I am a fisherman.

The season has started. Last Friday was the first day of regular season and we hit it hard. Pulled in 10,000 lbs in 18 straight hours of fishing. Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday were pretty much the same with less fish but we are at 26,000 as of Wednesday. I finally got some sleep last night after pretty much fishing around the clock. I am tired but we are doing well and the sleep helped. A closure tonight means we will probably do pretty well tomorrow and possibly hit our goal of forty thousand by the weekend. Hands are thrashed and my back is sore. The weather turned from sun to cold and gray on Tuesday. I am always thinking of thing to say when I am on the boat but I can't remember them all now. We havent been able to get the internet up at the cabin and I don't know if that project is canned or not. The power roller on my boat went down within five minutes of starting it and it won't start again. Otherwise things have been good and I should be sending fish down soon.

Pins and Needles

We are waiting with great expectations of a lot of salmon coming in soon. I picked up Micheal Perry my third crew member today and the boat should be finished tonight. Subsistence nets have been catching sockeye and beluga have been sighted all over. Even when you get out of the boat you can feel them hit your legs. It will be soon.

Internet Issues

In this town there are only a two places where you can use the internet. The university extension and the library. The university password protected theirs two days ago and so now all the cannery workers and fishermen are crammed into the small library and using what once was a medium fast connection. Needless to say it has become super slow to the point that uploading pictures to the blog is impossible. Hopefully we will have something at the cabin although this is never been attempted before that I know of in the bay so if it works I'll be surprised and very happy. For now I will try to type this blog and you will eventually get a bunch of photos that are not as timely.

Mug-up

So there is such a thing as free lunch in this mythical land of igloos and northern lights and midnight sun. A long standing tradition in this hard working town is "mug up" which began in the early years of the canneries. In those days the cannery would have hot coffee and sometimes donuts for the fishermen. Now it is a break for the cannery workers that the fisher-peoples are invited to as well. there are generally three a day at the standard break times 10am, 3pm, and 9pm. Coffee and pastries are standard as well as juice and sometimes there are other things offered as well. A few days ago there was fish and chips and what one worker called a McYukkie; essentially breaded fish fillet with american cheese and a seeded bun. It is a good time to socialize with other fishermen and cannery people. A wonderful tradition.

Eric is Downloading!

Home Sweet Home

Dillingham Tractor Pull

Talking about the weather.

The storm broke yesterday. I went to the harbor and looked out at the bay, the water was glass absolutely flat, not even a ripple of a breeze disturbing its placidity. Hard to believe that the day before all kinds of raging winds were whipping it up. An unmanned skiff was lost and it was not much fun in the boatyard. Hard to maintain any motivation to sit in the boat and install electronics or work on uncooperative engine components.
Today is an entirely different scene. Big white fluffy clouds and golden rays of sunshine even as I write this at 10:15. How did I get to be so lucky? It is amazing. anyone want to come up and see this? Marc? Mike?
I guess its lame to talk about the weather but up here the natural world is what makes up your days, not people. It is much less predictable and much more powerful.

Alaskan Car Phone

I really don't know what to say about this.
I mean it works.
But I think its hilarious.
Retro-Phone by MagicJack.

How much is a cheeseburger in paradise?

$13.45 to be exact. Want fries with that? Gardenburgers 15.45 A milkshake you guessed it five dollars. A five dollar milkshake? That better be a D__ Good milkshake. (well actually its a seven dollar milkshake, but don't tell john travolta because he'll fly here with a bunch of scientologists and I'll never hear the end of it.)

And this is why.

That bolt was a lot longer when I took it out. there is such a thing as to tight.

I did it twice, in the rain.

Captains Dinner

Pictures from the Captains dinner. First one is my dad, second one is the Peter Pan messhall full of fisherman, third is Yvonne the CFO at Dilly, Travis from the boatyard, Tom the Plant Manager, and Oly Olsen character/fisherman. The third is Iso and the Lovely Office Girls. Appetizers were Shrimp, Snow Crab, Wings, Taquitos, Chips and Guac! Dinner was Prime Rib, King Salmon, and Split Chicken. With All the Fixins. Quite a spread and a good time to see everyone.

Yup Living the Dream

Need I say more?

The Boatyard

Here is an photo of a photo from above the boatyard. Make sense? Our containers and boats are in the upper left corner of the yard. By the two blue roofed buildings. The cannery is to the left and the harbor is to the right past the road. you can barely see a few boats on the mooring. The various colored lines next to that are internet cables in the boatyard office where the photo currently is displayed.

This is more like it.

The first storm of the season blew in last night with 40 mph gusts and enough rain to make it feel like home, PDX, so don't feel jealous. Needless to say if you don't have to make a crossing, don't. So we didn't make it to the cabin today either. More posts for all of you. Yeah looking at these pictures from the beach by the cannery it doesn't look to bad but, when you get in the middle of the bay it gets a little bit dicey.

Can you spot the Palin?

This is a wall about native values that the school kids contributed a tile a piece. Figured all you contiguous states people would like this. Its on the wall of the grocery store in town.

Subsistence nets

So what you're looking at here are the subsistence (non-commercial food only) nets for the townspeople. Some of these caught a few kings. These are located below the bluffs in front of town.

Things that happened today.

Earthquake!
There was a 4.?? earthquake in egegik that shook the boatyard knocking a few things down and causing some cracks in the dried mud. No tsunamis, no surf.

My Boat.
Got my engine running and it purrs! A major milestone.

Culture
I learned how to raise my baseball/trucker cap and scratch the top of my head like real redneck. Its scary how natural it is.

Fishing
King salmon are hitting the subsistence nets. Pete and Rose caught 26 kings this morning. They also caught a 3 pound red that they gave to us. Salmon for dinner tonight! We might be able to fish by friday but thats the earliest.

Yeah, its nice here!

Today was nice but a little windy, Slept in took it easy. Walked around town and said hello to all the people I haven't seen since last summer. Cleaned out my container and my old boat to get it ready for a first cabin trip which was supposed to happen tonight but is getting postponed because of the wind. Its a little choppy out there and there's no rush at the moment. Saw Paolo out in the yard today. He fished with Eric last year and a few years ago this year he's drifting. We just had a Captains dinner at Peter Pan Cannery, the processor we sell our salmon to, The first King salmon of the season was very nice. Great time to see everyone and talk. Earlier I had my first salmon of the season. Ralph from the aluminum welding shop stopped by my boat to see when I wanted to put on my power roller and his wife had jarred some smoked salmon. Nothing is better I had to tear into it right then and there. I had my first I'm up in Alaska moment last night when I popped some microwave popcorn that had expired in 2005 in a microwave that was built in 1983. Past crew know what Im talking about and all you that are horrified don't worry it has held up well and is still tasty even if you have to use a little tabasco. More later but things are good and its good to hang out with my dad.

Back in the AK

I landed in the big DLG last night at 5:30 after a long day of hopping planes, running through airport terminals, and waking up one good friend at 4:30 in the morning to give me a ride to PDX. Thanks Liza. I got off the plane and the sun was shining and the sky was blue. Absolutely beautiful, especially after the nonexistent spring in Portland. Terry Steben flew from Anchorage up with me and it was good to catch up with him. Dad picked me up from the airport and we went to the PAF boatyard where I checked out my container. Everything was there just a little bit more moldy and smelling of gasoline than last year. We went over to some friends of ours in town, Leann and Chris' for dinner and had true Alaskan fish and chips, tasty stuff. Drove through town and went back to the containers. Saw our neighbors in the slough, Joe Carney and Mike Merlino, at the harbor and stopped to talk. It was a long day and I was fighting to stay awake so I passed out early as the sun started to set.