Diving for South East Alaska "Gold"

  I look at the weather report; Storm warnings. Winds 45 knots gusting to 60 knots in coastal areas, One hundred percent chance of rain, with up to one inch in twelve hours!
  It must be dive season.
  Last Monday and Tuesday was the opening of the South East Alaska Sea Cucumber season, or as some of us divers refer to them... Gold!
  It is money laying on the bottom of the ocean. All one has to do is swim past and pick it up.... Simple enough... Yeah, right.
  Mike and I met at the store next door at 5:00 am for coffee and doughnuts. After eating, we headed to the boat and off to our local dive area.
  I have not really been excited for this dive season. The cold water, stormy weather, and last year's rock crash episode has tainted me a bit.
  We made the half hour run to our dive area and began getting the boat ready. All the dive gear was stowed and packed from last year, and we had been running the mountains for the past week deer hunting instead of getting the boat ready.
  I wriggled my way into my woollies and dry suit as Mike scrambled to get the boat set up. Surprisingly enough, we were both ready at 8:05, just five minutes past the opening time.
  I slid off the back of the boat and into the biting cold water. Yes, I have forgotten how cold this water is from last year. My forehead felt like eating ice cream too quickly, my lips burned, and my hands numbed almost instantly. Oh the sweet feeling of diving for cucumber gold in Alaska.
  I found cucumbers instantly and began filling my bag, as I worked I could feel the cold trickle of water on my right arm. My thought goes to dry suit diving.
  Dry suit. Ha! Only those who have not worked under water in a dry suit could believe that a dry suit keeps you dry. Wearing a dry suit sure helps with keeping cold water away from your body, but throughout a day of hard diving and picking cucumbers you move your hands and flex your wrist enough the little burps of air escape and at the same time, burps of ice water enter your wrist. As you unroll a float to the surface when the bag is filled with cucumbers you will have a burst of cold water enter your neck seal as well. Over the course of an 8 hour day you will come up with your arms soaked and your chest wet with ice cold pacific ocean water.
  The cold water I was feeling on my arm was not coming in through my wrist seal, but rather from my zipper area.... it felt like.
  I had had the same soaking last season and sent my dry suit to a dive shop in another town in South East Alaska with the instructions that I was getting soaked down my right side. "It might be the zipper, or some where else," I told the lady over the phone. "Please check it out and get it repaired."
  "No problem, I'll have it right back to you," was her reply.
  Three months later I got the dive suit back and hung it in the closet for this dive year.
  Ah... the wonderful feeling of a flooding dry suit.
  I dove for a couple hours and could feel the water sloshing in my right arm. Cold was creeping into my whole body.
  I made my way to the surface and handed Mike a bag of cucumber "Gold".
  "Man, I'm freezing I told him. I've got to warm up a bit.."
  "If your too cold let's just call the dive day and head back to town," Mike said making sure he was not pressuring me to earn him more money and in doing so endanger myself.
  "Thanks, but I think I'm good for one more dive," I told him.
  After a brief warm up I headed back to the bottom. I was working at a depth of 30 to 50 feet. The deeper I would dive the more water would squeeze into my suit.
  It only took a few minutes down this time and both of my legs cramped tight with charlie horses.
 I dragged myself along on the bottom with my arms, my useless legs locked tight in throbbing cramps. After some time the cramps subsided enough to allow me to use my swim fins, and I carefully finned my way along the bottom.
  A half hour and I was back to the surface. "No can do!" I shouted over the roar of the hookah and the hauler motors. "I'm soaked into my right leg and cramping like crazy."
  Mike shut down the machines as I wriggled out of my dry suit. Water poured out of my sopping wet sleeves and my right leg. Great repair job on my suit, dive shop!
  I did get into my back up suit and made another hour dive before freezing completely out.
  Mike and I were the first boat at the tender. He asked if I timed out on my decompression time. Nope. Going back out after you sell? Nope.
  "I'm old, wore out, and freezing cold," I told the guy. "We are selling our catch and heading home."
  I grabbed the check out of the envelope from the processor and could only stare at the numbers. Gold. For sure these cucumbers are like picking gold.
  Now I'm sitting here watching this 60 knot storm blow through and thinking of my dive day tomorrow. No one in their right mind would go out in storm force winds to jump into freezing cold water... unless there was the glitter of gold!
  Oh, I did air up my dry suit and find a dime size ware spot under my right arm. It was not the zipper at all, just a tad bit of fix it glue and no more leak.  Oh well, only a few hundred dollars to some dive shop for nothing.... What is a few hundred to a gold harvester?

         Mike working a bag of Cucumbers... "Gold!"

New Puppy

 I have a new character to introduce you to. She is just a little over 12 pounds, brown, fury, cute as a bug, but naughty as a puppy can be.
  She is a little 9 week old lab puppy. We have named her Halibut or Hali for short.
  I made a quick trip to Eastern Idaho with my parents to pick up the puppy. After flying out of Alaska to Idaho, I found the drive to be a bit long. A five hour drive to Eastern Idaho near the Wyoming border.
  Hali was not very impressed and made my dad's ride back home a bit unsettled. She wriggled, climbed, howled, and chewed on dad for nearly the full five hours. Dad's comment was, "This puppy sure has a strong main spring".
  I have watched the breeder's web sight for over a year trying to time a litter of puppies for the small window of time I have between my summer guiding and my winter diving.
  "We have a litter of chocolate puppies just born last night," the breeder told me when I contacted him. "I'll keep first pick of litter for myself but give you next in line," he informed me. I quickly sent him a deposit and the matter was settled.
  Now the work has begun. House training a new high energy puppy. I am sure it thinks its name is "NO!"
  This puppy is very high strung. We asked the breeder to make sure our puppy would make a great house dog, friend, as well as a good companion for our two other dogs.
  She does not want to be held at all, sleeps by herself across the room from my wife or I, and the other two dogs.
  She walked into the house and immediately dominated our 12 year old lab, Jaz. She tried to take on the boxer, Mav but we were encouraging him to stand his ground. This cute little puppy ran both of the old dogs up onto the couch for the first day.
  I took little Hali out for her evening potty time to find the neighbor's two dominate poodles racing at us barking like they always do. In just a minute this cute little lab puppy had them both pinned under my truck cowering in fear. Their owner came to their rescue, but we both shook our heads at the nice little, supposed to be mild 8 week old lab dominating these two seasoned dogs. Hmm.... makes me wonder what we signed up for.
  We texted the breeder kind of jabbing that he pawned off the alpha female onto us and he claimed he had two other females in the litter who were the alpha dogs.
  "At least you won't have to worry about some other dog taking a duck out of her mouth when she is old enough to hunt," my wife consoled me. I gave her a quirky little smile, thinking of all the bloody battles I might have to break up if another dog even gets close to us.
  The names I quickly though of for the new puppy... Tasmanian Devil, Killer, Satan. Then Shark, Killer Whale, or Snapping Turtle... just to name a few.
  My wife and daughter came with a little more reason and her name was to be Sweet Pea, Mild Jill, or some such.. Ha! Nice try.
  After three days we settled on Halibut. We wanted something with a good Alaska slant to it. Seeing this little puppy flop around on the floor sure looks like a halibut flopping around on deck.
  Hali is a very smart little dog. She learned to sit in less than an hour, lay down in about the same amount of time. In two days she has not touched most of the household items we have told her "No" to. I am amazed at how quickly she learns.
  Hali has settled in with our other two dogs as well. She and Mav wrestle for hours each day, and he will let her know when she is getting too bossy. It is nice having a dog do the correcting instead of us. We go for long walks and she is doing very good. she has no fear and we have to watch that she doesn't jump off cliffs or into deep water. Her brown coat blends with the forest floor and makes spotting her nearly impossible so we have to keep continual eyes on her. She does not seem to mind taking off by herself and expects us to come find her.
  I can tell this will be a very independent dog. She is going to be strong willed, but I can already tell this will probably be my best hunting dog of my life so far.
  If I can learn to train her, she will be incredibly. Jaz has been so good and so easy to train. Hali will be hard to train, but should become the best dog ever.
  So.... wish me luck. Here we go on a 12 year roller coaster ride of dog training.
  "by the way dear..." I'm looking at my wife,  "where is that add for the shock collar?"


                                          Halibut  "Hali"

                                             Hali with the two big dogs chased onto the couch

2015 Summer Guiding Review

 I have just finished one of the longest, toughest, but probably the most rewarding of all summer guiding seasons.
  We battled the ocean like never before.
  At the start of the season we had weeks of north west winds blasting us with 20 knots or more daily. In town, it was beautiful hot and sunny. The ocean, on the other hand, was rough, windy, and foggy cold.
  El nino was working its magic. Warm water flooded the North Pacific Ocean. Our cold water fish reacted in strange ways. They spread out and moved deep. Only on heavy rain days would the fish school up like normal years.
  Jelly fish moved in clouding the ocean in heavy slime. The salmon would have to position themselves either above or below the mass of stinging tentacles.
  It seemed the only normal was our halibut fishing. The halibut were thick and hungry day after day.
  On storm days we usually duck in behind islands and catch salmon. Not to be this year. The warmer water kept the fish out on open ocean, away from the reach of our storm day efforts.
  Year after year we have pounded the fish around Sitka with results non failing... until this summer. Clients who have been here for the past ten to twenty years found this unacceptable, blaming us as guides, for not finding fish every day. Nasty storm days was unacceptable for not filling out limits of fish. We found ourselves pushing weather we have never fished through. Late in the grinding season we fished on the edge of our safety, pushing our little boats to the limits of their design. I have to tip my hat to the skills of the guides in piloting our boats through such dangerous water and bringing clients back to the dock each day.
  Some lodges opted to burn fuel to find fish in calm water. They would make runs of three to four hours one way to catch a hand full of salmon. Hundreds of gallons of fuel burned for just a tad bit of fish. I think I would have offered to park the boat and use fuel money to purchase more fish, but I guess the experience is part of the trip.
  August found swarms of blue sharks moving into our area. Normally, they come through for a week or two, this summer they hovered around for more than a month. Many of our silver salmon and last kings came aboard with huge shark bite gashes on them.
  We would have to clean our salmon in ares where we did not halibut fish, wash out every bit of blood, and pour bleach in the bilge of the boat once anchored. We would get one free drop of halibut bait, after that it was like playing shark Russian roulette to get bait to the bottom before the blues bit it off.
  Many of our halibut came up with shark bite marks.
  Those who got careless with the blood draining out of the boat and into the ocean would be bitten off so many times that it would end the day of halibut fishing.
  All of the above was mixed with constantly swirling winds. One day it would blow 20 NW, then next day would be calm, only to ramp up the following day with SE 25. Around and around the winds chased themselves all summer. It made us guides nervous to even click on the weather link. One calm day would make us gun shy for the next day, knowing it would probably be blowing.
  Day after day, week after week, and then month after month the grind wore down the guides. By mid August we were zombies walking around in a daze. We performed our duties, to collapse at home in weariness. I could hear the numbness in the radio conversations, sometimes talking but not making sense.
  We smiled at the nasty jabs of clients unhappy with fishing conditions or lack of fish, we dodged the commercial fleet who were also struggling and looking for someone to take out their frustrations.
  We made it. We can hang up our hats with pride. We pushed through the toughest season on record and did our best.
  I'm glad it is over.
                                            shark bit halibut

                                           client with a blue shark

Mid Season Grind

  I rolled another page on my log book. Day 76.
  My hands are swollen, my arms are sore, I'm getting out of a chair like an old duffer. I seem to be sore all over my body.
  The guides are walking around like zombies. We greet each other with hollow eyes and smiles that just don't reach into the eyes.
  I've had three days off since starting on the 15th of May, it is now the first of August. A typical "day off" means you haul the boat out of the water, pressure wash the bottom, change the engine oil, change the lower unit oil, repair anything that is not function properly, like downriggers, reels, wash down pumps on the boat... the list seems endless. Of course, there is also a list of projects at home that need attention.
  I raced into the hardware store for some parts and was greeted by Joann, "Hey Earl, a day off?"
  "You got it," I replied sagging against the counter in exhaustion.
  "Hey Joann, do you come back into the store here on your day off to fix the computer and stock shelves?" I asked.
  She shot me a look that would have taken my head off but I was sagging so low it went right over me.
  "Ha! she snorted, "this is the last place I come to on my day off!"
  "Yeah, I thought so," I mumbled, grabbing my bag of parts and heading back into the rain to go fix the boat on my day off.
  We are in the mid season grind. Half the summer behind us and still facing half a summer to go.  I tell the new guides, "When you feel the most tired, you have to be the toughest!"
  I was heading to the fuel dock the other evening and passed a Bering Sea crab boat. The crabbers leave the deadly waters of the Bering sea each summer to pack fish for the commercial salmon fleet.
  We see some of the boats in Sitka that you see on the Deadliest Catch.
  This beautiful crab boat named the Handler looked so calm and peaceful tied to the dock, but I know the brutal danger they face each winter.
  I idled past and could see some writing on the side of the wheel house. I grabbed my binoculars to read this little quote:
  "The only easy day was yesterday" - Handler
  I chewed over that little saying for some days. I even read it to my wife.
  I have been through some very tough times, having a fish hook take the sight from my eye, crashing my boat onto a rock, and just the grind of trying to finish a fishing season. Running on empty day after day.
  The mindset of that crab boat, my easiest day might have been yesterday. I know each day is a battle with the wind and the ocean. Jelly fish is swarming our waters, and fish seem very hard to find. Clients relentlessly push for more and more, all of my equipment seems to fail around this time of the season due to daily abuse, and the endless rain that never seems to stop driving into your very being.
  Yes, it is the mid season grind. I know I will make it. I just need to toughen up a bit. When I am the most tired, I need to be the strongest.

"The only easy day was Yesterday"  thank you, Handler

Warm Water Brings Strangeness to Alaska Waters

South East Alaska is heading into another El Nino summer.
  I can remember years ago when the big warm El Nino hit and all the strange fish showed up with the warm water.
  Yesterday is the first day for me to start seeing the new El Nino strange fish begin showing.
  July first, the commercial salmon boats swarmed the ocean to share the harvest with the charter and sport boats. As far as we could see troll poles dotted the horizon in all directions.
  "I think I'll just start outside the main troll drag and try not to get us ran over," I told the clients, as I throttled back the big outboards and began dropping troll lines.
  The Silver Salmon were hungry but not around in great numbers. We caught a few, but the little Pink Salmon (Humpies) started driving us crazy. Each time I put the lines down the tip of the rod started jiggling.
  "Bite.... get ready... as soon as the line snaps out of the down rigger clip start reeling," I encouraged the clients who were alread poised at the ready. No snap... another humpie.
  "Ok, give it a tug to help the humpie," I kept repeating over and over. "Hey, at least we have fresh halibut bait."
  Humpeis are a soft meat fish and not desired by the clients to eat. Once frozen and thawed they become very mushy. When the airlines are charging for each fish box flown it is not worth the money to crowd out better fish with humpie meat.
  I throttled the kicker motor back and saw one of the lines snap out of the down rigger clip.
  "Fish on! get it, get it, get it!" I shouted.
  The client raced to the rod and started reeling. When the slack was taken up I was looking for the signs of a silver Salmon racing for the surface and pulling harder than a humpie.
  Not to be.
  "It looks like another humpie," I said to the groan of all four clients.
  I put the net back on the boat and readied the gaff hook to release the humpie.
  "What in the world?" I exclaimed as I saw a strange form coming up on the hook.
  It was not silver at all like the salmon we catch ever day.  I held the line to see if it were a big wad of kelp or jelly fish.
  "It's a fish," I said as I hoisted it on board.
  "Oh cool! It's a Pompano!" I shouted.
  The clients just stood looking at the strange fish lying on the deck.
  "I have not seen a Pompano since the years ago El Nino," I informed them.
  We laid it on deck and took many pictures of it.
  Back home I looked it up on line to find that it is a Pacific Pompano that is found along the coast of Baja California and the lower two-thirds of the Sea of Cortez.
  I guess this little guy was a bit lost!  He made his grand voyage all the way to the coast of South East Alaska only to bite the hook of someone looking for Salmon.
  I'm sure we will start catching more of them as the water continues on its overly warm course.
  The Jelly fish are thick just like the last time the water warmed like this, and the salmon seem more difficult to catch as they hug the bottom looking for their preferred cooler waters.
  In spite of the warmer temperatures we are still managing to catch our fish each day.
  I'll keep you posted if we find other such creatures roaming about.

                                                 Pacific Pompano

                                      The clients with a mornings catch                   

Flatlanders Go Fishing

  It is hard for me to get my mind around the fact that another season is upon me. Not Christmas, but rather, guiding season.
l  I invited my brother, Gary, his youngest son, Luke, a long time friend, Ivak, his son, Colton, and Jimmy.  This sounds more like a goose hunt in Idaho to me, but the entire goose gang sauntered off the plane into the Sitka airport.
  For some reason, the sun decided to grace these guys nearly the entire time they were here. I kept hearing, "Thought you said it rained all the time here."  No matter, we made the best of the miserable sunny weather and fished anyway.
  Luke and Colton had never been on the ocean so this was going to be the testing grounds to see if they were real fishermen material.
  Their dads insisted on having them wear the ear patch for seasickness... claiming the old adage, "better safe than sorry." Only one of the boys did his best to disprove the working of the patch and "chummed" briefly the first day.  Hey, I've seen seasoned commercial fishermen spend much more time than that over the rail.
  The week before the boys arrived the king salmon fishing had been heating up. I was excited but of course in the two days before their arrival that batch of kings started thinning out. With no rain in the forecast it did not look good for new fish to move into my favorite fishing areas.
  I read the weather forecast to the group that first evening: "Gale warnings, North West winds to 35 knots seas 8 feet. The next day: "Small craft warnings due to seas. South East winds 25 knots seas building to 10 feet"
  "Doesn't look good boys," I kept repeating each time I looked at my Ipad.  I kept hoping that if I looked every five minutes I would find a different forecast, but nope, same words every time.
  I had just mounted two new motors on the boat and this was going to be our break in fishing trip. I was going to get to see what the new motors would do in nasty ocean. Oh boy!
  We headed out of the harbor at 5:30 am and not a breeze could be found.
  "We will go out as far as the weather will let us," I informed the boys as we motored past the end of the airport.
  We passed Vitskari Rocks, Bird Island, and then found ourselves at the Cape with still no wind.
  Good ol' weather man missed again, but fortunately for us, missed with calm winds.
  The first morning we worked hard for just a couple of kings. I really was intent on getting the two boys their first King Salmon.  By noon we had at least accomplished that. Of course the dads sat with trembling chins and teared up eyes hoping for a fish of their own. (Ok, I just made that up, but that's probably what they were thinking inside, even though they pasted smiles on their faces).
  Late in the day we raced off to a far out halibut area. This is a place I only fish when the ocean is calm and the waves look friendly.
  As soon as the halibut lines hit the bottom the boys started bring up bottom fish. Yellow Eye Rock Fish. Ling Cod, mouths large enough to swallow a basketball, and finally some halibut started trickling in. Ling season does not open until later in the year so it was catch and release on those.
  We fished hard and made it back to the dock at about 5:30 that evening. A long day for flatlanders and an old wore out charter captain.
  After a quick stop by the cleaning dock we made home for hot showers and a nice supper my wife had cooked up.
  All the guys were nodding off in their chairs by nine, so it was off to dream land and only two days left of fishing.

Luke with his first King Salmon

 

                  The boys after the first day fishing Luke and Colton with first Kings

Part 2 of Mayday

"I'll Keep coming your way until I know you are safe," he replies back.
  "Thanks so much," I quickly reply.
  My second engine roars to life!
  I throttle it forward and it causes the boat to jump forward.
  We are under both engine power!
  "Mike, I'm going to try and get on step. Keep a close look in the fish holds to see if we start taking on water," I shout to Mike.
  The boat jumps out of the water just like normal and we are on plane!
  "Looks good back here," Mike yells above the noise of the outboards, especially the one without the cover.
  "Juneau Coast Guard, Samantha," I say into the radio.
  "Go ahead Samantha."
  "We are now running on both motors and are on plane. We can see no water coming on board, so we will attempt to run back to Sitka."
  "Roger that Samantha."
  I call the crabber and let him know we are leaving the area and thank him again for his willingness to help out.
  "Good luck," he says.
  Another boat has now pulled along side of us and informs us he is running back to town right now and will follow us all the way to make sure we make it alright. Coast Guard Juneau affirms that they also heard the offer.
  "Slow down a bit and let the bow come up," he asks over the radio, "I"ll make a circle around you and have one of my guys look the bottom of your boat over with binoculars."
  I slow so the bow of the boat is lifted high. The Samaritan boat cruises in a slow circle around us. I can see a couple of his guys looking us over with binoculars.
  "Looks good, Samantha," he says. "Lots of gouges, scrapes, and scratches, but we see no holes."
  About an hour and a half later Mike and I wave goodbye to our escort boat and idle into our home harbor.
  We tie the boat to the dock. I call the Coast guard and inform them that we have made it back and are in good shape.
  I race to the truck, race through town, hook up my trailer and then back to the harbor. I breath a huge sigh of relief when the boat slides onto the trailer. We have officially made it.
  We haul the boat out and examine the bottom. It is roughed up quite a bit. There are some deep gouges in some areas but I am very impressed with the fact that no rock penetrated through the hull. I whisper a prayer of thanks to the boat manufacture for building a very sturdy boat.
  To stop that many tons of boat, traveling 20 plus knots on a pile of rocks, have it thrash around in waves and wind for quite some time, and not puncture the hull is incredible.
  Mike and I also are amazed that the engines were both able to run. At the dock I could not get one of the engines to shift once it stopped. It would not restart or shift again.
  We are so thankful for all those involved in helping us. Even just voices over the radio. All helped us in more ways than they will ever know.
  Now we have to pick up the pieces and see about a rebuild. Not in the plans this winter, but something that will have to be handled. 
  The above was written the day after the crash. It is now April. After a long winter of rebuilding, the boat is once again in top shape. The local fiberglass repair man did an incredible job.
  The fuel tank had to be removed and the bottom of the boat cut out. He had to replace stringers as well as just bottom repair.
  Right now the boat is sitting in the outboard motor shop getting a brand new pair of Yamaha motors.
  It has been a long stressful winter, but spring is here and the fishing season upon me.
  We will survive, we are thankful for the fact that no one was injured in the crash.  There was just enough water to bring the boat to a sliding (Ok, maybe a crunching, bumping, grinding stop) but just an hour more of tide and we would have cleared the rock completely.
  It has been an eye opener for me as I share my story around town, to learn how many people have also crashed boats into rocks. The resounding words I hear is, "If you run a boat long enough up here... You WILL hit a rock!"
  I hope and pray that I have gotten all of my misadventures out of my system.  I'm ready to just work hard, earn money, and buy beans for the rest of my working life!
  Hey, this is Wild Alaska so you just don't know...
  I'll keep you posted.

                                          repairing the bottom of the boat

                                          the motor damage.. just the skaggs.