird did not fall. Now it was fare game for me as well. I shot and shot with Dad and the goose flew away untouched!
  "Wow, what a lucky bird," I told Dad, while stuffing shells into my gun as well as his. In hunter's language that means, "We sure shot poorly"!
  A bit later in the morning I finally got my wish of a flock working into the decoys. I have wanted to show Dad the thrill of seeing those white birds circle and circle lower and lower. They seem to always be floating just out of gun range as they look over the decoys and blind.
  This time they decided to come right in.
  "Ok, let's get them," I said rising to shoot. I would shoot my side of the flock,  while Dad would shoot his side.
  Bang, bang, bang! We opened up on them. I expected to see geese raining out of the sky, but  typical snow goose hunting it seems I miss more than I hit. Dad was faring no better.
  One goose fell on my side and I stopped shooting.
  Bang! one last lone shot came from Dad's gun and a single goose fell out of the flock.
  I was surprised. Those birds were way out there when Dad hit it.
  I ran out and retrieved the birds.
  "Well, you got your first snow goose ," I informed Dad.
  He did his best to blame it on me.
  "I don't think I got that one," he said.
  "Well, unless my last shot took a long long time to reach the birds, you had to have hit that one. I was done shooting and it fell right when your gun went off," I explained to Dad.
  I could tell he was still not convinced.
  We hunted the rest of the day with little results, but that one flock had made it worth our day.
  At Dad and Mom's house I cleaned the two geese we had gotten. In my bird I found number 2 shot, and then in Dad's goose I found BB size shot, just what we each had been shooting.
  At nearly 96 years old my Dad had gotten his first snow goose.
  I am so thankful for the time I have with my Dad and Mom. I treasure each moment like this day.
  I am very blessed.
  And... way to go Dad!
 
                                          Dad with his first snow goose

Thieving Rascals

A new fisherman had joined our fleet of trollers. His name was Donnie.
  I must say here that Donnie passed away after a fierce battle with cancer some years ago. He would smile if he could read this today. No, he would have a beaming smile, wave his huge hands in a come here sign, and offer you a big chunk of cheese cut right off a big Costco block. With the cheese would come a hot cup of coffee and a very wonderful day of visiting. That was Donnie.
  He was a good friend of Wayne and myself, and also came from the tournament bass fishing world.
  The lure of Alaska proved too strong for Donnie and he retired from his business in the lower 48's and talked (conned) his wife into letting him purchase an old wooden troller. His boat was long and narrow and tended to roll a bit in the ocean, but Donnie didn't mind one bit. It added to the wildness of his new adventure.
  Donnie was so excited to get into salmon fishing. He had made many sport fishing trips to the Oregon coast and considered himself a fairly knowledgeable fisherman. Trolling was something different indeed.
  I had ran a small load of King Salmon to the fish buying plant in town, shoveled a ton of ice, cleaned the fish hold, re-iced, and fueled up.
  I now put-putted my way into the harbor and to my slip. Big Donnie was standing waiting for me to toss him a tie up line, a big smile on his face.
  Tomorrow I was going to lead him out for his first solo day of fishing on the wild North Pacific Ocean.
  "Hey Donnie!" I shouted out the wheel house door, "Are you ready for tomorrow?"
  He made a quick job of tying up my boat as I shut down the pumps, electronics, and engine.
  "Man, I can hardly wait!" his voice was almost shaking with excitement.
  As Donnie was speaking I looked past his head at a huge black Raven flying towards us.  It had something white in its beak.
  "Look at that Donnie," I said, "that raven has a marshmallow in its beak!"
  We both laughed at how funny it looked as it zoomed past us to land and eat its stolen booty
  Donnie and I stood chatting, leaning against the bow of my boat.
  Just then another raven came flying by with yet another marshmallow looking thing in its beak.
 "Ha, must be having a raven camp fire across the harbor," we joked with each other.
  It is not uncommon at all here in Sitka to see ravens flying around with food in their beaks. They are very bold and like to dig in trash all the time. We called them "Sidewalk Eagles".
  Here came another raven with white in its beak, then another...
    "I just did my grocery shopping," Donnie casually remarked, "so I'm ready for a week of fishing.
  It suddenly struck me.
  "Donnie, did you put your groceries inside the house of your boat?" I asked.
  "No, I laid them on my hatch cover to come help you tie up your boat," he casually said.
  I took off running for his boat, directly in the fly path of the ravens!
  I got to Donnie's boat ahead of him to find all of his groceries scattered on his hatch cover.
  "What the Hell?" exploded Donnie. Why those Thieving Rascals have gotten into everything!"
  Those "marshmallows" we had observed flying by were two dozen of his newly purchased eggs!
  We had only caught a few of the thieving rascals flying by. Most of them had been sitting happily on Donnie's boat eating the bounty of a new fisherman.
  "I can't believe it," Donnie sputtered, I left all my groceries in bags so they would be safe.
  "There is your mistake, my friend," I told him, "these Ravens have learned to dig open bags, and can do it so quickly that if you just turn your back they can sneak off with a slice of bread... or an egg!"
  After Donnie cooled down a bit he was able to laugh at himself. I don't think he ever made peace with the ravens of Sitka. He would go out of his way to make one fly if it were sitting minding its own business.
  His "thieving rascals" gave us hours of conversation and laughter in the summers to follow, as we fought off the boredom of trolling by ones self waiting for a salmon to bite a hook.
  We will always remember Big Donnie and his thieving rascals.

Bowling with a Boat

 It was the middle of the summer and a huge storm blew across the Gulf of Alaska forcing the commercial troll fleet to either take cover in some anchorage or race to town and tie to a dock. Most of the fleet opted for the town run and a nice time fellow shipping in town.
  The harbors were packed with boats and activity was non stop. Boats were being repaired, restocked with food, and even some trading deck hands for a fresh go the last half of the season.
  I had decided on making my storm tie up in the little board walk town of Pelican. By the time I arrived most of the good stalls were filled, but the harbor master found me a spot way on the inside and near the ramp, easy access to the store and gym. Not bad at all for me.
  When the entire fishing fleet is forced in at one time it jams the unloading at the one cold storage and a waiting list is made. When you are in sight of town you can then call the cold storage on the radio to get your boat name on the list. You then tie to the dock and just wait for your turn. When enough boats are in it can mean a wait of several days.
  Each boat unloads its catch of salmon, the deck hand then shovels the tons of dirty ice out of the fish hold into the ocean, then scrubs the hold completely, and tons of new ice is blown back into the clean hold.
  Most times the hold up in the unloading is in the clean up and re-icing. If things tend to drag tempers flare and things can get a bit ugly. This late in the season, and with the weather calling for days of blow, no one is in a hurry.
  I had gone to one of the town's two restaurants to eat a burger ( a $20 ordeal in the 80's), and then back to the boat to listen for my name to be called for unloading.
  I was pleasantly surprised to find live music on the dock as I neared my boat. A group of young people were playing guitars and singing. They were lined along the dock in a straight line to allow the fishermen to pass by. Near where they were playing and singing was an open slip. No one seemed to pay attention the reason for the open slip.
  I sat down to listen to the impromptu group, enjoying the rare entertainment. These youngsters were pretty good. Others were stopping to listen as well.
  Out of the corner of my eye I saw a huge troller approaching the empty slip. The boat was owned by a good friend of mine so I decided to put my things on my boat and then help him tie up once he got into his slip.
  The singing group was on the far side of the little dock just doing their thing.
  As the captain eased the huge boat into the slip he throttled back shifted from forward to neutral, then into reverse. As the bow of the boat was about five feet from the dock he throttled hard in reverse to bring the massive boat to a stop. The deck hands were ready to jump off with tie up lines.
  Instead of reverse, the massive boat lurched forward and drove straight into the dock. It was not going very fast but with tons and tons of weight it hit the dock like a battering ram.
  "Crash!"
  The singers and guitar players were mowed down like pulling a blanked out from under their feet!
 I could see it like slow motion as the entire group toppled over backwards.
  The big boat was still racing its engine and still in forward instead of reverse!
  The Captain quickly shut down the engine and the deck hand secured it tight with the tie up lines.
  The poor captain hopped off the boat and raced to the pile of singers. He was red in the face and apologizing profusely.
  It seems his boat used a hydrostatic shifter and a link in the line had chosen that moment to come apart.
  He had shifted the boat into reverse but the broken link kept the transmission in forward causing the boat to ram the dock.
  Everyone was laughing like crazy. No one had been inured, except the captain's pride.
  We all laughed about it for days to come.
  To me standing a bit away it looked like a boat bowling ball hitting a strike, knocking down every standing pin!

Christmas Alaska Style

Many years ago... I think either 1995 or 1996 I spent a Christmas to remember... Diving.
  Scott and I had teamed up diving for Abalone for the month of October. We met other divers who informed us that there were other options to keep us busy for most of the winter. Diving for Sea Cucumbers.
  During those years of Abalone diving, the season for Cucumbers did not open until the first of November and would go into January as the quota of harvest remained strong.
  It was mid December by the time the close to town quota was harvested forcing us to make a two day run from Sitka to a Bay on the far side of Chatham Straits, called Tebenkof. Scott was called by a friend just days before we left asking us to haul a complete camp of tents and other supplies as the dive group had no boat and planned on staying for a full month until the dive season closed. We ran with another friend and troller, Jay, who had a boat named the Lillian Ann.
  It was bitter cold and Jay talked us into hauling some old scraps of carpet with us. That would come in very handy we were to find out.
  Chatham Strait was unusually calm for our trip down and we made great time. We cruised into Tebenkof early in the afternoon the day before the opening. All our dive ares were on a Monday - Tuesday dive time.
  Scott and I were diving off an eighteen foot aluminum skiff that we towed behind Scott's big troller, the Elizabeth Ann. We had an old fisherman for our tender, Bill. Bill was in his seventies or eighties, strong as an ox and a mechanical genius. Anything that broke, Bill could figure out how to fix it. A real blessing to have on a dive operation.
  We anchored the Elizabeth Ann in a quiet bay and enjoyed a relaxing evening.
  To bed early in anticipation of a grueling hard day tomorrow.
  At about one or two in the night we woke up to a horrific sound. A grinding crushing sound of wood being ripped open.
  "We mush have dragged off anchor and are crashing into the beach!" on of us shouted as we bailed out of bed and fired up the boat spot light.
  No shore close, but what we saw was unbelievable. The bay had frozen over and the out going tide pulled all the solid ice right into our anchored boat.
  "Quick, get the skiff untied and break ice so it does not cut the wooden hull in half!" Scott shouted.
  Bill and I raced outside to biting cold. Back inside for more clothing and then to the skiff tied to the back of the boat.
  Scott had the Elizabeth Ann's engine fired up and was pulling anchor rope in as quickly as the winch would wind. He needed to get to the heavy chain before the ice sliced the poly line in two.
  Bill and I drove the skiff around the Elizabeth Ann to its bow and began weaving back and forth in front of the boat to break the huge bay of frozen ice racing to the helpless boat.
  Scott was quickly getting the carpet scraps tied to lines and hung over the side and into the water. The carpet would protect the wooden hull... if he could get it in place quickly enough.
  Back and forth, back and forth Bill and I ran the little metal boat grinding and breaking ice. It was a nasty sound to anyone who cares about boats and motors. We just hoped the ice would break before the thin aluminum hull. Throughout the early morning we would switch running the skiff to come inside and warm up.
  Darkness gave way to dawn at about eight thirty and we were still grinding away in the little skiff. Hands and feet were frozen, as was ears and noses, but we could not stop, our lives depended on us making this work.
  At daylight the last of the ice moved past us and we tied the skiff to the mother boat. Exhausted, we staggered into the warm house and fell into soft seats.
  "Well boys, Bill said, "Diving starts in about an hour so if you guys want to get into your dive suits, I'll rummage up something for breakfast.''
   Starting a six hour dive day totally exhausted is not the way to do things, but we had no choice... and we were young.
  Scott and I dove in that freezing cold water all day, and the next one as well. Sometimes Bill would have to use the skiff to break ice as it drifted towards our yellow dive hoses. He did not want a big slab of ice to cut our air hose and leave us on the bottom airless.
  We spoke to Jay while selling our catch at the tender. He too had found a bay full of ice, but had thought ahead and had his carpet hanging the night before. They were able to sleep through most of the grinding knowing that at least his hull was safe from cuts.
  The group that we hauled the tent for opted for staying on Jay's boat as it was much warmer than staying on the beach in a couple feet of snow in a tent.
  We Dove for a couple of weeks in Tebenkof before the quota was caught.
  Christmas morning found us tied to a dock at a little waterfall, hot springs place called Baranof Warm Springs.
  The snow was a few feet deep and blanketed the entire place. A huge waterfall plunged out of a high mountain lake in a boiling sheet of white water. Ice coated the edges of the falls making this Christmas morning one of the most beautiful any of us had ever seen.
  We soaked in some hot tubs we cleared of snow and filled with the natural running hot water. Talk about a great time.
  I found a small branch from a pine tree and made us a small Christmas Tree to put on the table of the boat. We shared a meal with Jay and the other divers. I think there were eight of us. All of us thanking the Good Lord for His blessings.
  It certainly was a Christmas to remember, Alaska style!

Shower Dance

  Commercial fishing has a certain poetic appeal to the outside world. The real story is much different to those brave enough to attempt to make a living chasing ocean fish.
  I lived on a small boat for seven years. The house living area would be about the size of a camper on a Volkswagen. Always damp, even with the stove going, I learned to stack my clothes and sleeping equipment out of the constant leaks developed by a wooden boat pounding daily on the North Pacific Ocean. Romantic... hardly! To bathe one had to heat a kettle of water on the diesel stove and pour into a pan to take a sponge bath, crude at best.
  The cold storage provides free showers and pay laundry facilities... and therein lies the problem. The two do not mix! The washing machines are next to the shower stalls and compete for the same water.
  I was fishing off Cross Sound and doing my fish selling, fuel, and grocery restocking in a small board walk town of Pelican.
  Here is on of the stories of the difficulty of just taking a shower after a full week of hard work and sweating.
  I made a turn-around in Pelican the other evening. It was a routine event in the line of delivering the fish and taking on new ice. Also routine was the practice of my dance steps.  I know you're wondering what dance steps a crusty ol' fisherman could possibly have... Let me tell you.  I call it the one legged, screeching, eyes shut shower dance. 
  It starts like this; After a week on the ocean I am very ready for a real shower. I love to stand and feel that first blast of warm water course down my  body. Invariable a big, "aaahhhh" escapes my lips, of its own account. It is hard to explain the feeling of a hot shower after a full week of sweat. Sometimes I would find myself laughing out loud at the great pleasure of hot water.
   I stand there and smile real big for a while.  As I start getting used to the water I begin cranking up the heat to steam the weariness out of my bones.  Shampoo in the hair and a bar of great smelling soap on one leg hiked up in the air.
  It is very difficult to stand on one leg after being on the sea for a week and doubly so with one's eyes closed. The motion of the ocean continues while on land.
  Then it happens. Some one outside must know all the pleasure I am feeling right now and decides to put a damper on it. They put a load of laundry in the washing machine.
  I have tried for years to tune my ears in to the sound of a coin feeder being pushed forward and released to spring back starting a load of wash. I still miss most of them.  
  Here I stand wobbling around in a small shower room, one leg in the air, shampoo running over my closed eyelids when suddenly all the hot water is sucked into a washing machine! 
  "oooohhhh! sshheeessshh! ugggghhh!" I stammer as I dance on one leg trying to get out of the stream of glacier fed cold water.  I reach back and crank the hot water up to a tolerable luke warm to rinse the soap suds off me.
  I stand there trembling watching the goose bumps slowly recede to the size of oranges. 
  Alright, now I've been warned. I know there is a washer in operation.
  The tricky part of the shower is now underway.  I must time the water temperature fluctuation in order to finish this fine shower. 
  Even with that knowledge,I get lulled into a false sense of security. I forget.  
  I shampoo the hair again and begin soaping the other leg. 
  POW!
  "Iiiieeee!" I shriek as the now warm water turns scalding hot.
  I dance around in the shower room banging off walls in an attempt at keeping some hide left un-scalded.  The washing machine just went to cold water rinse. 
  "ouch, ouch, oweeee!" I mutter as I start adjusting the water to a once again luke warm temperature. 
  I give up on trying for another shampoo. I'll just stand here and enjoy the water.  The machine now goes into the spin cycle blasting little bursts of hot or cold water. 
  I dance around the shower until at last I am weary from all the dancing and water adjusting. 
  Back in my clothes I open the door and step out of the shower room to see a guy sitting on a washing machine reading a book. He looks up and smiles. "Wonderful shower, huh? he asks. 
  "Bah!" I reply as I walk back to the boat.  "What's wrong with that grumpy guy?" I hear him mutter as I walk out of earshot.

Dinner and a Movie, Ocean Style

  I'm recovering from yet another eye surgery, so thought I'd go back into some of my earlier years of commercial fishing to recall a story or two.
  I know my mind is as sharp as a tack... ok, maybe as sharp as the top of a large globe! I guess what I'm saying is that some of the details may be a bit fuzzy or not quite as accurate as when it happened.
  I was talking to my buddy Scott, who is in many of my writings. He informed me that when I write about him he has a hard time remembering it the same way I write it.
  "Was I really there?" he asks me.
  "Of course you were. You are the star of the story," I tell him.  "I may embellish a few things just to keep the story exciting. Our normal boring lives would not impress many people."
  Scott and I were commercial fishing late in August. It had been a long season and we had pounded day after day 19 to 20 hours each day. Scott owned and operated a beautiful boat named the Elizabeth Ann. she was a large horse shoe sterned 43 foot wooden vessel that had plied the Alaskan waters for many years.
  I owned and was fishing off a smaller 36 foot double ended troller named the Col. Lindy.
  If I remember right we were fishing off Cape Spenser. The Silver Salmon run was tapering down a bit on the open ocean but we were dragging our hooks from dark to dark hoping to land on the mother lode and fill the fish holds.
  Day after day we would pass each other as we fished. We would pause fishing to wave at each other. Our radio traffic was constant as we broke the daily boredom chatting about anything we could think of. Growing up in the same area and even attending the same high school gave us many topics to chat about.
  "one two, one two, Scotty are you there," I spoke into the radio mic.
  "Hey, I've got you," came the static voice over my scrambled radio.
  We had purchased voice scrambled radios so we could speak freely without the entire fleet hearing what was being said. The big trick of commercial fishing was to try and break other groups scramble code so you could listen in and get fish numbers without them knowing. Scott and I were not "High liner" boats so we doubted that anyone else really cared where we fished and what we caught, but it was still nice to know most of the fleet could not hear your conversations.
  "I've got a couple of steaks for supper tonight," I told Scott. "If we could figure a way to get together we could have a nice dinner."
  "I've got a good movie from my last turn around in town that we could watch," came his reply over the radio.
  We had been fishing hard all day and then just shutting our boats down and drifting at night. It saves the fuel of running a few hours to the shore and picking ones way into an anchorage by radar and spot lights. You then have to wake up in the dark to make your run back out to the fishing grounds early the next morning.
  "It is a beautiful ocean, maybe I could pull in close and you could jump on my boat for a meal and a movie," Scott planted an idea in both of our minds.
  We fished until the ocean was gobbling the sun in darkness before Scott brought up the crazy plan again.
  "You still up for dinner and a movie?" he asked over the radio.
  "Wow, thought you were kidding," I replied back. "Just how is this going to work?"
  We had both pulled our fishing gear but our 40 foot long poles with stabilizers were sprouting off the sides of both of our boats. When we tie together in an anchorage we would both pull a pole so we could lash the two boats together for the night. It takes very calm water to keep a couple of twenty ton vessels from grinding and crashing each other to pieces.
  "I think I could come up behind you, nose the Elizabeth Ann to your stern, you could hop aboard and I could back away," Scott planned.
  There was a large gentle swell running on the ocean that evening. A large swell would bring our boats into a very tricky situation. If Scott came in too close his bow could raise over my stern and crush my smaller boat. If my stern came up hard under his bow it could rip a gaping hole in his bow planks.
  "I guess we can set it up and see how it looks," I said with just a bit of doubt in my voice.
  I grabbed my steaks and moved to the stern of my now drifting boat. Scott edged the big Elizabeth Ann in close. The mild swells now looked like roaring waves smashing things to bits in my mind.
  I stood on the back of my boat under a cover called a hay rack. As Scott's boat neared I had to look up to see the top of his bow rail. I would be crushed in between his bow and my hay rack.
  I raced back in to my radio. "Not going to work. Your bow it to tall for the hay rack," I told Scott.
  "How about standing on your hay rack?" Scott questioned back.
  The playing field just got substantially more tricky. One thing to stand on the deck of a rolling boat, another to stand on the top of a flat roof on a rolling boat.
  I climbed up the hay rack moving my buoys, shrimp and crab pots, and other items stored out of the way up there. I tried to stand but learned quickly it was just not secure enough footing. Wow, this was going to be tricky!
  Scott once again maneuvered the big Elizabeth Ann in close. The bow of his boat and stern of my boat were not at all in sync. My stern would rise up while his bow dropped deep in the swell. We would have to have perfect timing to pull this off.
  The swells leveled just a bit and Scott throttled forward, as his bow and my stern evened out I jumped!
  I could hear Scott full throttle reverse as I left the hay rack of the Col. Lindy. I landed in the center of his bow deck and rolled onto my knees. I jumped up to see if we were clearing my stern. The tall bow of the Elizabeth Ann slowly backed away from my stern.
  We did it!
  I watched my boat grow smaller in the distance with just a little drifting mast light glowing in the darkness. My boat was now up for official ocean salvage. Once you abandon a boat on the ocean, the first one to come upon it can claim salvage rights. Not a good feeling at all to think about that.
  Scott drove us quite a distance from my drifting boat to make sure we did not drift into it as we watched the movie.
  We fired up the barbecue and had the steaks sizzling in no time.
  We shared a great steak dinner while watching a movie on the high seas of Alaska. When you have not had contact with a real person for days and days, it is just nice to be able to carry on a conversation without keying a radio mic. We visited into the pitch black of the night.
  "Well, I'd better get back to my boat for the night," I told Scott.
  We turned on his radar and waited for it to warm up. He adjusted the distance to a half mile. No blips on the screen. One mile. Still no sign of my boat. I was looking out the windows with Scott's binoculars and could not pick up my anchor light at all.
  We had lost my boat on a huge ocean!
  Scott cranked up the distance on his radar again. Three miles. The sweep went in a complete circle. No blip to indicate a boat. Unbelievable!
  The radar was completing its second sweep when a tiny blip showed up.
  "There! Is that my boat?" I asked.
  Scott brought the bow of the Elizabeth Ann around to point in the direction of the blip on the radar. I kept scanning the horizon with binoculars. We cruised a bit before the light of my boat became visible to us.
  "Whew," I let out a big sigh, "I sure am glad to find my boat again."
  Scott motored his boat to my stern again. Once again we played the fragile game of bumper boats. With perfect timing of waves and boat control, I was able to make the jump from Scott's bow to the top of my hay rack.
  "Hey we did it!" I exclaimed to Scott, over the radio. " Thanks for the dinner and the movie!"
  I fired up my boat and slowly gave distance between our two boats.
  "Happy drifting," we both told each other as we shut down our boats for a night of drifting sleep on the wild North Pacific Ocean.