Mile14

Painless

2012-02-06T11:32:00.000-08:00

Ahhhhh...the mantra of Team X, why make life complicated when sometimes its just this simple? It was a great week. MP hit a 500 peso score on a superbowl board, I caught many a toro and listened to some live music right here at our building that was incredibly good and we had a wonderful pescado feed at Slah's house and superbowl at Stans, the exclusive Tower 360 here on Cerritos beach. But, there was one little speed bump...I've had one of my gold crowned molars kind of loose for a couple years now so I thought I better get it looked at. I'm not real good with dentists, in fact next to elevators they might be my least favorite thing, I'd rather get my finger slammed in a car door than have a tooth extracted but that's exactly what had to happen this week. My friend and dentist Franciso Echeagaray said it had to go, in fact I'd been fighting an infection for who knows how long and the jig was up.......So, how long has it been, or have you ever, been in a professional health care office when they have time for small talk and you discuss fishing, the Beatles and the upcoming Carnaval events? Well thats Francisco's M.O., if theres a such thing as a pleasurable dental experience it has to be his.

So this morning he looked at the gaping hole where my tooth used to be and said alls good with the world. MP scheduled a cleaning and I'm going to get a filling replaced soon, a little preventative dentistry as I'm starting to run low on chompers. Just as the doc ordered I iced the tooth and abstained from cerveza and of course the enemy of all tooth extractions, milk and milk products. I have to say that even though I was a doubting Thomas the extraction was pain free....except for the part where he stuck the #2 pencil sized needle full of novacaine in me...3 times....and I left with this wisdom.

As we left Francisco's MP and I were talking about maintenance and keeping our good dental and all around health. Well, I'm kind of soft for VW Beetles ever since I drove to Alaska in one as a young man and this one told the whole story of how to view the ageing process, maintenance. Just like the guy who drives this VW I'm convinced a lot of it is state of mind, just perception and how to view the world and your part in it with a healthy and positive manner.

Lucky for us Franciscos office (and house) is close to the malecon. Me and MPeasy have a hand holder going, its 10 am and we've got a hankering for nice fresh coconut, one of Mexicos simple pleasures. We find this 'cococ, helados' spot on the beach and have not one but two. If you've never had one before you'd be astounded by how much juice is in each one.

Then you have the machete expert open the coco up and carve out the meat. We like ours authentic style with lots of chili sauce and limon drizzled over the top. Mmmmmm baby, and you know when I was a kid I thought coconut was dry and kind of disgusting, well it ain't....its moist, flavorful and I think pretty darn good for your health. and getting them here on the Malceon is certainly good for your mental health....Pure La Vida as we say in Mazatlan....

Timing is everything....but luck is good to.

2012-01-31T15:07:00.000-08:00

The right place, at the right time, with hard work and the right gear... sometimes works, sometimes not. This morning found Team X a bit fractured, Ern and Jay went to 4th point and Slah and me and a new guy named Mike went far afield to Marmol. Slah is on injured reserve, his shoulder is as bad or worse as mine was when I first injured it several months back. I'm very concerned as he can't lift his arm over his head. My doc at home said go straight to the doctor if you have tingling, can see it deformed....or lose mobility, like Slah. So with Slah only coaching we're severely weakened as a team. Plus its low tide at Marmol and we know in this game distance is everything so theres only one thing to do to get out to where old slimey lives...its into the water.

Considering the situation I know I need to turn my game up a notch. Mike is new to the long cast and he's just not getting it there so wade and cast....2 full hours with just one bite and the loss of 3 metal lures. It becomes apparent that no matter how hard you try, you can't catch what isn't there. I'm wet up to my arm pits so I strip down a and get dried off with fresh clothes and we drive north towards Mazatlan. We get on the beach at Gringo point and our friend Ron is there without a bite. We continue on to 4th point and Ern has 3 Chata on the beach. He caught the last one 5 minutes ago. Mike and I rig as quick as possible and with about 3 casts in I catch a nice one...theres a school of corvina here. Within 15 minutes we have 4 on the beach and both Mike and I have missed a few, I lost a really good one in the surf, a really good one. Mike is on fire and gets 3 of the 4, even with taking time to re tie. And that fast its over....we're finally in the right place, the right time.

I have to tell you about my friend Jake Marquis and his bird abatement project at our building. MP says they' brewers blackbirds and we have hundreds...no thousands of them. Its interesting in that at dusk and dawn they perch in the wires to get that last and first bit of sun on them. In the evening they face the west and in the morning the east. Unfortunately they adopted our building, this is what the cars in the lot look like every morning...you can see those darn birds

So enter Jake, our buildings ambassador, poker expert and chief of special operations. I had my doubts with the success of the mission and knowing Jake I guess I shouldn't have. With several days of fireworks, camera flashes and the addition of this owl its problemo solved, I'm impressed.

Below is a pic of the problem so you'll know what Jake was up against. If you're squeamish around birds like my mother was this is not the place for you at sunset. But the guys who wash cars for a living have to be a little bummed, that industry moved down the street to new building.

So if you're in Alaska and need an excavator Jake Marquis at Knik Construction in Wasilla gets things done. I took this pic of him last July, as luck would have it he came down to fish and wouldn't ya know it turned out to be the day after my emergency surgery, my good luck. I was rung out, way less than my usual energy charged fishing guide so with MP's prodding me to go to work and Jakes pitching in we had a great day....actually he did more than pitch in, he did everything, I was just kind of there. But, he caught a nice King, his friend Dubie's wife caught her biggest King so I'd say that catching 2 out of 3 and running on 7 cylinders was pretty darn impressive, that's Jake....thanks buddy.

Every Day Life

2012-01-26T05:21:00.000-08:00

I would have posted pics of us catching these fish but as much as I like my Lumix camera....it doesn't do so well when its dark thirty at the 4th point. As we pulled up to the spot and hour before sunrise the guys ahead of us already had a few corvina laying in the sand, so expectations are high as we silently and quickly assemble the surf rods. These 'chata' like I'm holding below are real school fish, its a bit like salmon fishing in that you seem to either do real good....or real bad. Our friend Stan caught a corvina on his first cast and I followed up with this one only minutes later. I've caught many of them but this was the first on the rubber swimfish and jighead that my expert Mexican friends prefer. I always seem to do better with the iron, it just go to show that what I tell the young guys all the time....what works for one guy doesn't necessarily work for the next guy.

The pic below is our mornings effort, a few corvina, a couple ladyfish and one snapper as well as a monster sierra that Ernie caught. For distance the guys seem to be going to lighter and lighter line so for Ernesto to get this spainish mackeral on 15 pound test is a pretty good trick, lots of civiche in that deal.

I guess you kinda know you're settling into middle/old age when you're out shopping for binoculars that cost more than you college education for bird watching. Who'd a thunked it, Jeff King...bird watcher. Well, its partly a concession to love, MP's crazy about the birds, and its partially something I can learn because its fun. And Mazatlan is a birders paradise, I'll post more pics soon but trust me, we have huge Egrets, Herons, Flamingos and the wildest colored Orioles I've ever seen....but...When MP spotted this Vermillion Fly Catcher the other day it was her days big event. I guess the closest thing we have in Alaska with such vivid colors are the Stellars Jays that run the bird world at Mile 14.

My Lumix has 7 power zoom so its trade off. Its a nice sized pocket camera to always have with you but even having got as close as we can and using max zoom, this pic is the best we can do. The good news is that we have lots of pixtels so when I get home and have time to mess around I should be able to turn this into a prety cool close up.

Yesterday I had to go to the dentist. Francisco's office and home are near the Aquarium and maybe a 4th of the way down the malecon. The Aquario is one of my favorite things, we watch the seals splash the school kids then to the big tank and watch my favorite fish, the toro, swim nose to tail, the fastest fish in the tank. What I need to do someday is be there at feeding time so I can see the bite....so we decide to walk a mile or two on the malecon. Yesterday we set a new record for this year, 17,000 steps on MP's pedometer, about 8 miles or so. This next pic is the view north.

Its one oclock in the afternoon, the temp is 80 degrees and theres nobody on the beach or even walking the malecon. Tourist related businesses here report that they're 80% down, well this day it might as well be 100%. The vibrancy that we're used to seeing is just not here, theres low energy everywhere and people just seem resigned to it all.

I stood in the same place and took the shot north and this one to the south. In the right of the frame you notice a fruit salesman, one of every body's favorites on the beach. He has melon, strawberry's, mandarins and my favorite, coconut with lots of the red peppery chili sauce. I watched him go, maybe a mile between potential sales. If I'm ever in his shoes I hope I can show the same strength, the same resolve, He didn't cause it, he can't fix it...he just does what he does, keep moving, keep trying, keep the faith.... I hope he knows some how that we notice, a guy true to himself.

In the Flow

2012-01-20T15:18:00.000-08:00

Well,that's where we're at, going on 3 weeks in Maz we're finally in the flow....life has slowed right down. A little speed bump last night with MP being the first on injured-reserve with the tourista. The only thing she ate different than me was an unwashed apple so I'd guess that's the culprit. It hit her about 3 am. So I have her some Electrolit to rehydrate and shes on the mend. Mp has always had a strong constitution, she says she got it from picking up bubble gum from the sidewalk as a kid...well, the immunity wore off.

My friend Charlie McDonald says that at our age and with our level of activity that if you're ever completely pain free theres a good chance its because you're dead...well, I'm almost there and I attribute it to the Reumofan Plus regime that me and half of Mazatlan are on. Its only sold in Mexico and is an mix of all natural ingredients some of which we know to work in the USA. It has Holm Oak form the Mexican Province of Durango (this is reputed to also be an anti carcinogen) , Shark Cartilage, glucosimine, Vitamins, Calluna Vulgaris from Mexico and a thing called Gausima from Cuba. So my shoulder is way better and I'm casting the 3 ounce lures like a young guy....the problem is, this week our bite kind of disappeared.

This morning found Team X with great tides, a nice surf break and a beautiful sunrise...no pescado. The first pic is the sun coming up over the 4th point 15 miles north or Mazatlan. The surf was washing up the bank real well so I got down to get the foamy white water into the show, I just love that.

So below is Jay, Alberto and Bernardo. You can tell by the looks on their faces that they're not stressed about our poor showing, been skunked before...gonna get skunked again. The highlight of the day was a new guy named Ron we met who showed up with a brand new type of Power Pro line that nobody had seen before, so ol Ron ramped things up in the cool 'gotta have gear' program.

So theres a lot of talk going on and more testosterone floating around than the last Kenai River Guide meeting I attended. But Ernies got to keep throwing, his persistence and stamina for guy his age is ultra impressive...And walla...he hits the payoff. Well Erns a little hot headed and this thing came close to what he calls a 'schamozle'. We're howling, it ain't much, I don't know what it is and it looks semi poisonous but by jiminy its more than anybody else caught, even the legendary Slah Sali who's directing as you can see.

Me and MP road tripped the other days to get my meds...even with insurance this stuff is way cheaper in Mexico, I wonder why? I take enalapril for my blood pressure and now I'm on omeprazole (prilosec) for my acid reflux which caused my throat to lock up last summer that caused half of Soldotna to laugh and recommend I chew my food better. So on the way I came up with a new advertising plan, always networking you know. So this summer if I get a guy who says he heard about me on the Sablo Centro Liguid Courage bus in Mazatlan Mexico I'm supplying the Pacifico's....for sure.

I consider myself a pretty creative guy with a healthy imagination. Sometimes when I'm singing I imagine that I sound like Gary Allan and sometimes when fishing I imagine that 30 pound king is really 52 pounds. So it was kind of cool to come across this blue print on how it all really works....ya just gotta open up your mind baaaaaaaby.....just let it flow, get in the flow, be the flow, feel the flow, know the flow...

If it hadn't been for that darn.....

2012-01-15T15:54:00.000-08:00

Bronco game, I'd of had about a perfect last 24 hours. Of course I also lost the Saints game but I'm used to have my hopes dashed in that deal. At half time time of the Saints game I couldn't stand it....I had to go fishing and schools of toro where everywhere on the beach, I must have caught 40 of them all around 2 to 3 pounds I'd guess. Well right at the end of one cast in the whitewater I hit a fish that feels different, walla, a gift of the best eating fish in Maz, a nice little robalo.

Now I've eaten fresh fish before, lots of it. But I don't think I've ever eaten a fish that I caught one hour and cooked the next. It was magnificent, white flaky fish done with the Minnesota shore lunch batter that my friend Keith Holtan taught me....muey bueno.

So this morning I tell MP I'll stay close to home and we'll have a hand holder when she's had her coffee. Its dark thirty and I throw a rubber swim fish next to the jetty with no results. My friend Alejandro usually fish this spot so I figure I'll cast the rocks in front of the next building with the top water and try to catch a snapper. Having been a salmon guy for so long I just love the top water, to see the fish take it adds so much excitement.....Well, I get to seeing some mullet jumping and theres some big fish after them . So with it being low tide and a pretty good surf break I carefully negotiate rock to rock until I'm 30 feet off shore amongst the boulders. The water splashing up around my waist and I know just to stand still so you don't lose your footing. I see a big boil and make the cast and the fish bites once....twice...and then after still following for 7 or 8 cranks of the reel he's hooked hard on the line. I only wish King salmon would bite a bait this aggressive, my life would be sooooo much easier. Anyway, I have this hard pulling fish on and in this precarious position that if I can get him through all the rocks I still have no place to land him. So I stay put, 15 minutes in he's at my feet and I grab his tail and then wade him to shore. A dandy toro, soon to be on my wall.

Thats my friend Alberto, through the years we've spent a lot of time together. Its a funny deal,theres only a hand full of passionate surf casters in Mazatlan so when the bite is on here or there we all converge, kinda like the tide bite in the lower river. The next pic is a close up of the toro so you can see what we're dealing with. They're fast and strong like the roosterfish, one of my friends characterizes them in a cool way....he says they're a 'noble' fish.

So I give the Toro to one of Alberto's friends and MP and I are off on the hike. Its 3 miles to the end of the road and Alberto tells me that theres a mexican outdoor comida where I can get my sunday morning menudo about half way there. I'd been by this place lots of time and just didn't recognise it as an outdoor restaurant, its perfectly clean, fresh blue corn tortillas that MP said are the best ever. she has eggs ranchero style and I have my menudo....Its a tripe stew that has a tasty broth and lots of hominy, you sprinkle onion,cilantro and this morning some mint on top. No juice, just this wonderfully sweet fanta pops that remind me the pop machines in the gas station when we traveled as a kid.

The next pic is the avenue so you get an idea of what its like. After breakfast its approaching 80 degrees, shirts off and the sun on my back...man I like that feel.

Right across the street from the new fancy Riu hotel is a wetland full of ducks we've never seen, Mp says some kind of spoon bill....and these really cool turtles, which reminded me. Thats something I gotta do, track down for myself some turtle soup, you know me,I gotta try it all. I'll report back on the turtle soup....did I ever tell you about the frog legs I had at Pancho's last year?

Pescado fresca

2012-01-11T08:52:00.000-08:00

Thats a nice Sierra I caught the other day, they're actually a spainish mackeral and for us surf guys they are kind of like a budget Wahoo. This fish is the favorite for civiche and Slah's neighbor makes some of the best in Mazatlan.

I just had to post a pic of Ernies surf set-up....the envy of the beach. I have a Saltiga reel but Ernie has the rod as well as the reel so I guess he wins. Most of us have seen or even own the best of the best when it comes to salmon fishing, maybe a Loomis IMX with a Calcutta reel, maybe 300 bucks a copy....well Erns setup is a cool grand and let me tell you it casts a mile, smooth, light and durable. So when we load up like this to move on down the beach everybody takes a bit of care to make sure all the equipment is set just right. You'll notice the jeep is set up for doing what we're all about, fat tires, rod holders and fishing stickers.

But with all the gear, experience, hard work and luck....we don't always catch them so its on to plan B, one of my favorite things, 9 am on Los Pino's beach where you can buy just about anything you might desire from the sea, nice and fresh. Some mornings MP and I show up and watch the fisherman come in and set up and then we just wander through old town and find a place for huevos rancheros, my favorite breakfeast. The first pic is a fish I'd never seen before, unbelieveable, its like a huge fresh water aquarium fish. Click on the pic to enlarge it and I think you'll agree, thats a gorgeous creature.

The next pic is a typical set up for the guys selling. A lot of times they don't fillet the fish as much as they 'break' the fish. I really don't know what or why the uses might be but a clever is used to whack the cleaned fish into pieces, most likely for soup I'd guess. The lobster were jumpin out of the tote fresh and for 200 pesos ( about 16 bucks) you could fanagle a purchase of at least 5 and maybe 7 depending on there size of course. The lobster are awful good here.....but us northerners all kind of agree that the dungies and king crab we get are pretty hard to beat.

The picture below was taken just a couple blocks away, the 'shrimp ladies' are a Mazatlan institution. Everyday they have it all , Camarones in large , small, grande, head on, head off, even dried shrimp that I really like, its kind of like a shrimp jerky. Even though we usually get our shrimp delivered to the house, the shrimp ladies have the best in fresh and prices, not to mention that the shopping experience is a fun social exercise, i love it.

So this morning we end up at Revolution park where Mazatlan always has their official Christmas tree. Well this year they went all out, a nativity scene with real live animals and people. You notice I didn't get to close to this mule, I seem to remember somewhere from back in my cowboy days that those things are kind of unpredictable, I kind of need all my fingers to play the musica tonight....

Hardcore

2012-01-07T05:17:00.000-08:00

I'm up at 4:00 am, this time I'm smart and have all my gear ready. At 4:30 we're on the road to Marmol only 25 miles from town but we have a lot to do to be set up and in the water at first light. Just right here past emeradl bay we go through a check point to get on the maxi pista. Through the fog we see the flashing lights so being as savy as Slah is he turns on the dome lights so the police can planely see that we're the good guys. In the 25 miles north we see every bridge has flashing lights going, lots of security and we feel good about that.

We have it set up to get through a private gate and gain beach access with a bottle of tequila but the security guard is no where around.....mmmmm....Slah and I walk through the dark to his house but he's obviously not home but his 5 or 6 howling watch dogs were, that was a bit exciting, haven't wet a line yet and already I've got a good adrenaline rush. So its plan B, park as close as we can get and hoof it down the beach to the point we want to fish, about a mile and a half. Its just light and we start out throwing the 'small' rods. Its the perfect morning with a high tide and we're on a point in the rocks. An hour goes by and Slah is the first to switch to the big rod and it doesn't take him long to have our 1st corvina. Ern gaffs it for him and we're on the board.

So I start throwing the big rod and an hour in I'm happyily surprised how well it feels, no shoulder pain at all...I can do this. Heres a pic of Slah and the beach we walked to. He's throwing a home made 2 or 3 ounce jig head and I promise you...thats a legitimate 150 yard cast. Pretty cool huh?

We ended up with Slah catching 2 corvina and I caught a nice snapper. We were semi disappointed with the catching but absolutely wild eyed about the fishing, not a soul in sight. Heres a pic of our catch, I know it looks like we don't take care of it but its the beach and well, we've got lots of stuff to carry.

This is our bivouc spot. Mid morning we sat and had breakfeast, for me it was a bag of peel and eat shrimp and an avocado which I washed down with a Jumex sports drink. Thats pretty good living if you ask me.

On the walk back we came across our watchman. I guess I missed the hand carved stairs in the early morning dark. We stopped and threw the lures a bit here but the tides leaving, parties over.

Sometimes I get to wondering....what am I doing working this hard for fish in Mexico ? Its simple, these guys are the best of the best, drawn together by a driving passion... I got to thinking about when I was learning carpentry and having trouble with heights and walking the walls, it scared me. My foreman, a wise man named Mert Gertin told me...." Jeff, you just gotta want to do it ".

A walk through

2012-01-04T05:09:00.000-08:00

Well Marci wants fish pictures from Mexico, we can do that....the picture I've had a little trouble with for her is the one where she's in guide boat #003 holding up a huge King Salmon. But we had a great toro bite two evenings ago and yesterday morning Team X did what the thespians call a 'walk through', we fished just hard enough to catch a few but not hard enough to hurt ourselves. The surf casting deal really is hard work, we earn these fish so with my shoulder just about healed we went kind of easy. This first pic is sun up at Black rock....off to the distance you can see the high rises of Nuevo Mazatlan.

Even though I'm prepared and brought pounds of iron we're fishing the rocks and I really don't want to lose to much gear. Right off the bat I lost 3 jig heads with rubber swim fish and then I lost a nice new Krocidile spoon. So, my budget side kicked in and I put on a 2 ounce Lujon....yup, the same lure we used to snag reds when I was a kid because they cast like a bullet and walla,,,,on my third cast with it I caught this nice Black Snapper.

Slah figured it weighed 8 to 10 pounds. I've caught a few of them that were smaller on top water lures so I'm a pretty happy guy to have caught the biggest snapper of my beach fishing career on the 1st trip...if you ask me its a sign. I think this fish is actually what the book calls a Hounds Tooth Snapper, very good eating when matched with a nice bottle of Mexican Chardonay.

So heres a pic of me Ern and Slah....Team X was awful happy to be reunited and we actually spent a good part of the morning just talking and catching up and wrestlin in the sand a bit. I brought down team shirts but forgot to wear mine.

As I've mentioned before, Mazatlan runs on Pacifico Beer, the brewery is just down the street. So here at our house this is how a case comes to you. A recycled box with 24 returnable only bottles delivered within 2 hours to your door for 190 pesos, about 15 dollars....We keep ours in the vegetable bin, a trick I learned from my old friend Bill Forrest.

Thats a mighty long airplane ride

2012-01-02T09:09:00.000-08:00

I wanted to post about the trip yesterday but as much as I love Mexico, my computer doesn't. It took me a day just to get it to speak english to me so I could re figure out how to down size my pics. But perserverance is one of my things and we got it figured out....

Me and MP just gained 5000 miles and 100 degrees. That jet is an amazing deal when you think about. we leave my house at 7 pm and its -15, 15 hours later its Mazatlan and 78 degrees....As happens in our small state of Alaska we ran into our friends Jeff and Pam Breakfield at the Anchorage airport. They're on their way to Cabo to fish and Jeff works for Fish and Game so guess what we talked about ? Wow, we're off to a good start on this deal.

As we're walking through the Sea Tac MP notices these kids, pretty cool. They're obviously triplet and they are pulling identical bags with there mom having them lined, ducks in a row. Pretty darn cute if you ask me.

One the way down we always sit onthe right side of the plane so we can see the ocean, in fact I have a ttradition that when I first see the water is when I go in the bathroom and get on my shorts and a wife beater shirt. I wanted you to see the beach we fish so there it is. The point to the left is Point Cerritos and our building and many others are just up from it, the isolated beach to the right is Oceanica and the place we go to is about 3/4 the way down in this pic a place we call Gringo point. Its a pretty cool dynamic in that when we fish there its totally undeveloped, you can't see a single house or building looking up or down the beach...but off in the distance are the skyscrapers.

My favorite thing on this trip is that first smell and feel of Mexico. Here they don't use the jetway, we just walk down the stairs and you are greeted by that humidity and smell of Mexico. Its hard to describe and I'd bet some people don't like it but I sure do....that smell is a like a cross between diesel fumes and good organic farm dirt with a little human smell thrown in, I guess to describe it right...its just smells like Mexico.

Showing up at our building although jet lagged is just tooooo much fun. everybody is happy to see us and in total Jethronian style we're told that the weather just broke for us. It had been cold and windy but the day we arrived its normal again, 75 degrees as we watch our first sunset. AND....our first sunset has what I call the 'human assist'....pretty cool.

So my friend Slah will download me a program to reduce the pics and I'd bet dollars to donuts that our first real day of fishing tommorrow will produce divedends. So please come back, we'll have dead fish soon....OH, as I walked and fished right here this morning it gave me great optimism for the roosterfish. The waters warmand there are a lot of mullet around and we know where theres mullet also is the guyo. So I think we'll be catching them, don't bet against us

Jeff's always insightful but usually wrong picks for the year 2012

2011-12-27T06:50:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm going to try this again and I think the odds are starting to stack my way. They say even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every now and then so after two consecutive years of not getting a single prediction correct....I'm due.

NFL-SuperBowl... Just last night I watched the Saints run rough shod over the Falcons, they look unbeatable to me. Its hard to not root for the Pack as they just have a cool way of doing business but I'm picking the Saints to win, maybe against the Texans or those Steelers that I detest. Its been fun watching the Tim Tebow show but that deals run its course, he's traded into a life as a back-up in 2012.

NBA...the all new Clippers, the other L.A. Team.

MLB...I'm thinking that the A.L. West teams will once again prove something that the Marlins did a few years ago...yes you can buy the pennant. So, its either the Angels or Rangers to win the series. Hows that for stratedgy to get a pick right....you pick 2 and double your odds...Wasn't game 6 of the series this year just about as exciting as it gets for a baseball fan??? Another yawner for us Mariner fans.

NCAA B-Ball Tourney....Now that's a pretty darn exciting thing lately too. It takes a pretty good crystal ball to pick teams like Butler and wasn't it Western West Virginia or some team like that?...So, we go with conventional thinking cause I'd really like to get something right this year....Duke.

Daytona 500 and Nextel Champ.... I'm proud of Team Penske for firing that loud mouth prima dona Kurt Busch. So, I have to go with them, Brad Keselowski to win both. He was right there the entire 2011 season and Penske is due for it all.

Indy 500....this season is going to be interesting for the IRL. With the crash in Las Vegas and new cars and another engine coming its a new day, which they need. So having picked a Penske driver for nascar I better be consistent and do likewise here...so...that Hunter Reay guy.

Our Next President....ahhhhh......m.....mmm......ya know, lets get back to sports here....

Iditarod... I'd like to see our own local guy Paul Gebhardt finally win the thing. He's been oh so close for several years now...and watch out for Jeff King, he's unretired and a pretty crafty guy.

King Salmon on the Kenai River....ya know, I got a feeling that after going through a few below average years that the worm is going to turn and we're going to enjoy a great run of Kings. One thing we know about the Kenai is that its a dynamic place and anything to everything can happen....So I'm predicitng an always great silver run and a king run of mmmmm...42,000, that oughta be enough.

Oscar for best movie....The Help, great movie, go see it.
Other important things in the year 2012.

Drill Baby Drill....Pebble Project has about a 25% chance of making it...But, Chuit Coal project has a 75% chance....

We're going to see a lot of new faces on our political scene. In fact, if I wasn't so committed to guiding I might even giver er a run. I mean what the heck, could I screw something up?...I doubt it.

Now this is the big one...Theres life on Mars. Yup. My friend Chris Fejes years ago got me investigating the moon of Mars called Phoebus and I've decided that theres something going on there...hide and watch.

Great things are to be accomplished at Mile 14...we're going to have a lot of fun and I hope all you do too. I wish you all the best of health and happiness salted with success in our next year of 2012....

All I want for Christmas is.....

2011-12-16T17:43:00.000-08:00

Maybe its an important milestone in a guys life when he realizes he has a lot of stuff, or at least enough stuff. I drive a nice truck, MP's got a nice car, we get to live here at Mile 14, what else is there really ? I never thought my life would turn out that I own 50 fishing rods, 5 guitars and at least 8 picnic tables, we're doing just fine. So, I thought I'd show you what I'd really like for Christmas, things that in Jeff's world would be really cool.

I'd like some one new to call our local call in radio program 'sound off ' on KSRM radio 92. Maybe even someone with an original and thought provoking perspective....that would be nice.

I'd like the Kenai River Special Management Advisory Board to do something...in fact anything. I don't need them to make the river run backwards or wave a wand and create a King Salmon run of 65,000 like the old days....I just need them to do something, ya know, let us know you guys are functional over there.

I'd like for once to have my boat trailer lights work when I first hook them up in the spring....that would be really different.

I'd like the State of Alaska come out with a new 'Old Hippie' commemorative license plate.

I'd like to see Ron Paul stick around in the race, maybe right to the end, he's good for the discussion.

I'd like my two sons to find and build the kind of love that I have...as a matter of fact I'd like that for everybody that might not have it.

I'd like to see a reality TV show about the Kenai city dock during dip-net season.

Speaking of Reality TV, I'd like to see them put all the Alaska programs together....you could have Sarah Palin going broke mining gold while the State Troopers and trying to serve her a warrant all the while as Levi is deck boss on the Time Bandit as they're anchored up off of Homer partying....Theres a lot going on in this state, lets be creative.

I'd like to catch a 20 pound robalo to go with my select collection of very cool fishes.

I'd like Gary Allan to come out with a new album...the poor guys had a tough run of it so I figure after he completely recovers from his throat surgery whatever he puts out will be special.

Well, you get the idea. Simple life, simple pleasures. I guess during the holiday season its a time for reflection, I don't think I ever really thought about what life would be like at 58 Christmas's .....I wouldn't haven't been able to imagine it being like this anyway.....sweet.

Mile 13.5

2011-12-12T12:21:00.000-08:00

That's the scene 1/2 mile downriver from here. That darn river is one fickle creature, maybe that's why we get along so good. Two weeks ago when I took the video of the river locking in for the winter I would have bet dollars to donuts it was frozen for good...well, wrong again.

Normally this time of year we'd have a ski track set down to Fall-in-Hole and then through the swamp and back up the bench to our house. But this year as you can see the river is just to unsafe, almost to unsafe even for walking. The warm trend and rain we had broke up the ice and then the huge tides with the full moon the last few days lifted all the ice and left it sitting around like a martian landscape.

That picture of Jet pretty much shows you what we're up against when trying to take a walk. The ice chunks are all under cut and we have places where theres 5 or 6 feet of ice over the river bed....and its got holes in it everywhere. Several years ago Jet fell through into one of these cavern type deals and disappeared, she found her way out in an entirely different area than where she went through and let me tell you her owner was fit to be tied.

If you've ever launched a boat here you'll recognise the rock on the right that's a prop eater at low water. When I first started at Mile 14 that rock was huge and even at high water you could wing ding your stuff if you weren't looking. Well through the years its either sank some or the river has filled up around it or maybe its even eroded...whatever the case it illustrates the nature and vitality of this Kenai River, a wonderfully crazy place. Thought you might like the pics of our earliest 'break-up' ever, Dec 11, 2011...

Cardio King

2011-12-08T18:19:00.000-08:00

That kind of sings doesn't it? I stole it from our friend Sharon Smith who is no doubt the fittest person in our gym and we call the cardio-queen. I've been off the weight lifting now for about 7 weeks, my shoulder is finally feeling like its going to heal and I'll be able to surf fish in a few weeks, it had me worried. I should have seen a doctor but I got a little pig headed and frankly with all that's happened this year, I've seen enough doctors....You know how I feel, theres a bright side to everything and with my shoulder injury it was this, a ramped up cardio regime and some needed weight loss.

My normal routine would be 25 minutes of cardio everyday followed by a lifting routine alternating on different body parts. So since the injury I've doubled my cardio time and alternate between a fat burn and hard cardio rest / recover type of work out. For instance today was a fat burn day, 40 minutes on the elliptical trainer set at a resistance of 10 and then followed by 15 minutes of walking at a fairly steep incline and rapid pace. For this my heart rate stays right at 120 and my sweat is just moderate like in the picture. Then on the next day I'll do a hard cardio session ramping my heart rate up to 160 by pumping hard on the elliptical trainer set at 15 for two minutes and then I manually set the resistance down to 10 and slow my pedaling down to let my heart rate recover to 130 or so and then I repeat over and over until I've done 40 minutes. Then I walk for 15 minutes on the treadmill. These two routines I do every morning and have for the last two months and just this last week I've taken to going back to the gym in the afternoon and walking for an hour while I read my book. In the last three weeks I've gone from 203 pounds to 195 and hope to hit 190 my Christmas. Some of the weight has to be the hard earned muscle from lifting but I feel like I've gone just about as far as I can with the 58 year old body building deal so now its time to be lean, healthy and agile. For some reason change is not something I've ever thought of as bad, we just move on.

Right before Thanksgiving MP and I were in the grog shop shopping for the other major food group when my friend Ben Jackinsky asked me if I needed some beer for the holidays. I told him no beer, to many calories and that I am training hard....he asked me what I was training for.....jeez Ben, I replied, just life.

Weak---Strong

2011-12-01T18:29:00.000-08:00

I just go over a miserable bout with the flu. It was your basic 3 day flu deal but being a guy who over does most things I stretched it into 4 days. I have no problems with my machismo....I hate not feeling good and I tend to panic, MP says I'm fatalistic and expect the worst.. Well, I don't know but I do know if it weren't for her help getting through that flu deal it would be even tougher. Something you risk as a guy is that whenever you might mention your discomfort you can bounce right off that old gold standard of misery...child birth. But I didn't get that this time, but I did get a few of these nuggets from Nurse Ratchet.

Honey, I'm really really hot, how high does your temp have to get before it causes brain damage do you think?....."mmmmm, how high was it that yours was last night ? "

Oh baby, I'm just dieing here, I'm just sweating and sweating...." Hey ! , I'm a 56 year old woman OK, I sweat every night. Here, put this shirt on. Do you want to borrow my flannel Snoopy capri pants ? "

I think I'm getting really dehydrated.... " Yeh, me too. I'm havin a glass of Chardonay...you want one ?"

ya know hon, I don't seem to be getting better. Do you think it could be something other than the flu? " Well, mmmm, it could be the Noro Virus ." The What ? Whats it do? How longs it last?....." HEY, HEY. I was just jokin, ok ?"

MP, I shivered so much last night I think I tore the meniscus in my knee...."WHAT ELSE !!!! ???? "

Boy baby, if the flu can make you this miserable can you imagine what it must be like when you're dieing? " NO, I can't,,,,but I'm sure I'll be hearing about it ".

So my hard earned advice to all you guys like me is this....don't talk so much when you're sick, drink the fluids, sacrifice monday night football for Antique Roadshow, try to dry out the sheets yourself and take care of your own reading material....I'm sure a missed a few. And make sure you say thanks and I love ya baby....and never, never, never get into that 'who's tougher' argument, its soooooo obvious.

As close as you can get to being here

2011-11-27T14:28:00.000-08:00

This year our river has behaved strangely. All year long we've had high water after high water event with the latest one coming in October when the river is usually low and slow. Of course the more water there is the faster it runs and the faster it runs the longer it takes to freeze. Well its been so cold lately that even with the high water the freezing process has begun here at Mile 14. About 4 days ago we had pan ice floating onto the shallows at Fall-in-Hole, pretty soon the pan ice was all across the river and by the hour it was raising here as the water backed up behind the ice dam downriver. Pretty soon it got to where it was nothing but ice and it was all standing still, quiet and settled in for the winter....or so we thought. We were in the sauna for about an hour and when I was drying off I could here the weirdest 'whooshing' sound, and it was loud.

As soon as my glasses went fog free I could see that the head pressure had gotten to the breakable point and all the reserved ice was flushing downriver, fast and loud. I ran to the house and got the camera and recorded the video. It was much louder at first but its still pretty cool, shows the power of the river and what I tell people all the time......its a living thing, just like us. If you can't hear it turn your volume up. Now, two days later its pretty much settled in again and maybe this time for good. We were going to walk on it today but the upper crust is still to soft and you break through. So just like Thanksgiving day we've been doing our walking in town where I took these pics on t-day morning about 10 am, temperature -6.

It wouldn't be Soldotna if you didn't run into a few fish while out on your walk. I also snapped this pic of MP after she'd fixed her drooping socks, is that pic cute or what? She was just slightly fogged up.

And the local High School art class was good enough to paint the retaining wall with our location, so me and MP might not act like it....but we're never lost.

Hows about that, my first ever video blog up link. Theres lots of possibilities that go with this video deal, my buddy Ernie surf fishing a schamoozle. Or Slah rattling on in his Arabic laced Spanish language after losing whats always the biggest fish of the year....lots of possibilities.

wheres the Beach?

2011-11-23T15:58:00.000-08:00

That picture I took tells the story, I'm firmly standing in the snow while my mind is walking barefoot on the beach. This Alaska is something and I know I shouldn't complain about the weather as my niece Melonie is having Thanksgiving in Fairbanks with a record cold spell of being in the - 40's...but....In the last three weeks that this blog has taken its trip down memory lane the weather here has been horrible. We've had 2 hurricane force wind events so its either blowing, or snowin, or colder than hell.

That's the biggest flag in Soldotna, standing straight out a few days ago. For 40 years our local Chevy Dealer anchored the business community in this town. Well, like a lot of small towns we lost it when GM figured they would cut back on 'marginal' dealerships. Small towns like ours are now without the guys who always
sponsored the Kick Off Basketball tournaments all around America. But...back to the wind. Here at Stewarts Landing it uprooted at least a dozen trees. I guess because the ground is good and frozen that the week spot was there and it turned them over just like this below.

So in the spring I have a ton of work to do. It reminds me of a conversation I had with my brother one time. I was telling about the Spruce Bark Beetle infestation that went through here about 10 years ago and I was saying that we had so many dead trees that I could spend the rest of my life cutting them and never get them all. He kind of responded with "wow, you have that much property?" and I said heck no.....but we sure got that many trees. So below you see a pic of MP's brand spanking new , state of the art, high tech and slightly smashed greenhouse. The tree that got it was just huge but we;re always lucky as it came just feet from a direct hit that would have taken out both greenhouses as well as the fence around the garden....my moe-joe is still working.

But I'm not one to miss the natural beauty of nature showing its force. I don't know what they're really called but as a kid they were 'snow snakes' to us and something you very seldom see in Alaska. Around here the snow comes straight down but the other day, oh baby, was it moving around.

The next pic we've seen a zillion times. I never get tired of it, right here at Mile 14 and its -15 in the low light of morning, Jet-dogs with me and I try to get a pic of her trying to stand and walk with the least amount of legs touching the ground....but I can't get the pic, next time.

The last pic answers a question I get often while fishing...." where do all the eagles go in the winter?" Well, that's a pretty good chunk of them right there at the South Soldotna mini mall...or to some people, the dump.

Me and MP wish everybody a happy and especially healthy Thanksgiving....I'll get on the beach real soon so please, keep coming back and I'll get some exciting fish stories and pics up on the blog, Mile 14.

The JourneyMan

2011-11-15T17:16:00.000-08:00

I was going to follow up the apprentice blog with this one and got a bit side tracked last week, a little a.d.d. don't ya know. But it was in the 1990's that I came of age with the guiding, I had my Honda sponsorship, I was President of the Guide Association and it was time to secure my spot as a top guide on the Kenai River.

Always being one to do things myself I really never had anybody to mentor me and I certainly never had somebody really really good to show me. But I did keep my eyes open and wasn't afraid to try new things. I got to thinking that this river is so well fished that I got to doubting that a King Salmon could swim up this river without seeing a lure. So, what makes him bite this one, or that one? How can you make your lure look or be different ?( after all, every kwikfish and spin-glo looks the same) So I boiled it down to two no brainer things, boating skills and bait. I started experimenting with different scents for my eggs and I lucked into the secret of finding good sardines for the trolled lures.....we're catching a lot of fish so with that goes more eggs for bait which means we use more which means more bites which means....well, we were on our way. To this day I'm convinced that well scented fresh eggs are 75% of success, people used to think we were lucky, well, people who work hard get awful lucky. And I don't mean simply applying the scent to the eggs, I cure them with the scent. Not only do we change the bait super often but I also go through great pains off the river to make sure the curing process is just right. I've heard guides judge a good egg by its ability to stay on the hook or its color to the human eye.....mmmmm.....a good egg is one that catches a fish if you ask me. If you don't think I was into it just check out those Carharts I'm wearing in the pic below.

In 1990 my friend Greg Davis of King Louies Guide Service was keeping his boat at a friends dock who had built some cabins for fishermen to stay and was working to get the business started. Greg invited me down to share the dock and then he quit guideing. Well, I missed Greg as he just might be the funnest guy who's ever ran the Kenai but it was good fit for me and I stayed many years, even after we bought the boat launch....you know how I am about loyalty. The pic below is the dock with the Honda boat and Vinces boat who is one of the guides I helped get going back in that era. In my boat is a special group, my cousin Larry Rannals and one of the fishiest people I've ever met, Gene Putman.

Even though the cabins were a 6 mile drive farther than I was used to it was a pretty nice situation. The owners didn't sell fishing trips and I didn't sell accommodations so working in unison it made for a great value for our customers. We got to be friends with the owners and having been guiding now for well over 10 years I had a pretty good customer base so I even had a second boat working. We bought Stewarts Landing in 1996 and in hind sight I guess I should have kept my boat here at Mile 14 but I felt like MP should run the boat launch without my everyday imput and I was happy where I was, always am. But in the early 2000's I started to sense some strangeness with the owners. I don't really to this day know what it was but I guess theres a certain natural resentment that occurs with all the success, no success, familiarity, ambitions....and unlike me and my life, a lot of peoples lives are always changing. On the day my dad died I got a call from the owner complaining about customers parking...although I waited until the end of the season, it was clearly time to move on.

So the next year I stayed put, right here at Mile 14 and let me tell you, I had no idea what I was missing. Life got waaaaaay simpler. I got extra sleep in the morning, I drive my 4-wheeler to work, no trailering the boat, no driving the truck, my own gutting tables, walla. The pic above is Craig Humphries and friends, the Alaska sign brought to us by John Iverson, pretty cool eh? So by the early 2000's I'd been in the same boat for 20 years and although the old Minnow 3 was good to go I felt like if I was going to guide for another 20 years a fresh boat might be in order. Most of the guide boats on the Kenai are Willie brand boats but I'd had such good luck with Alumaweld I wanted to stay so I searched out this 1998 Super Vee. The biggest change was going from a steering console to the tiller handle and from Honda to Yamaha. She's a 21 footer and with all the walk around room and plush seats about as comfortable as you can get.

As I said earlier, I really think boating control is huge part of success in our fishery and I was bit concerned about running the tiller. And so I should have been...it was plane hard on my back the first few years but the actual learning to control the boat was easy. The tiller is so much more responsive than the wheel and I never felt uncomfortable with it. Here's a pic of my friend Brandon Greene with one of the first very large models that we got in the Minnow 4.

Is that gorgeous or what? Below is a pretty cool pic of my friend Steve Wendt hunkered over in battle. Steve's a local guy who treats himself to a trip with me every year for the last 15. What a cool thing to have friends like Steve and Sally Brook who's summer wouldn't be the same without a trip with me. We know each others kids, we talk politics....its what my fishing has become....comfortable and relaxed, sincere and steady. Thanks you guys ....all of you.

Sally was with me this last year when my throat locked up and I was off to emergency surgery. So Sal, in 2012 I'm leaving the boiled eggs at home and we'll make it through the ENTIRE fishing trip, I promise. I'll end this blog with a pic that my Friend Marty Holloran took in my boat in the mid 1980's. Marty has an eye for art and the unusual I'd say. Its something I try to live by, you have to have goals and to get them you have to be positive....so in that light and seeings as in the last few blogs I've recounted 30 years on the river I thought I should also announce the future, my retirement date....2025, I'll be 70 years old. Ya gotta have goals , right? We'll leave the light on.

Answers Given

2011-11-08T11:03:00.000-08:00

A week of two away from the 2nd anniversary of this blog I figure I have about 100 regular readers and another fifty to 75 sometime readers....and that's cool by me. But compared to internetdom its a modest group which I think of as kind of intimate, maybe more personal. So, I'm going to take a risk here and blog something that I've wanted to for some time now. I guess I shouldn't really worry about revealing too much of myself, after all I'm a guy who plays music for the masses and once blogged a pic of myself in a speedo...but still, this is personal. I think you'll like it and maybe see some reflections in your own lives, I hope so.

As you know 10 days after my 20th birthday I was trapped under a boat with my friend Steve Blossom, he died. I guess like most losses the people left behind have so many questions, ones to do with the hereafter and their own mortality. I spent years and years wondering all of the what if's , hours of agonising over what could have been if it just wasn't for...that. I had heartbreak, I had seen the other side, I had guilt, I had, well....I bet a lot of you know. But the biggest question, the one that after all the other things had fatigued in my mind remained was this, WOULD WE STILL BE FRIENDS ?

Well, about 8 months ago the answer came in a round about way. My sister in Oregon was going through her stuff and found this old blue book of poetry, written by Steve Blossom. After his death his parents compiled and printed it and then inscribed a copy to Karen and Woody. They never had any contact with me. So below are two poems, the first Steve wrote and the second I wrote after the accident . I just scanned them onto the blog and they might be hard to read....but that rawness I think is part of the story. I could have just re typed them but, well this is better. If you can't read them just click on them to enlarge with your own computer.

It all seems so similar and of course we know that friends have similar interests, similar passions, similar views of life, similar hobbies. I know as far as resolution goes this might not be much, but its all I'm going to get , I think maybe its more than a lot of people get. So, after 38 years .....we're moving on, finally.

The Apprentice

2011-10-29T10:02:00.000-07:00

That's me and my first King Salmon ever, the start of a lifetime of learnin, laughin and depleting the chinook salmon resource on the Kenai Pennisula. That fish might not look like much to you but it was a big day in my life, I had caught silver salmon in the early 70's but that King right there signaled me that those babies are darn hard to catch and this whole whack em and stack em deal was going to take some hard work and an investment in technology. Technology like that spankin new 78 Dodge Power Wagon in the background. Today I kind of role my eyes up at the young guys who show up at our boat launch with a brand new Willie Boat being pulled by a brand new F-150....well, I guess I was that guy to. I bought that truck from My friend Kenny Cooper in Missoula Montana for 5200 bucks, its the only new truck I've ever had.....

Thats 1979 and that guy on the right was one of the reasons I got to guiding. We had an apartment on the river where I kept the first Minnow (the apartment building is now a fishing lodge) so me and my buddy Dan (Stergio) Sterchi would take our boss John Manson fishing. John was a hard man to work for, when he was around you'd best be humping it but when he found out I had the boat his view of me changed. On Friday afternoons he's pay me 4 hours regular time and 2 hours overtime and we'd go fishing, my first dollar, I felt like I was doing something illegal...

My first big King. My friend Paul Kelley took this pic beside our apartment at 4 am on a July Saturday. Paul lost his hand in a sawmill accident and when he netted this fish it was...well....the outcome was in doubt.
We had this fish and another just about as big and let me tell you, I was PUMPED....

My first 'real' boat, a 16 foot Klamath deluxe. This is one fishing machine and to this day I tell new Alaskans if you want a 'do everything' boat buy one of those babies right there. Max there in the foreground is now 31 years old and my Dad there passed away a few years back...he looks kind of proud doesn't he? This boat the Minnow 2 opened my eyes to adventure and it saw lots and lots and lots of pescado like this catch of Halibut below.

Me and Stergio, Gary Allison and his boss Gerald. I personally caught the big halibut and it was my first time to shoot-harpon-gaff a monster...I got in a fight in Townsend Montana one time with a cowboy who wasn't as tough as that fish.

Joe Hanes told me one time I might be the best silver guide on the river, well, we've been chasing em for a while. Me and my dad and Woody on the right, that's a pretty big silver he's holding, the guy with his fly open is my old friend Bill Bertram, who's still around the Kenai area. Off to he right you see part of an old Datsun truck I had, Budget Charters coming your way. We routinely towed to Deep Creek with the Datsun and would launch in the River on the tide and return in 2 hours while there was still tide to enter the river, it was way simpler than the new tractor system they have now....

That would be my running partner with a nice King salmon. You'll notice a kitchen chair in the boat and that improvised PVC pipe rod holder, that's how Budget Charters got its moniker. At this point of my career I was obsessed with harvest and catching so things like comfort and safety kind of took a back seat to the fishing. On the console was my self taught bait system, thread to make old slimey hold onto the eggs a bit longer.

She's still that gorgeous and smiles just as readily. As you can see she's helping me work on the patience part of guideing...whats the matter with all this line?....did you buy the cheap *^$# again?....how come I always get the bad reel ?....That pic was actually taken in the boat I had to have, the boat that came to be the 'million dollar' boat that I bought for 8200 dollars from Skip Hoskins, we finalised the deal at the Maverick Club.

I spent 20 guide season in her, a 20 foot Alumaweld Guide Special with a 90 horse Merc and a 25 horse Kicker. Now we had the right tool, now we're going to get some work done. The Minnow 3 is low to the water so she doesn't catch much air when trolling, she's 5 feet wide for walk around stability and with the jet shoe on it it runs in 6 inches of water. I had Gary Allsion do a custom paint job on it and it looked as fast as it was.

Thats Ed Waslh in the stearn of guidebat 003. The motor was Mercury's 'tower of power' a gas guzzleing in line 6 cylinder. To this day I'm always way early for my fishing trips and I think I learned that from that Mercury....that thing took forever to start. It had an actual starting procedure that if not followed would mean a flooded motor and a half hour wait....pump the bulb to hard, (it didn't have a choke but instead a direct fuel pump) push the fuel plunger 6 times and make sure the motor is in a perfectly down position, turn the key, pray.....

That pic of my old friend Ray Lavalee and his buddy Joe was taken right here at Stewarts Landing, Mile 14 Kenai River Alaska. I'll never forget this day as it was Memorial day and the river was packed with both people and fish. As you can see the boat now has a Johnson 35 horse and a 15 kicker thanks to the State Parks horsepower limit regulation that was put into effect in 1985. They made the Kenai a State Park and wanted to slow the boats down so this controversial rule cost all of us a ton of lettuce...I remember sitting in a meeting when the rule was proposed and telling my friend Rod Berg..."they can't do that". Wrong again, Jethro. In fact Ray there was fishing with me because he was put out of his own boat by the regulation, it was a Water Walker 2 built by Rick Cheverton in Anchorage and had a 454 Chevy engine in it.

The scene below actually signaled the end for big fast beautiful boats like Rays. Two jet boats came around the corner right here at the Big Eddy and were going so fast that the closing rate made it impossible to avoid a collision. This boat here ended up high and dry, 40 feet from the water. Nobody was killed but several folks had broken bones and the scare of their lives. All of us that were so effected by the horsepower limit had to admit that as bitter a pill as it was to swallow it was a good thing...Now I just wish we'd have another fresh idea that could help the river as much as it did.

The pic below was my first legit 70 pound King to come to the boat. As luck would have it MP's sister Paula caught it. This fish was a bruiser, it jumped, it ran, we hooked it in the Big Eddy and landed at HoneyMoon Cove. Paula and her husband there, Eric, were on their honeymoon and that fish kind of took Paula out of the game. She threw her back out and had to see the doctor then had days of bed rest....that's when you know you've tussled with a salmon.

In the mid 80's I met Jacque Lizin who kind of helped change my life. Working for Sabena Airlines Jacko sent me lots and lots of customers and taught me and MP about good food and wine. As an Airline guy he can fish anywhere in the world, and you know where he likes it best? yup, right here at Mile 14. In this pic Jacque has a silver on, the rod is a one piece Fenwick that I had made by Dangerous Dan Ring, the rowboat man. That rod is fiberglass and let me tell you...you could land the Queen Mary with that baby.

Below is ole Griz....Loren Stewart. It was mid May and we were working around the boat launch and we see a salmon role....then another, and another. Well, it takes me about 15 minutes to hustle home and get the boat and Loren catches this fish on the first drift right here in front of the boat launch. Wow. He's got an old Berkely Bucaneer with a Spinning reel and yellow Stren line. While he had the fish on I was kind of shielding my face figuring the rod could explode at anytime. It didn't and we had fresh salmon for supper. It was this day that got me to fishing earlier and earlier every spring. I'd bet dollars to donuts the Minnow 3 caught the first King out of the Kenai for at least 10 of the 20 years it fished.

So in 1990 I get a call from my friend Ron Swanson who owns the Honda dealership. Honda has just come out with the 1st 'large' 4-stroke motor and he wants me to showcase the product. Yahtzee. I ended up running two different motors and went 10 years without buying an outboard. Going to the Honda was one of the best and biggest changes of my guide career, it was like when I quit smoking, big Ju Ju. It was quiet, it didn't smoke, it was frugal on gas, it trolled smoothly...I had the best stuff on the river, no doubt, and to be a spokesman for Honda was huge...I'd arrived, I'm a full blown, go to, professional guide.

Well, thats a short trip through the first 25 years or so. What started out as me dodging work turned into a lifetimes pursuit....ahh....but I'm still dodging work...and pretty successfully I'd say. So please come back to the blog next week and I'll run through this last decade and the Minnow 4.

Busy Work

2011-10-26T13:43:00.000-07:00

The other day I built this collage. I was trying to use up the ink in my printer ( so that I can use my new scanner and show you next week pictures from the Kenai 30 years ago)....(the scanner that Sam left) and this sunset compilation is something I'd been wanting to do, I might just lead the world in sunset pictures....and it kind of matches my mood, I've been in a bit of a funk lately. I guess I'm just having a hard time getting used to the idea that of the the 3 people I love the most 2 of them are not in Alaska with me anymore. Part of it I guess is the frustration of love, no matter how much you want, how well you know, whatever you'd do to make it happen, you can't make other people happy and have a good life, they have to do it themselves. All you can do is make yourself happy and hope that it is a foundation for all you love. It kind of blends in with the truth or relationships, as close as MP and I are, as much as I think I know her and can sense her....well, I ain't her and she ain't me and I really don't and never will really know for certain what she thinks and what she goes through, but I wish I could. Am I rambling? I'll get over it , I just wish I could do more for Sam right now.

So doctor Jeff prescribes a regime of busyness to help me over these temporary blues. I've been doubling up on my gym time although today I was forced to stop lifting with some kind of deep muscle pull in my bi-cep, it'll heal, I always do. On Friday I'm installing new carpet in the master bedroom and replacing a window with a crack in that has bothered MP for the 15 years we've lived in this house. I cleaned out the wood stove in the sauna. And the other day I built this bottle tree which will be a nice addition to the eclectic mix of things we have here at Mile 14. As you can see we have a modest start on the bottles and I think its going to be ultra cool.....so yesterday when shopping for a bottle of wine to go with supper we were looking at bottle colors rather than varietals and cost.....mmmmm... this could get weird. I found my self looking in the recycle bin at the dump, theres gotta be some red bottles somewhere.

MP loves her birds, the nut hatchers and chicadees, the Jay birds and woodpeckers. So as she got out the feeder that Dick Hahn built for her 10 years ago I got to thinking that the birds might not notice but it looked a little rough. But the birds liked it so I built a spanking new one with the same dimensions as the old one. MP was impressed, she didn't even ask me to do it. I guess maybe thats why my Mexican buddies call me mon da lon, man who wears apron.

So I'm staying busy. busy body = busy mind. I'm going to lay off the weight lifting until my arm feels better and I'll concentrate on cardio exercise and losing some body fat. I'll practice my music, watch the series, take a sauna, write the blog, order some surf fishing tackle, cook supper, just keep busy, no worries....I might even do the dishes...So come back in a week, when I get this scanner figured out I'm going to post pics of fishing back in 'the good ole days'. I'll print pics of my first few boats and the fish they brought in. I'll bet I can even find some pics and history of this place right here.....mile 14, Kenai River Alaska.

Moving On...Ya don't know, until ya go

2011-10-18T16:58:00.000-07:00

Even after 40 years in Alaska I'll never get used to the transient nature of the people here. You forge new friendships...and they leave for the 48, of all the people I started with in Alaska I can only name a few that are still here. Some came with a plan, make their North Slope money and then buy that ranch in the states or retire to Arizona. Some people just have to move on, they 've been in Alaska too long, they wonder what its like in the real world....that's the case I guess with that guy right there, my youngest son Samuel John.

Having grown up in the military I wanted my kids to have the kind of community continuity that I never had. To live in one place and to have known people there entire lives. I think that's part of this deal, part of this Alaska love-hate-gotta go-be right back syndrome. My oldest son Maxwell Steven is already in the 48, Sams leaving next week for the Seattle area, which to me is way better than the first plan that was to go to Los Angeles. While going to college he did several semesters at Northern Arizona in Flagstaff and that was just enough taste of it that he never forgot that he wanted more, like my first summer working the cannery in Kenai I guess. So after working different jobs and getting his degree from UAA he's out of here, wander lust at work and I understand entirely, after all, theres a big old interesting world out there and Sam needs to challenge it and himself. But Alaska is a special place, its hard to get started here and for some harder to leave. Let me tell you what I've learned about that whole deal.....

Personally I figure that I haven't really lived here as much as I've accomplished it. When I came to Soldotna I jokingly told people "ya better get used to me cause I ain't leavin". The sacrifice and hard work, not to mention the heart ache that it took to work through our youth and land here at Mile 14 is way too much to gamble away with the notion I could live somewhere else....but for Sam, its perfect, the right time in his life to find things out just as me and MP did when we moved here.

I think Alaskans, born and bred like Samuel John sometimes don't do so well in the 48, it is different you know. Looking around my old home State of Montana I think of the hunting and fishing opportunities and I see all the fences it feels like you'd be fishing in somebodies yard . I'm in town and I look around and instead of seeing nothing that man has made I see only what he has. I look around the city and I wonder what are the chances of running into somebody I might know like happens so routinely here in Slowdotna. I guess I'm also a bit naive, I've never really seen poverty or even poorness of spirit, it bothers me and I see it in the city..... I'm always amused at how the city boundaries are delineated by only a sign, before it and after it looks the same but its new town, new school district, new politics, new social order, new issues....here in Alaska all that is so much easier to spot. In the city you go for walks, here its a hike.

So we're doing all we can to help make this transition as 'seamless' as possible as they say in the white collar world . We talked Sam into shipping his car rather than drive the Alcan as winter approaches but it occurred to me that deprived him of some of the adventure. That was his concession to me, so I wouldn't be so nervous about the trip. His old store manager has house in Tacoma where he'll hang his hat and find a job and follow his passion for micro brews. We have family and many good friends like Dick and Lorreta in the area so thats a comfort as well.....but jeez....we're going to miss that bi-yearly drive to Soldotna to get his oil changed by the old man. We're going to miss Turkey Day. We're going to miss....him. Oh, did I tell you he plays a pretty darn good lead guitar and well, that I'm going to miss....

So being a musician and a little consumer orientated Sam has some pretty cool stuff that I get temporary custody of like a Fender Strat and this Line 6 amp. Its Line FlexTone 3 which is as cool as it gets. A lot of musicians favor the old 'tube type' amps for sound quality and effects. Well this amp has a computer in it that mimics any and all of the 'classic' sounds, if you want it to sound like an old Fender Princeton from my Jr. High days or a Marshall Stack from my last rock concert you just turn it to it...walla. The dogs scared of it and I think MP hates it but me....I'm liking that real good... In a godda divida baby....Well, I'll take good care of it Sam, happy trails and I'd bet you'll still get that alcan drive in, if not soon, someday. I've seen that part of the syndrome many times to.

Rag Top Days

2011-10-10T18:32:00.000-07:00

8:30 at night at Thrifty car Rentals its 95 degrees. I tell the guy I really need a car with a sun roof, he say he's got the ' ultimate sunroof ' for me, a spankin new Mustang convertible, yahtzee. We've only been in Vegas 25 minutes and we're winning already. I know a lot of you go to Vegas and everybody does it different but I'll give you bit of a primer on how we do it.

For us the car is a must, I get restless feet and driving in the desert with many different real roads to choose from is one of my favorite things....and it saves you money, lots of money. MP snapped this pic of me in the car just a smilin away. The thing that jumped out at me was those earlobes, we've got them in the family. Some families have height or a red hair gene but us Kings we've got ear lobes. With gravity hard at work the days going to come when I can tuck them babies into my shirt...or use them to keep my balance like a tight rope walker with his pole.....Ah, but about Vegas.... We stay at a place called the GrandView which is right next door to the SouthPoint Casino. The place is ultra nice. We trade a timeshare so for us its about 100 bucks a night, full kitchen, jetted oval hot tub, two tv's and free ice. HOT TIP, go to Hotels.com and get this place for 77 bucks a night, its great value.

One of the first places we took the Mustang was out to see the new Bridge over the Colorado River. Anybody that's been to Hoover Dam knows that the old way was a log jam, you drove over the two lane dam and people were every where and well....we needed another route. But I think once they started on this baby and realised the scope of the project they saw an opportunity to renew America's sense of accomplishment, a little national pride in what we can achieve, still. After all, our country has been through a lot lately. Well, it worked because this deal is spectacular and as we walked on it and viewed it and I looked around at all the folks from different cultures and nationalities I was taken with some patriotism, I felt good. We've got people who are thinking and I think we can bridge just about anything we chose to....we just gotta chose.

Being the fishin musician there were two stops that are mandatory, the Bass Pro Shops and the Guitar Center which is the best guitar shop in the universe, at least my universe. The day we were there they had a special Gibson Les Paul promotion going on and they had literally hundreds of them. Add in the Martins, vintage Fenders, high end Taylors and they had more value than many small countries. So I bought some DeAddario strings in light gauge which is new to me and some picks....but I sure liked googling over those Gibsons, it would have drove my buddy Stan Kluth nuts.

The Bass Pro shop is a fisherman's Mecca. I was really hoping that MP would find some shoes and clothes to buy so I could linger. But as it was we had to run but I was able to get 2 and 3 ounce casting metal for Mexico and some shirts for my fishing team there, team X, the most misunderstood fishing team in Mazatlan.

I'm kind of a research guy and as one of us has some appreciation for the arts and natural history a few days later found us at the Clark County Museum out In Henderson. This is an undiscovered jewel and worth the drive, let me tell you.... try finding something really , really cool in Vegas for two bucks, when you do , let me know. We started back 10,000 years ago when this Dire Wolf populated the valley and worked up to the recent history and development of Las Vegas. This guy was one knarly looking dud.

Before we got outside to the mini town MP and I had our horoscopes done on an old carnival type machine. It only cost a nickel. What amazed me was what it said, you know me, theres no coincidences in my life, I think its all of purpose. So , you can imagine how I felt about this....

The Clark County museum (where I got to meet Mark the expert from the reality show Pawn Stars) has collected homes from each decade of Vegas past and furnished them with all the trappings from that era. Very cool. That TV on the left, my folks had one real similar to, kinda put a lump in my throat as I remembered watching Kennicott Theatre on Friday night while my folks were at the Officers Club and my sister watching me and having boyfriends over at the same time. And oh...I always got a Pot Pie or a TV dinner on a real TV tray on that night.

The houses were just open for you to walk through so the 'honor system' is alive and well at least in one place in this old world. Some of the kitchens reminded MP of her family and for some reason in one house I flashed on my aunt Elsa who really wasn't my aunt at all but loved us like she was and used to make us tee-shirts with dinosaurs Magic Markered onto them.

The building looked like a regular street in the 50's, Mayberry USA. There was a print shop and a small campground as well as a wedding chapel where these two lovebirds were getting hitched. Now if any of you that are anywhere near my age can't remember people who looked sooooo much just like this, you're just not trying. I got to thinkin.....mmmm......Karen and Woody, Tom and Jan, Jeff and.....actually that guy looks just like Tom Hansen who sang Color My World at our wedding.

On our past Vegas trips we've done just about all there is to do....or so I thought. We'd been to the Grand Canyon, Red Rocks, Valley of Fire and we even drove up to Rachel Nevada home of Area 51 to look for UFO's a few years ago, we didn't see any. So this year it was off to Death Valley. Its impressive for sure. In this pic of me and MP you can see the vastness of the Valley that must have left the pioneers wondering....how in the hell am I going to get over there? But me, I got to wondering just how they got over those mountains on the other side once they drudged over miles of salt flats.

As we drove by a place called Badwater from out of nowhere this coyote appeared. mmmmmm, somethings wrong here we decide, he just doesn't seem wild. Well, its National Park syndrome I'd say, this guy knows we're tourists and at some time somebody gave him a sandwich so his job now is begging. So much for the Wylie Coyote. Living at Mile 14 I've seen many coyotes and I'll admit that they're curious and sometimes bold....but this was out of control, he circled the car, he gave us the old sad eyes routine, that behavior in Alaska would have earned him a trip to the taxidermist. Healthy looking bugger ain't he?

Death Valley was very cool. We drove a couple one way scenic drives, one at a place called the Artists Palette and another at a Borax mining district. Like I've said before the desert is a bit like the ocean, you can see a long ways and with a trained eye, its all different. As we left the park we came across one of my favorite things, an old worn out and leaning farm building. I've taken a lot of these picks through the years and I wonder what the attraction is.....I guess it underlines something I learned about permenance so many years ago. There was a building like this on Portage flats on the way to Anchorage that was damaged in the 64 earth quack. I watched it lean and lean and lean more as the years went on. Then one day when we drove by it was down, done....just a reminder. And yup, I'm leaning left, just trying to help out that old building.

Naturally I did some fishing, albeit in a virtual manner. Because the weather was rainy on a few days we did a bit more gambling than we probably should have, but no worries, we really didn't lose too much. This machine here was a Behive of activity at SouthPoint Casino. 8 people all fish together, kind of party boat style. When one angler gets the right fish it triggers a feeding frenzy and the bite is on, pretty exciting.

So holy moly....MP is playing the 'Fishing in Paradise' game and you know what swims by. What do I like the best? the holy grail of surf fishing, pez Guyo, the Roosterfish. Wow, that thing is flat gorgeous, the prettiest thing in the sea. Its gotta be a message, a prediction, a show of faith....we're going to have a Roosterfish bite this year in Mazatlan, its obvious.

We're back at Mile 14 now and it actually feels pretty good. Its really warm for October so MP's happily doing lawn work as I type the blog. In this week I learned that to an Alaskan 100 degree weather sounds better than it really is. I learned that its possible to gain a pound a day. I learned it rains everywhere, even the desert. And I'll admit something else I learned....a week with me and a convertible gets a little intense for my best friend, she needs a little 'quiet' time here at Mile 14.

Death Valley Days

2011-10-07T10:48:00.000-07:00

I wanted to make a quick post, its going to be a few days before I'm in front of a real keyboard....thats when I'll make full report, and trust me, theres a lot to report. Right outside of Vegas is a Geological formation and State Park called Red Rocks. I think it was put there by the casinos so folks could get away, but not for to long. Well, Red Rocks ain't good enough for me and runnin buddy so yesterday we toured the Death Valley. If you've never been you'd be surprised by a lot of things there, like the wildlife, the vistas and the way the temprature changes 20 degrees in 20 miles...its an extreme place, and thats why I like it. Come back in a few days, I've got pictures of Road runners, coyotes and ........

Basic Economics, Vegas Style

2011-09-30T06:11:00.000-07:00

We've got a time share in Whitefish Montana that we bought from MP's mom who bought it from my mom. We've never been there. From what I garner in my travels, timeshares are not the best investment and this one is no exception, it cost 500 bucks a year along with the RCI membership and then if you trade for another location its 189.00.....so its about 700 bucks to use it somewhere else....like we did for Max and Sam in Mexico last year and Tom and Angel the year before and.....well, we just need to use that darn thing ourselves, after all, we don't want to 'lose' a week we already paid for. We might spend a ton of lettuce in Vegas next week but by jiminy we ain't going to waste a week of RCI.

Someone once said that Vegas is the perfect metaphor for America....its electric, its expensive, and you always lose. Well, I don't know about that but it does certainly teach you what money is all about, or what I think its all about anyway. We really don't gamble much but one night we will and that night we usually spend some money, then the next morning you're looking for a 2 dollar buffet.....mmmm.....whats that all about? For me the gambling has always been a real casual thing but this year I'm doing it different, I think its a matter of attitude. Every morning as I get ready to go fishing I'm 100% sure, I'm certain, confident that we're going to catch fish so why not apply that same mind set to the gambling? But part of my confidence in fishing comes from the work and preparation I've put into it so I've done the same this year with the gambling by practicing my blackjack on the computer an hour a day. I'm pretty comfortable with the basic strategy, so we'll just see....

One of the things we like about Vegas is the desert views, its expansive and a little bit like being on the ocean that way. We also like the quirkiness of the whole area. Like this ponderosa pine cell phone tower....now that's some great thinking, blends right in with the terrain don't it? We love to hike in the desert so this year we're going to investigate Death Valley. This pic of me was taken about as close as we've gotten to Death Valley at a place called Tecopa we discovered where theres a wonderful natural hot springs. I know that thing looks to being leaning to the right but its really me leaning towards the left as always.

Theres a place few people know about called 'The Springs' right in downtown Vegas. Its an old spring fed ranch that was preserved for desert education. It has all the flora and fauna of the area as well as history where I got to meet these Mormon city fathers.

Usually by October 1st its starting to look like winter here at Mile 14. But this year its different, we've only had one frost and the fall colors as well as the fishing just keeps lasting. I took this pic to show you, its the hay field of our friend Abby's right around the corner from my house. Notice that line along the trees that stands out so well....its just the maximum height that our moose can reach and as you can see they pretty much cause this 'tunnel type of effect along all the roads and open areas of our town. So we're leaving this view for a week, trading a 50 degree high for the day for a 90 degree....but its a dry heat eh? Come back, me and MP should have some adventures to report in a few days.

I know you've seen this shot many times, its my everyday Jet-dog walk....beautiful.

Remember that time we.....

2011-09-24T11:45:00.000-07:00

Me and Mpeasy pulled into Soldotna in an old blue dodge pick-up in July of 1977. We were headed south to see our old friend Walt Larson in Anchor Point when a pretty red step-side Ford pulled up close behind us honking the horn and flashing its lights.....mmmmm......two guys and they're wearing cowboy hats....So, being fresh up from Montana I'm figurin theres some kind of road rage problem or they're drunk and want to fight, I just don't know, but I pull over and tell MP I'll take care of it and to stay in the truck. Well that guy right there , Tommy Rosin and his brother Orin jump out of the truck saying "he man, where you from ? we're from Billings". I told them the 5 on my license plate meant we were from Helena and that's how we started a 30 year friendship. Before I started guiding I fished with Tom and Orin a lot. I played music at the Maverick club with his brother Orville who had a gorgeous J-45 Gibson. Tom plumbed the houses that we built when I worked for the Passe's so I was just absolutely tickled when he walked up and got in my guide boat the other day for a trip that the Cabaret, Hospitality and Restaurant Association had arranged for their state convention. The other guys might have gotten a bit bored listening to old times but I don't think so, we caught a lot of fish and it was good to catch up with Tommy. Thanks buddy, that's what we like about our small town living......continuity.

So the next day I got to follow up by fishing with one of my favorite people in the entire hemisphere, Jim Bennet. Jim is the funniest and funnest guy I've ever known and his zest for life is legendary here in Soldotna. Jim is a cancer survivor and is active in the awareness movement, he volunteers at the Hospital, he's president of the Dog Obedience group, he's an Elk and just an all around community supporter....just the kind of guy that inspires me and that I want to be around. He's also a pretty darn good fisherman who's good deeds seem to translate into to good Karma driven moe-joe.It was the last trip of the season on my books so to end it with Jim and my friend Kevin Fuze was pretty darn cool. When Jim owned Signal communications he hired me yearly for his friends and employees, pretty much put my kids through college he did so here's a big thanks to you J.B....me and MP love ya....

Thats a pic of Jesse who caught his first ever salmon with me this week. My friend Greg Smith with Repsol ( the Spanish oil company) had business here and snuck in some fishing with the guys. His friend John in the pic below is retiring so it was a fishing send off for a guy who's a real outdoors man. We kept 9 silvers as you can see which is short of the limit but we released several as they guys wanted a good full day of fishing, and with the sunny weather and beautiful fall colors who wouldn't want to fish 8 or 9 hours. It was great.

So unless I get a call for silver fishing next week its a wrap for salmon in the season of 2011. Of course I hope to get a call as the fishing is really holding up well this year and I've just been enjoying it so but if I don't I'll winterize the boat and stow the rods. Theres no getting around it, Kings were a struggle this year but we had absolutely exceptional silver fishing. I met some really cool people and many of my old friends were around. I had a little speed bump with my health which kind of puts things into perspective for a guy...I end the season feeling good, knowing I gave it all 100% effort, its all I can do....

Please come back to Mile 14, we might not be salmon fishing for 7 months but I guarantee we're going to do some catching. Catchin life, catchin fun, catchin love, catchin on and probably some other fish to....

My Three Sons

2011-09-19T11:43:00.000-07:00

Nate, Doug, Nate and Andrew....my buddies...and they know how to stage a pic eh? Once a year the guys try to get together here at Mile 14 for a camp out and a trip for silvers. This year the fishing reminded me of my high school basketball career, it was interesting. We had lots of nibble, nibble, nibble, jerk....no fish. We had lots of nibble, nibble, nibble,nibble, jerk, fish-on... fish off. We had quiescent period of two full hours....But we ralleyed a bit late in the day and got a decent catch for supper. Leave it to Nate to grab the 'petite' model from the box, trust me there was a bigger salmon he could have used for the pic. These guys love the time together and for me its the best of the year, we talk sports (Red Sox guys ), we talk Vegas, we talk family.....and how many guides get a gift of a Maine license plate for the collection and a 2 pound bag of licorice? Thanks guys and I'm going to try the Pai Gao poker for sure...

There must be something to it here at Mile 14 because these two guys, Hans and Kurt come all the way from Frankfurt Germany just to stake claim to that picnic table and bank fish for a week. They caught their limit of silvers on a trip with me but they also caught some gorgeous salmon right from the bank....who needs that guide anyway eh? One day they caught 5, pretty darn good I'd say. When they were here last time Hans confided to me that Kurt had lymphatic cancer and the trip was his swan song. Well they show up and Kurt tells me he's beaten the cancer and for all the friends I've lost I'm just over joyed to see a win....very cool. They come every two years so stay healthy guys and we'll leave the light on.

I'm kind of the caretaker of Geno / Pauley's boat and yesterday it was time to put it to bed for the winter so MP and I figured we better run the boat and maybe catch supper while we're at it. So we run the boat 2 miles upriver where Nate and us surrounded the salmon the day before but the boats were all anchored and lined up so we troll around them. Walla, it takes exactly 5 minutes and MP has this salmon on the end of her line....its magic. We land him, project finished, when we get home we'd only missed two innings of the Boston - Tampa Bay game....speaking of which Nate, The way that series went its a good thing your team is at Baltimore today, couple more Tampa games and it could be 'lets wait for next season'.

So we had an 'All Alaska' supper. One fillet I put a little wasabi mayo with dill on it ( dill is a great spice for salmon if you ask me) and the other fillet got a nice basting of garlic olive oil with basil. I grill them babies meat side down for a bit and then turn them to the skin side and apply my toppings. then we have a fresh cole slaw from the garden and I cut up some tomatoes and cukes as well....oh baby.... As I was cooking I got to looking around a bit and even though most of the flowers and veggies have run their course theres still surprises here at the boat launch. I noticed these strangely purple flowers that MP says are kind of rare thing called a shoe-fly and of course the blue flowers on top are lobelia.

And thanks to my friend Harry Thomas from Massaschuttes ( hope spell checker gets that one for me) who sent us the seeds we have several gorgeous sunflowers. They're kind of the story of Alaska summers I'd say. They're really impressive but difficult to grow, then they don't last long once they flower and they seem to want to tip over, ya know they're just difficult and like Alaska they look....well....unusual, just different.

Back in the Game

2011-09-14T07:13:00.000-07:00

After sitting on my hands for a few days due to a river scene like this we're out fishing again in nice clear Kenai colored water....but, its awful high for this time of year. The rain that I reported on last week was enough at the headwaters to make the river jump up and just barely miss a full blown flood stage down here at Mile 14. The silver fishing itself remained a bit catchy but for several days it just wasn't entirely safe to be out there with all the floating debris. You hit a log, it kills the motor, you end up in a sweeper, boats over, you're swimming....bad deal. So I had 3 canceled trips, my friend Tom Riette is a local guy who can fish anytime so we figure discretion was the better part of valor and we'd do it another time. I have to say I was shocked here at the boat launch to several of our guides leave for fishing in the dark to 'get their spot' with all the logs floating down the river....fish ain't that important, period.

The graph at right shows you where we are. The pyramids at the bottom are the average flow for this time of year. Once again I'll tell you this is the coolest info and its nice to see a real usable use of our government funding. Just google USGS real time stream flow data and then add the Kenai to your favorites. Every morning I go to this page to check our conditions and then go to the NOAA weather forecast....which has to be the most conservative forecaster on the Internet. According to NOAA the best it EVER gets around here is 'partly sunny'.

So we have two more weeks of fishing to go here at Mile 14. I have my friend and confidant Nate Morton coming this weekend and next week I have friends and even a double day booked where we're doing a trip for the Cabaret and Bar owners Association. With the high water we kind of have to re-learn the fishing trends a bit so yesterday with a fun group of folks from Australia we did our research and frankly didn't do quite as well as we're used to. We caught them but didn't set any records....but I'm confident we're going to make the lines tug real good in the next few days.

Great smile huh?....thanks Jere, you're a cooool a guy. So please come back to the blog and we'll wrap up the fishing and then a road trip to Las Vegas via a side road to Death Valley and more. Then we'll do a little bird hunting and...well....have fun. As we approach 20,000 reads I gotta thank you all, pretty cool to have you with me.

Limits

2011-09-05T07:17:00.000-07:00

This week was defined by limits.....we caught many limits of silvers and on several occasions met our limit of rain. On Weds I did a fundraiser trip for our friends at the Kenai Watershed Forum, from this picture of Mike you can see just how wet it was. The guys from Utah arrived with nice Gore Tex rain gear but to me it was definitely a vinyl rain gear day. We started as usual at O dark thirty and it took until 11:30 or so to catch our limit, so we fished about 4 and 1/2 hours....when we broke up for the day the guys said they really enjoyed the first two hours.

We also had our limit of seals, they're everywhere. The Kenai has the last salmon to come into the Cook Inlet basin so every savy seal in South Central Alaska is right here this time of the year. When they are around it effects the bite, the silvers ares spooked and swimming fast. We frequently see them with fish in there mouths and yesterday I saw one try and take a fish off an anglers hook. In other parts of the world the local fisheries managers might be wondering about their impact on the overall silver run. But not here, those guys are way to busy tracking radio tagged salmon and refilling the coffee pot...So I figure we have at any given time 50 to 100 seals in the lower river X maybe 5 silvers a day for dinner = maybe an average of 350 fish a day @ 30 days =10,500 dead cohoes which should = a little notice by the Dept of Fish and Game...HELLO guys....Kenai River Calling....

One morning as it was getting light I was struck by the beauty enough to take this picture. I guess its kind of the human condition that we get used to just about everything so I try to stay conscience of that and reaffirm my love for this deal every so often. This morning the tide was up and the water just weirdly flat, there was just a slight misty fog laying on the water and the mountain was just peaking over the trees illuminated with a hint of alpenglow ....gorgeous....

I have a rule....I never tell people what to do or not do and I never get to finicky with the gear, after all this stuff may cost a lot but they're only tools to be used for harvesting salmon. BUT, this deal here is an illustration of what NOT to do with your guides fishing rods. Believe it or not, and it tested my limits, I didn't say a word about it, I just retrieved the anchor line myself after we let go for the next fish. Its also an illustration of why I'm a Lamiglass guy, these rods are ultra tuff. I think the Loomis brand is the most popular here but 30 years ago my first expensive rod was a Lamiglass and...well....you know how I am about loyalty. They work for me and I work for them, buy Lamiglass, its the best.

Here at Mile 14 we've kind of raised up those two young eagles that I always report on. They've become a fixture around here and we finally have them eating at the table, how refined. But, we're still working on their table manners because after this deal is done you don't really want to sit down and have a hot dog at that table, its a little gross. But theres still plenty of season left and I figure theres time for training before they have to leave for a winter at the dump.

OK, OK, here's a dead fish picture. My friends Jay and Lesley Gammel with two cohoes that were caught virtually at the same time. It rained the entire morning and when Les caught our last fish to limit out at 10:00 I was a pretty darn happy fishing guide. We went to the house and cleaned the fish, I cleaned and gassed the boat, took off 5 layers of polar fleece and hung them up to dry. Then I sat on the recliner feeling the warmth of the house while still wearing my merleti smart wool long johns and fell instantly asleep, I call it 'old guide syndrome'....Hope you guys all have as good a week as I'm gonna...

Home Land Defense

2011-08-29T18:16:00.000-07:00

Well, we were awoken twice this last week at 2 am by Jet-dogs no B.S. bark. Once for about a 600 pound brown bear in our yard and once by a spotlight from a State Trooper searching the grounds here at Mile 14. It seems that at our local meth-crack-rip off- lazy bum house someone went missing and the person that called the Troopers left him with the impression that she might have gone to the river. We've been through 3 years of hell with these people, the kid who is in his mid 20's has been arrested 10 times and is awaiting trial on a felony drug charge. The mom is in a methadone program. The house has frozen up and theres no sanitation. There was shooting at the house 2 years ago. They're 86'd from our property but defiant....so me and MP figured it was time to go to defcon 4.....and do some shooting of our own.

It turns out MP's a pretty darn good shot. We have a personal protection piece that was passed down to us, Woody used to call it a 'bean'. So as you can see from the next photo we have MP pretty well 'qualified' as the experts would say. The X'd holes are hers and the rounded holes are mine. She keeps the bean close by and I'm pretty confident that we have the neighbor intimidated enough that he wouldn't try anything and if he did he could get himself shot real easy.

So we shot off 50 rounds or so about cocktail hour so the neighbor could hear and it was fun....but things just change in our world and not only don't TV sets last like they used to but they're not as fun to shoot up either. The old tube type would explode and throw glass around, this 1500 dollar Visio just kinda layed there....very disappointing. Oh, don't buy that brand, it was only 4 years old.

I don't know if its because of the intensity of my July or the fact that I'm 58 years old but time just seems to be scootin right by. The leaves here already have a hint of yellow on them and on our bike ride we came across the following sign. So wherever you're reading this blog entry from just be glad you're not seeing these temps yet. Folklore here says that the snow will be as deep as the Fireweed is high and with temps like this in august...well....bring er on, winters coming. And ahh....well....I gotta hurry with the rest of this blog so I can buy Vegas plane tickets for October, we're fighting back.

On that same bike ride we came across this system of bank fishing. Only on the Kenai could you see something this cool and with such good success. The guys use our habitat friendly elevated platform at the bridge to walk along as their bobbers float through what us guides call 'the frog water'. What a deal, bank fishing with exercise, I might give it a try myself next week.

I don't suppose the Chamber of Commerce ever expected a scene like this on their beautifully crafted deck project but I think its ultra cool.

This fellow here proudly showed me his catch, 2 silvers in 20 minutes....yikes....don't be telling everybody that, I need a job. But as I spoke with him the coolest thing was what he said about his fishing partner who was yet to catch one. " He doesn't fish so good but I just love to fish with him....he's like...family". Well, that put the whole fishing deal into perspective for me. As I snapped pics and talked to the guys MP stood her distance and looked a little annoyed that I was chatting fish....well, thats me, its what I do.

Its the first time I really looked at our new bridge. The next pic I just liked the focus of it and the turquoise of the water. Then I got to noticing the custom rock work on the pilaster in the middle of the river. Now thats pretty cool but really, c'mon, do we need custom work on the bridge pier? Do you think most people notice? Do you think maybe thats kinda how we got 400 zillion trillion in debt?

I started back in the gym today. I have to do a preemptive strike on my body weight....cause I'm eating soooo good. The procedures have made my throat feel new, even fluids are going down easier. But, I have a peptic ulcer so I'm on a lifetime Prilosec routine and I think my tanqueray martini days are finito. The situation in the neighborhood is well known and the Troopers say they're on top of it. So no worries really, I'd rather not have to worry about being robbed but rest assured we have it covered....home land defense and the jet-dog.

Ya think it'll rain ?

2011-08-21T16:42:00.000-07:00

You don't need a Farmers Almanac to know when its going to rain around here, it ALWAYS rains on two days....the day you go to the Kenai Peninsula Fair and the first day of Little League baseball. On Friday I fished with my old friends Scott and Sue Steffy and it rained buckets with a 25 or 30 mph wind, what I call a 'character builder'. We caught our fish but boy oh boy they were hard earned. The next day found me and my dinner date at the Fair, here's a pic to let you know what we were up against. And oh, that would be a vanilla with white chocolate dip with almond sprinkles bar she's eating.

I'm not usually to much into the veggies and flowers at the fair as we have a wriggly botanical garden right here at Mile 14 but we spent a little time looking. I mean....it was raining. So MP got this pic of me with an English Cuke kind of like the ones we grow. She was a little embarrassed to take the pic but you know me, 'never say wooo in a horse race'. She did however mention that ...and this is a quote " you couldn't look any more ridiculous". Oh well.

This Fair calls itself the 'biggest little Fair in Alaska' and its really come along in the last 30 years or so. I remember when me and Walt Larson used to be kind of rodeo people the bull riders sometimes rode cows. mmmm....well as you can see they have full blown bucking bulls now with horns and all. With the mud this year the rodeo was superb.

We got home and drove down the hill to check on the boat launch and walla, another first, or so we thought. These two eagles were bravely eating the silver carcasses that the gulls leave laying around and they were so dark and huge we thought they were Golden Eagles. So like Marlin Perkins I gave them a stalk and they let me get with 20 feet or so. After looking at the pics we're thinking now that they're Baldies that have molted off their mottled looking feathers of youth. We've been finding alot of feathers around so that's most likely the deal. If any of you know anymore about it than me just chine in here, we need to know.

On Wednesday I fished with Doug Bryant and his dad Matt, who incidentally has the same throat problem as me. We had our limit of silvers real early and easy so I figured I'd just ride the tide down to the ocean and see how the commercial season is wrapping up. It was a cloudy morning but the horizon was clear so we could see all the volcanoes and I kind of like this pic of the bridge with everyone headed to work with the mountains just peeking over it. Gorgeous.

Two more miles downriver and we come across the old McNeil Libby cannery which dates back to the 1800's. Really cool old buildings that have a soft spot in my heart, I worked the retorts here in the summer of 72. (the retort is the huge walk in pressure cooker for salmon cans) This place has been shut down for about 10 years now and a guy is trying to turn it into a tourist facility, I really hope it works for him.

So I'm cleaning the boat that afternoon and right there in front of me is a sight never before seen by me...Alaska Dept of Fish and Game employees floating a NET right through our backyard. Yikes. I guess these guys just don't get it. They obviously are researching something...but with a &$%@# net? I guess one way to know whats down there is to kill it....c'mon guys we gotta do better than that. It reminds me of trout population study done back in the 80's with electro shock. Our people would throw direct current into the river and up would float hundreds of trout to count. My friend and fellow fishing guide Bill Gavin saw that the bigger fish were all dieing of a broken back. It turns out that the the bigger the fish the more current they get and the end result is the scientific death of the broad stock, our best spawners. Right now the few King salmon that are around are trying to spawn, I'm thinking we need every single one of them to be successful...so you ADF&G guys STOP it with the NET. Period.

The other day a guy at launch asked me where he could see a bear. I told him just spend the night at my house. Its now routine that Jet-Dog wakes us up and the brownies have come up from the river to look for food, they're obviously habituated to our place. When the launch is quiet they eat the same carcasses as those two Eagles were, in the woods below the house there are piles of fish bones and trails that look like highways, this morning we had fresh bear steamer all over the road. The first pic below is where the brownies come up and down from the river. Then as if they weren't enough to deal with , when me and MP rode our bike this morning we find these black bear tracks right down the middle of the road in the subdivision. Yikes, I'm feeling like Dr. Dolittle. So I'm keeping both the gun and the camera close, hopefully I'll get a pic for you soon.

One thing you get used to in Alaska is having your friends move away. Dick and Loretta Hahn first met us in the mid 80's and then retired to Slowdotna. But things change which is good I guess and they moved to Squim Washington. So they came up for a week and we went fishing for the 131st time. Fishing was a bit off for us that day but we caught some and just as important, caught up. Thanks for coming Hahny's we love ya.....

Duck Soup

2011-08-15T06:33:00.000-07:00

That's a saying I use that means 'easy' or things are going really good. I'm not quite sure where I got that but it certainly applies to how things went here this week at Mile 14. I had a week of the best people and trips I've ever experienced. I started the week fishing with my new friend Jesse Flamme from LaCrosse Wisconsin. He and his girlfriend Karma (you know you've got it going on when you have a girlfriend named Karma!) like to travel and in Jesse style started their Alaska adventure with the unusual....which I like....flying into Fairbanks instead of Anchorage. So they got plenty of road time and saw a lot of our state. I don't think Jesse got as much fishing in as he'd like as I could tell just by the way he holds the rod that he fishes a ton, but he took it for the team a bit and toured Karma. Jesse's Kenai trip delivered the trifecta, a limit of silvers, some trout and a nice 40 pound King landed on 12 pound test. Now you might think this silver is a bit on the petite side but Jesse is 6'9" and weighs 340....honest.

I also had the pleasure of seeing my old friends Dick and Loretta Hahn again and they fished with a friend of my sisters named Trina Richardson. It was weird, we spent the day talking about Kenai in the 1970's...which was a pretty cool time and place. I also got to fish with Greg Mito and his mom and dad, Ryan, Pat and his teenage daughter Tati. Greg is one of the guys who's hauling the mail for us, he's in the Air force stationed at Elmendorf. He's a great guy who's always happy on the water and his mom caught her first salmon ever, pretty cool.....

Many a time I've floated between the buoys at mile 8 that mark the sonar transducers location and wondered just what the heck was down there. I mean I constantly hear all July that the counts are this or that....Its a Diston sonar or a Bendix...its calibrated or not...its working or not... duel beam or single beam...it cost 4 million....I mean that's one mysterious piece of hardware. Well on top of everything else this week that mystery was solved, there she is , the brain center of King salmon management on the Kenai River. mmmmmm....Now I was a bit disappointed. It doesn't really look like anything I'd trust my financial future with but what the hey...Its gotta be a whole lot higher techer than it looks. But, theres no getting away from the fact that it does look a bit like something in your basement next to the furnace.

I've seen Bald Eagles do just about anything Eagles do I'd guess. I've seen them soar, mate, fish, nest and nest build. I've seen them fight and screech and we even had ground dwellers here at Mile 14 this spring. But this deal the other day I've never seen. An Eagle stretching or drying his wings...or what?

That guy sat in that tree and held the pose for an hour and me and Hahny speculated on just what he was doing. It could have been that he was so surprised by the 3 days straight of sunny warm weather that he just lost track of what eagles do. But fishing was kind of slow here so I moved the boat downriver a couple miles and what do you suppose we run into?....yep, another eagle behaving exactly the same way.

This one here had the same pose as you see on the Nazi eagle of World War 2 so I guess maybe its not all so unusual. I don't know why they do it....I'm just glad they do.

On Thursday I go in to have my throat dilated for the second time. Being an old pro at this deal I'm not as anxious about as I was before. I'll get gassed, MP will take me for a chocolate milk shake, I'll sleep 14 hours and then have more ice cream, get up the next day and go fishing...Duck Soup.

Ya gotta have Faith

2011-08-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

On Thursday I had my throat dilated. although I had great apprehension going into the operating theatre it was really no biggy and it worked so well that last night night I had my first meat in almost a month. It was a perfectly grilled tenderloin about 1/2 pound with fresh corn, a ceasers salad and a nice Malbec...we're living good again. Here's a pic of me and my anesthesia nurse Gena, she, the doc, the facility, all of it is fantastic here in the small town of Slowdotna. Thanks everybody.

On Friday after the procedure I had a guy I'll call Joe Blow booked for silver fishing. Well Joe called to check on the fishing and to screen me I guess. Well old Joe was all focused on the 6 red salmon bag limit instead of the two silver bag limit. I explained to him that the silvers are a ball to catch....unlike the reds they actually bite...and jump...and go craaaaazy. So, Joe's giving me a bad vibe and with 30 years of experience you'd think he'd have some trust in me but he didn't. Well, its finally nice to arrive at a place in life where you're truly steering your own ship and I gave him the hook. That's right, I politely told him I might not be the guide for him and good luck filling his freezer.

But the next day (Saturday) I have a big trip planned. A wonderful guy named Les Hamilton who we new we'd love has me booked to fish his entire family. Its me and two other guide boats with kids, grandparents the whole shmeer. Going into it although I've done thousands of silver trips I'm a little nervous, I'd yet to make a silver trip and because of the huge red run our friends in the commercial industry have been fishing almost non-stop to mop up salmon....including our silvers. So I load up the youngest kids and their parents, Ger, Lyndal, Doyle and the 3 year old LaLa who is a miracle child having received a liver transplant shortly after birth and 20 some procedures since, she's the apple of her grandpa's eyes and I can see why. I run the boat downriver until my intuition tells me its the right spot and toss the anchor. We run out a couple Kwikfish for the kids and eggs on the bottom for the adults. Right away Ger says he had a bite. I'm kind of wondering but his eggs are gone so we re bait. It happens again, bite, hook set, no fish, eggs gone. mmmmmm..... I think we have silvers. Its not long and we have our first guided silver salmon of the 2011 season in the boat and I'm a happy guy.

So in true Jethronian style, we limit the boat out, see many seals, have a nice boat ride and finish up just after noon which is just about the right amount of time for kids this age. Perfecto...mucho pescado....mucho sonrisas.

The first silvers here are usually a bit smaller than the later ones but they don't know it, they really fight on the end of the line and that one on the right is an honest 14 pounder. Good work girls. The next pic is the entire Hamilton clan. I was honored to fish with them, they're steady ranch folks from Colorado and it was a great way for me start my silver season.

On Sunday we drove to Kenai and figured we'd check on the commercial fleet. Its ramping down for them and they've had a great season. It looks like we're going to have a good silver run so everybody's happy. I snapped this pic of the idle boats with Mt. ReDoubt in the background. This is the scene that so much spazzazed me 40 years ago when I arrived here....and it still does. I used to commercial fish so in the sport vrs commercial deal I'm real modertate, everybodys gotta live. The nets are up and the management plan calls for us to get the late silvers and we will, two more months of the best fishing of the year. I'm happy, the commercial guys are happy and even those seagulls are happy....everybody's getting their share.

Big or small...kill em all.

2011-08-02T07:04:00.000-07:00

On July 31st at 11:59 p.m. the Kenai River gave out a sigh of relief, King and dip netting season is over. The King run went out with a whimper, the no bait restriction made the last 5 days difficult but we did manage to get some nice fish like this one being lovingly cradled.

Because of the restriction I'm hoping that the run makes its escapement goal, we need these fish to spawn but I kind of have my doubts. The record red run we have makes management so difficult of the smaller runs in a mixed stock fishery. Right now we have 1.42 million reds into the Kenai, the most ever is my guess. When all is said and done it will be records all around, a commercial harvest of around 9 million, a dip net harvest of around 1/2 a million and a sport harvest of around 70,000.....I'm just guessing but I'd bet dollars to donuts the those numbers will be pretty close....anybody see anything jump out in that deal????

With King fishing in high gear and a million sockeyes in the river Mile 14 has been a busy place to say the least. Hers a pic of our parking lot on August 1st, where I'm standing our friend Stan had his fish camp set up with 3 campers and a tarp...as you can see the attraction here is the salmon and not the peace and quiet.

July is just flat intense around here. Its hard work and I like to think I do it gracefully, I think the only day of the entire month that was bit much for me was the 8th, the day I had the procedure and went mano on mano with the seal. One of my tricks for staying focused is I always put a list of goals on my chalk board in the gear shed. It helps keep me on task and reminds me of what I need to do, what I want to do. But I got to realizing that I was only batting about 50% with my goals and some of them were simply unattainable, maybe that's the best kind, when you continually work at it and admit that theres no perfection in your life. So this year I just condensed it down to some important words to notice every day, maybe its an easier way to remind myself of what should happen, maybe. And yes, I know I misspelled perseverance.

I have a few days here to get ready for silvers. I take the trolling motor off the boat and all the King gear goes away. Then I load the smaller nets like the rubber one I use to release trout and load the boat with all we need, bobbers, divers, smaller Kwikfish, spinners and wobblers. The next pics you see will be of my favorite fish, shiney bright Kenai silver salmon...and soon.

Thursday morning I'll be at Central Peninsula Hospital seeing a lot of my friends and having my esophagus dilated, just like before I'll be fishing the next day. Our friend Gena said she'd be my recovery room nurse so when I come out of the fog I'll see a friendly face right off...thats pretty cool. Then me and MPeasy will go the open house / opening of our friend Dr. Craig Humphries Kenai Spine office where the conversation will no doubt get around to why I should chew eggs before I swallow them...oh well....so please, come back next week when I'll have some silver and trout pics up.

WHAT ????

2011-07-25T17:28:00.000-07:00

I was wondering why it was taking so long to get a bill for my emergency procedure at the hospital. Well the bill arrived today and now I know why it took them over two weeks to send it...they're embarrassed. And I would be too if I sent out a bill for two hours that amounted to 7 thousand big ones. I figure they've got a strategy for it all like make sure it arrives on Monday as that's most peoples less favorite day anyway and you let the victim get through the weekend in blissful ignorance. Oh, the 7 G's doesn't include the surgeon.....ah crud, lets get to the fun stuff.

Like this pic of Tom Riette with the King that his granddaughter Shay Lynn caught on Saturday. We were back bouncing the tide water in front of the park and we had a kwikfish on a short leash with the magnum diver that this fish couldn't resist. In fact theres so many of them not being able to resist that starting tomorrow we're going to fish without bait to cut down on the harvest. Now that's not all bad, my boat will be clean and instead of outworking the other guides to produce more fish we fall back on plane old outhouse luck, and you know how lucky I am so no worries....What happened is this, not enough kings and way to many reds = lots of commercial fishing = incidental king harvest = us in river trying to save a few hundred kings by fishing with no bait = commercial fishing continues...Its called management. When alls said and done the forecasted red run of 3 million fish will come in at a handy 10 to 12 million. But even though its taken a toll on our kings this kind of sight is everyday at mile 14, a fish box plum full of Kenai River bluebacks.

And oh....you notice the dip nets that harvested them along the tackle tray. The tackle tray that sometimes holds actual sport fishing gear. Everbody's gotta live I guess but I'll tell you this much...we eat as much red salmon as anyone and ALL of ours are caught with a rod and reel, that's the way we do it...its what we stand for, its what we're all about.

So in the what we're all about department I just had to use this pic of Mack and Carole, it tells the whole story. I know I used them last year in a pic on fishing the crowd but these guys are just so photogenic and so obviously enjoy each other and the fishing that they're my poster kids...and oh, they catch an awful lot of King salmon and let them swim away no worse for wear. And the net....well...thats a 'landing' net, my favorite kind. Must be something to it because I'll bet you all of these boats here would like to use it just like Mack and Carol did.

Thursday I saw Dr. David King. On august 4th at 9 am he's going to knock me out and stick the scope down my throat. He'll trim the scar tissue and then 'dialate' the esophagus where my stricture was to make it bigger. Its basically a balloon that stretches the area and because mine is so abnormally small he might do the procedure 2 or even 3 times in the next month or two. He'll also send off tissue to be biopsied but he says he certain its not tumorous because of the location and the look of it. So, good news eh?.

80 %

2011-07-18T17:38:00.000-07:00

That's about how I was feeling this week, 80%. My throat was so sore from the procedure and because I'm a bit leary of food I went the entire week with fluids only, the right kind of fluids of course. I got my protein from the powder I use when I'm lifting and had my soup and food pulverised. It was brutally tough watching people eating jerky and chips in the boat. So this weekend I went to some soft food and let me tell you...macaroni and cheese never tasted to good.

But even though I was 80% I gave 110 % effort and the Kenai and us had a good week. We caught many kings like this one my friend Charlie Higgins is holding. He told me in June that he was going to keep coming down from Anchorage until he caught one, so once again it looks like I've worked myself out of a job.

I get up at 3:30 every morning and I'm in the boat doing my prep work at 4:00. this week we had huge tides and of course the full moon that causes them. Absolutely gorgeous and what a way to start the day when I'm the first down the hill and soak in the view alone and appreciatively.

But the view I'm getting a little tired of is this one. Three times we had to clean the garbage up after a large brown bear came visiting. We finally got a bear proof dumpster but that doesn't mean much for our peace of mind here at Mile 14. Its a little spooky knowing its the peak of the Red and King season with hundreds of people around, people walking from our place to the gravel bar to fish...and we KNOW theres at least one large brown bear nearby. In the pic you'll notice a nice bear steamer, that's no small poo poo.

MP and I just had to go see it and take a pic. We had to verify I guess what it is that makes you wait 10 minutes in line at the tackle store or not make the first light at the Y intersection. Well, this is it. Dipnetting mania at the mouth of the Kenai river. Thousands of people, thousands ans thousands of fish, thousands of problems...litter, drunks, accidents, conflicts...all the stuff I don't need in my life so we don't go dipnetting. We get our red salmon the old fashion way, sport fishing for them....well actually a friend sport fishes them for us.

Naturally I'm a little concerned for myself. We have a doctors appointment on Thursday and then I'll know when and what the surgery will entail. But I guess I've arrived in the caring department because what I'm most concerned about is the Jet-Dog, she's not doing well. I don't know if its because we're so connected she picks up on it from me or she's injured....and you know she can't talk. Those labs seem to always have a kind of forlorn look but this week her's is different and we can all tell. She doesn't jump into the truck, she sleeps in a different place and doesn't follow me step in and step out as usual. At one point last week she jumped out of my boat and kind of 'fell' up the stairs and maybe that was it. But I'm kind of feeling that's she's had a moment like mine, we're both finally facing the ageing process and the realisation that its not all going to be easy street. Ever since we got Jet I could swear I could sense some wisdom in her eyes, the way she'd look at you and crook her head just a bit. Maybe that's it, realisation...

Saturday for the only time this year I did 2 trips, a 12 hour fishing day. My old friend Stan Kluth came down and he's not a morning person so off we went for the afternoon tide. His wife Barb caught a fish but the best thing was we got to play some music together. Stan is THE most talented natural guitarist I have ever met, he can play it all. So after the day was done and although my throat is raw and I shouldn't be singing, we did. It was short and sweet as I was tired and starving but what a great way to end my week and celebrate my 58th birthday, July 16th....thanks Stan.

Stricture

2011-07-10T16:54:00.000-07:00

Well it all started as I was minding my own business sitting at the helm peeling a hard boiled egg. I eat a lot of eggs for the good protein source and once you get over the fluorescent red smudges from salmon egg cure that end up on them they're pretty darn tasty. Ya know Cool hand Luke ate 52 of them and never had a problem. Right then Sally Brooks rod goes off so I finish peeling and take a bite and swallow then take another bite and swallow. I'm kind of anxious but not really for the fish she has on after all I've seen that deal thousands of time....what I was anxious for was to get this pic of my old friend Sally fighting a fish with her pants down. Like always.

Sally and her husband Bill, (b.s. Brook) have fished with me since the 1980's and this is an every year event. She NEVER buttons the straps on her Helly's and invariably its a goat rope as she flounders around the boat with a fish on. But ya know if some people like to catch fish with their pants down, no worries, I'm with ya on that one. But this turned out to be no ordinary salmon. Sally has caught a lot of big fish and she has this one about worn out when a 150 pound harbor seal comes up 40 feet from the boat with her fish in its mouth, rodman qwickfish lure and all....mmm.....well, the first thing we do is yell a little and then I realize this seal is in pretty shallow water with a gravel bar right behind it. So I run the boat directly at him and he has no escape and our friend Toby Archuleta has the presence of mind to beat on the boat loudly with the fish bonker and walla, the seal lets go and we win. Here's a pic of the first King salmon I've ever seen lose a fight to us and a seal all in the same day.

So the fish is in the box and we set up another troll and I have this heaviness in my throat. For 15 years now I sometimes have dense food seem to get stuck in my esophagus and it always goes away and sometimes I can even kind of swallow with effort to make that happen. Being just smart enough to hurt myself I looked in web MD years ago and diagnosed myself with a common hietal hernia which is a bulge that sometimes traps food.....well, that ain't what I got and this time it wasn't going away. I worked through it for an hour or so and when I realised that I couldn't even drink water it was time to do something. Its all I can do to not panic. The pain is so unusual that if I didn't know, or think I know what it was I'd be calling 911. But instead , Toby calls MP and asks her to be at the launch when we arrive and I pilot the boat home safely albeit a little light headed. MP says, enough of this, you're going to the hospital. She first calls our best friends adult kid Jessie Arthur who works for a good Doc and she says it sounds like you'll end up in an emergency deal anyway so you better just get there. So we do.

I've got a plastic card that's cost me thousands of dollars so we give it to the admittance people and that's a breeze. Having the card is a bit like being a Crown club member with Best Western. They ask me the problem and some how or another it was wrote down as a sore throat so we waited and wait as they had other priority's. Well the doc finally arrives and wouldn't ya know its a guy I know who is also a fishing guide. The first thing he asks is how was the bite today.....hey Bob, I'm semi dieing here OK....he can't really believe my level of discomfort so he asks me to try and drink some Mountain Dew soda. I tell him I can't and he says try anyway. So, I take a big swallow and the world just about ends, I go into convulsions as some is in the airway and my body and throat are locked up. Bob goes to running. In two minutes (after I'm done convulsing) I have an I.V. needle in me and am being given muscle relaxants. I'm on my way to my first ever bona fide surgical procedure.

The doctors agree its a 'stricture' a tightening of tissue that will not allow the passage of food. Within 1/2 hour they wheel me into the operating room and as I'm trying to spit and am choking when they lay me down I get the mask immediately and the next thing I remember was waking up with a nurse friend, Gena Pollard giving me a hug. Well that's the cool thing about a small town, we know lots of people and all the support and love I've gotten was ultra cool. Thanks Slooooowdotna. So here's a pic of what my new friend surgeon David King saw when he looked down my throat. I know it looks a hell of a lot like I didn't chew that egg but trust me, the eggs turns to a kind of mush when eaten add then settles in the roundness of my stricture....although many hospital people told me to peel them next time. The doc said it was a time bomb, if not the egg something else would have done it. The first pic is before, the 2nd after.

I get home about 6 pm with an anesthesia fog and go to bed....I gotta go fishing in the morning. But, just my luck that its common for post anesthesia to create a fever and I have a terrible one all night so I toss and turn, shiver and freeze then sweat all night long. MP cools me off with wet towels and tells me the fever is not too bad ( later she confessed that I was burning up and didn't want to scare me...and I needed to go to work of course). But 4 am arrives and if nothing else, I've always been tough and my friend Jake Marguis from Mexico by way of Wasilla is here with some new friends. It was a bit difficult for me but Jake and his buddy Doobie are go to guys and they do most of the work. I usually don't like to publish just plain old dead fish pics as anybody and everybody does but in this case I have to, we were firing on only 3 cylinders and still had a great day. Here's Jake with the biggest King of his life and Doob's wife Vicki with a 54 pounder that was by far the hottest and hardest to catch, meanest and nastiest King salmon of the year.

So if you want to know what the future holds, hell....I wanna know what the future holds, here's the deal. Right now my throat is in shock and from convulsing my ab muscles are so sore I can hardly sit up. I'm on a liquid diet because the last thing we need is an encore performance of that deal. Soon I hope to eat soft food and soft food only until it is surgically repaired which will happen within a few weeks. The surgery will clean up scar tissue (you can even see some in the pic) and relax that area. Its been building for years although it is something that you are born to. So here's the lecture part....guys that put up with things instead of going to have them looked at are like parked on the railway tracks waiting for a train....it'll come, just when is the question. So surgery in a few weeks, in the meantime I think I'll go fishing.

BRO

2011-07-03T18:23:00.000-07:00

Through the years people leave a lot of stuff here at Mile 14. Wet raingear, broken tackle, old coolers, just mostly junk. But the other day right there on that seat where I wait for my fishing friends every morning was the darndest thing, a book called 'Bro'. And, it wasn't left there by accident either, its part of a book out reach kind of like a literary geo cache thing called Book Crossing. Well as I don't believe in co-incidence and I'm always looking for bigger meaning I just had to read it.

Its about a nine year old kid named Tugwell Dockery who's learned more and seen more in his years than most 50 year olds. When he's quite small his parents were hit by a train while drunk and killed. He then went to live with his grandparents on a poor cattle ranch in Florida. As he was playing one day he noticed his grandma lyeing unresponsive, she had been tromped by a high strung horse and his grandpa Branch is so saddened that in a fit of anger he kills the horse with a knife right in front of Tugwell....And Tugwell has not spoken a word since. But his brother who is 9 years older, Broda Joe is Tugs voice and inspiration. Tugs life is hard and he hates, even loathes Branch. But Broda Joe brings him around slowly but surely even though more pain is to come....its what Tug calls 'heart sore'. Theres a scene where Branch gives Tug a gift of a pencil with an eraser. He tells him that the written is so easy to erase and that he wishes it were so easy for other things....Well the book is about continuation and forgiveness, its about the faults in life in a really condensed form and it got me to thinking...

Forgiveness is something I've never been good at. Maybe its the Irish in me. I'm a varsity level grudge holder. I'm a guy who actually ruminated over going to my 40th high school reunion and smacking the class bully. Years ago my friend Don Frazier who was a Teamster Union big wig told me I'd had the perfect teamster attitude....you reward your friends and punish your enemies. Well, I'm tired of being that way, it takes time and energy and when you you're 58 years old why waste either. On the scale of problems this isn't a big one but you know the first step in problem solving is to admit the problem. I'm there. Thanks for the bump Tugwell Dockery.

So manana I'm going to find a cool place to let the book 'Bro' go, catch and release. I went to the net and the book came from 'ghir' in Hawaii and Slowdotna was its first stop. This deal ultra-grande-cosmicly cool so if you want to get with the program go to http://www.bookcrossing.com/ .

Smile 14

2011-06-27T17:46:00.000-07:00

For me theres no bigger compliment than to be taking out local folks fishing. This week I had two groups out of four and it worked out magically. With families I always ask first thing in the morning who needs a King the worse. Of course nobody really 'needs' a King but theres usually a guest everyone would like to see hook up first. So on Tuesday I met a guy named Thurre Johnson who was born and raised here in Soldotna and who knows a lot of people but heard about me in town. His father in law Howard Volz got into the seat closest to me in the Stern and walla, he caught this beautiful salmon. Thurre has caught lots of Kings so if we could only get one the right guy got it. I don't know what it is but I suspect its because its the rod that I watch the most and guide my boat speed to get just the right seductive wobble on the Kwikfish lure.

Then a few days later I have Jack Kliensmith and his friends out who are a father, son and grandfather team. I get Tom into 'the' seat and with all the confidence in the world we troll the sonar site several hours before the tide with not a single boat in sight. Jack is holding his rod and has a bump but no pull down. Just when I think its over Tom's rod goes off in the holder, and it goes off spectacularly hard. The fish runs himself out of gas and in no time we've boated the second 'who needs it' fish of the week.

Through the years theres no doubt that I've become a salmon expert. After all its my life's work and I've applied all I have to it. But as I was getting to know the salmon I guess I kind of learned a lot about other things and maybe I'm just a bit of an expert on the river in general....which brings me to noticing the unusual behavior of these juvenile Bald Eagles that have adopted us here at Mile 14. They're constantly around, we hear them night and day with their shrieking calls and they scare the dog from time to time. They walk across our yard and that's the part that's so unusual and drives Jet-dog crazy. That's right, they walk across the yard, these Eagles are ground dwellers. Look close at the pic below and you'll see one on each side of the frame.

Now I've never seen Eagles that didn't perch. These kids just don't fly so good so they're always on the ground and I think in most places besides my yard this would be kind of dangerous. Its funny to watch them, they'll try and land in a tree then loose their balance and soar off to try again...then they just give up and rather than watch the gutting table from a tree on the distance they'll take a stump 30 feet away. I don't know what the deal is, maybe poor parenting, maybe they got mad and left home to soon or maybe they're a new sub species, who knows.

Speaking of parenting, this weekend we got invited to a party with some of our oldest and most favorite friends. I met James Lott when he came to work for us framing houses when he was right out of high school. He credits me with teaching him carpentry but what ensued was that his family really taught me about love and parenting. That guy between me and my friend Sam Menopace is James' dad Matt Lott. He was a welder and oilfield hand here and his wife Tish and him had 4 girls and 3 boys, I really don't know the girls so well but I know the guys for sure.

All kids love their parents, respect their parents and maybe even cherish their parents. I don't even think I have words for it but Matt's kids don't just love him, they revere and worship him, its a ton of love. Being an Italian family the affection is outright and visible. Like a lot of successful people if you asked Matt the secret he probobaly couldn't tell you, its many thing but these are what I noticed. His kids weren't perfect, none are. But when they were young and you had a problem with a Lott kid you'd better bring it to Matt. One person and one person only talked to those kids of important things, he was the ultimate protector. He loves to have fun, his kids, his friends, his friends friends are all treated the same. I'm a friend of James, thats all he needs to know. Tish has been gone now for a few years but she and Matt were a couple of my first music fans. They love the country music and have made many pilgimages to Nashville. Many a winter night in the early 80's found us at the Lott house playing music and having Hamms beer, they inspired me to play and play and well.....play. A Lott family function is nothing without a hundred or two pounds of roasted pig. Heres a pic of James running the show on a rotisierre that Matt welded up for him 30 years ago....man thats good stuff.

During the party I was talking with Matt Jr. (Tugger) and I was lamenting the fact that MP and I really don't have a retirement plan. Well he mentioned that his mom and dad didn't either and it worked out just fine for them. As I drove home I related that conversation to MP. She was right on when she said that surrounded by that kind of love why wouldn't it work out. The kids help build a lake house, and I mean they built it with their own hands. Somebody drove dad to Alaska, somebody else will drive him back. So in the pic below I guess you can pic up on the vibe. Matt Lott is one of the best people I know and I'm honored to have watched him and tried to be like him......It was his daughter Jackies 50th birthday party and a reunion. A lot of pictures were being taken and finaly Matt said "enough with the picture *&%@"..... and then he added " but all them faces sure makes mine look good"....I love you too Matt.

Clearly the Kenai

2011-06-20T17:34:00.000-07:00

I'm not complaining....but....its always something on this gorgeous river. This week delivered some of the most challenging fishing conditions in all the years I've fished here. The graph below tells the story, we're at record low water for late June its as clear as anybody's ever seen. The pyramids above the graph line are the 40 year average flow. As you can see, the river is actually going down a bit and not up like would be the norm. We're used to clear water in May before the melt, its tributary water and a kind of brown bottom colored clear. And actually to fish with artificial as is the current regulation we need clear water, but not THIS clear. Its a Skilak Lake clear with visibility at 5 to 8 feet I'd guess. So what it all translates to is this, we have opportunity in the morning before a lot of boat movement and then again with the tide if we have that to work with. We're getting one or two, maybe 3 chances a day but I'm looking forward to more fish this next week.

The fish are just plane spooky. The water is so low that the boats are running just a few feet over their heads and they're seeing the lures to far off to create a good strike response. A few days ago I idled over a gravel bar to position myself at the top of a run and was watching the bottom when I saw 4 or 5 King Salmon flash away from my boat, spooked just by it being there. So I know this is probably falling on deaf ears but if any of you or people you know are running boats this week on the Kenai PLEASE keep the boats away from number 003 if you can. Enter the runs from the side or the top, never run over the water you intend to fish or someone else is fishing. When running on step please clear a boat with gear in the water by as far a margin as you safely can. When fishing around other boats try and keep yours quite...no banging, no music, stop any rattles....

On Saturday I fished with old friends. Joe Higgins and his wife Chelsea and brother Ben bought a fishing trip for my old buddy Charlie as a Fathers Day gift. We released one fish that we maybe should have kept and let a smaller one go but the highlight of the trip was watching the success of this harbor seal. Now I've seen a lot of seals catch a lot of salmon but I've never seen a 50 pound seal with a 50 pound salmon. It was so big he couldn't swim away with it so we idled right over and watched him eat it. This pic you see him with the salmons head strait up and he's holding it like a baby. We watched him for many minutes, he'd drop it and then go find it (the water is so clear eh) but in order to eat it he pretty much had to stay in one place. Even then its almost impossible to get a good pic, you aim, he goes down etc.....it was pretty darn cool.

I don't know about everybody else but the best gift I got was hearing from the two boys. And , MP bought me a special treat of Australian licorice, I'm a sucker for that stuff. But we saw the following ad in the paper and realized that gift giving possibilities can be endless. I don't know if I've seen many professional people advertise like this but...what the eh....

So by the time you read this Mile 14 will be celebrating 15,000 reads. Its not like making the best sellers list but in my world this is big ju-ju, I'm flattered that so many people think its entertaining and worth their time. So please keep coming back and tell your friends, I've got big plans.

Its a Game of Inches

2011-06-15T18:14:00.000-07:00

Great smile eh? That's my friend Deb O'brien with what we didn't know at the time turned out to be the biggest legal June King Salmon I've ever seen. Let me explain. For the early run only here we 've had a 'slot limit' for the last 10 years or so, all fish from 46 to 55 inches long must be released to spawn. ADF+G did this rule as a way to save some of the genetic size traits of these magnificent salmon. The idea was to protect for spawning the biggest spawners, 50, 60 or 70 pounders.

I met Deb about 20 years ago. I wasn't really her first choice as a guide as she met and fished with a young guy who worked for me I'll call Joel. But through the years Joel went on his own and just never seemed to have time for just one person or was to busy and didn't return phone calls and well....that was my good luck. She's been fishing with me ever since. I got lots of time for her, in fact I'm not exaggerating when I say she and I connect, she's really our friend. Deb came to Alaska from Alabama 20 years ago with a guy and the guy luckily didn't work out but Alaska sure did. She met and married Donovan O'brien who's the coolest guy and struggling to get it done started a family at the age of 40.....that takes a lot of love. Deb is an I.C.U. nurse and has a ton of things going on in her life, she's been busy and finally decided to take time with her daughter Haley and come fish with me.

So the other morning just 10 minutes into our first troll the Deb's rod goes off, its a gift. We have no boats below us and the fish runs off line, an easy 150 yards worth. Now normally I'd chase the fish with the boat but Deb has caught many a King, even a 70 pounder so I just watch as she stops him and slowly regains line. Its so far out that by the time near the boat its played out and laying on its side, blowing bubbles which indicates a very tired fish. Its in the net and I tell Deb its too big. I want to let it go and she wants to measure it. We measure and measure and double check and triple check, this fish is not only legal its about 1/4 inch short of the limit. We even measure again on the deck before I bonk it and its obvious legal. Its girth is what did it for us, it weighed an even 50 pounds at the scale and was just gorgeous shiny bright. Wow.

So after that theres nothing to do but hope Haley has a bite as we commune with nature. The rivers been quiet this year and this sight above I've seen several times in the last few days. Today we watched an eagle dive bomb mergansers and I'd never seen how well and long those little ducklings can dive under water.

Now I can't speak for all 4 of us, especially Jet-dog but I'd guess we all had about as cool a Kenai experience as you can have, Fishing and friends, whats better?....

Code of The West

2011-06-11T14:06:00.000-07:00

When I was young guy with some things, especially difficult things I was a bit lazy. But now that I'm full grown and on this quest I work hard, extra hard to be lazy at nothing, whether its work, relationships or even having fun. Thats where what I call 'the code of the west ' comes in...its something everyone wants to do and even thinks they do but mostly don't. Its the simple value of loyalty, the word I like best is 'fidelity' which Websters defines 'faithfulness' ; careful and exact observance of duty, or performance of obligations or vows.
It goes on ' firm adherence to a person or party with which one is united, or to which one is bound, loyalty'.

So in my world its simple and of the most importance, take care of the people that take care of you. It means paying maybe just a bit more for the product your friend sells. It means thinking of who has helped you in the past and making sure to help them. It means being honest and direct. It means making simple decisions like who you should buy what from, because they're your friends and you want them to do well. It means not only do you support your friends but also protect them, you defend them, you stand up.

But...I've noticed alot of your friends don't mind you making money, they just mind you making any of THEIR money. I don't understand, and never will. I guess simple jealously explains it and I'm glad I wasn't born with that gene. To me, when you cheat on your wife, your friend, your business associates the worse part is that you cheat yourself. How can you be proud of your life if you have no fidelity?

I've always set the standards high in my life and so I'm always disappointed in people who don't have the same standards. MP says that with me its all black and white, no grey areas. For awhile I kind of thought that it was my problem but I'm secure enough now that I see it for what it was...people who don't know the code of the west aren't your friends and never were. So, I've cut alot of people from my team over the years, alot. I don't have many friends but the ones I do have are true. Its a shame and if I sound like a pompous *^^$# its too bad, seems like theres more of them out there than there are of me in this old world.

A few years ago an awkward situation arose with one of my friends. After explaining why he did what he did he asked if we could still be friends through 'all this'. Well, why would you ask that if you didn't know for sure you'd broken the code??? I replied that of course we're friends, but I have two kinds of friends....those that would do things that would harm me and my family, and those that wouldn't.

Full Circle

2011-06-06T17:43:00.000-07:00

Well its kind of funny to have gone full circle with this fishing deal. When I was a kid I just had to get a boat, I was dieing for a boat, I envied others boats.....And now after having spent about half of my adult life in a boat I really enjoy fishing with my 200 pounds standing squarely on Terra firma. So, this morning at 4:30 am you find me and my partner-counselor-co defendant driving to Ninilchik to try and catch a King salmon the old fashioned way. The Kenai jumped up after the long weekend and was off color so bad there was really no fishing to be done, and in true Jethronian style I didn't have any trips scheduled so we got the muddy water for the year over with no stress....but I hadn't fished for a few days and need to keep my edge so its off to fish the tide 40 miles south of mile 14.

So its 5:30 when we arrive and nobody's around, mmmmm, is it legal? Are we on the wrong day? But I start fishing and a few fisherman arrive and I'm feeling good about this deal. But, its 35 degrees out and my right hand is numb. MP asks me how my carpal tunnel syndrome was holding up and I told her it felt the best it has in days, its numb, no problem. Having a bit of an extinct for this fishing I got to wondering why so few people were around and it came to me after but an hour or two....no people=no fish. I don't even see one fin.

We all know MP is the definintuion of A.D.D. And it wasn't long before she shucked that 200 dollar fishing rod down and went to beach combing. As we fished I was kinda figuring on how long it would take to get her moving, after all, we were in the shade and the beach wasn't and it was just so inviting. Her first big score were these (according to her) rare and unusual red rocks.

I had planned on putting a gorgeous 25 pound salmon in that fish tote but who needs that when you find all the free seaweed you want, kelp to. Ever since I built that cute greenhouse MP has gone to gardening with a zealousness that's remarkable. Shes' reading and digging and planting and composting and this stuff here is just the ticket for that new compost pile. The problem is that to get just the perfect PH she has to know how much to of this seaweed to add depending on whether its considered a 'green' or a 'brown'. The confusing part I pointed out to her is this....what if it was a green and then turned brown after it warshed up on the beach? That's a tough one.

We're pretty much fished-scavenged out by 8 am and the blood is returning to my fingers and you know, I really didn't need a salmon I just needed to go fishing so we saddle up and head for home. As we don't get to Ninilchik very often I decided to stop and see an old friend. To show my love I left a brand spanking new 7/8 ounce Blue Fox Pixie in the cranberry red with red insert color.

But the strangest thing was that on my buddies grave somebody had made a heart shape out of those same red rare and unusual rocks that MP picked up on the beach. Well, in my world that's some kind of sign for sure and I'm feeling connected and all of a sudden really good about me, him and her. I don't know how that red shaped heart in rocks got there, it could have been a spirit or a person, but who ever did it converged with me today. Love conquers all, we move on.

Now if any of you haven't been to the Old Believers Russian Orthodox church in Ninilchik its worth a look. We have a century old church that is similar in Kenai but this setting right on the high bluff overlooking the ocean and the volcanoes is just stunningly beautiful. And its just not just a show church, regular service is conducted here and the cemetery reflects the character of our country and Alaska. Pretty darn cool.

We're driving down the road and this wild rabbit actually poses for us. Now have you ever seen a rabbit that wasn't running? I know I never have, they don't come that way, where would the hare and the tortoise story be if we had rabbits behaving like this. I had time to stop the truck, get the camera out of the bag and shoot 3 pictures and then he WALKED away. I hate to over think this too much but it seems to me the messages were all pretty clear this morning....we're going to have a great summer.

Please come back to the blog. Although business is down a bit I'll be fishing hard real soon. The water is clearing and this year all of the indicators show that our early run is going to be OK. Maybe not like the old days but the sonar counts are up and I'm looking forward to some serious tugs on the line this June....thanks for reading mile 14.

Smilin Faces

2011-05-30T17:43:00.000-07:00

What could be cooler for a guide than to have a 79 year old ardent fisherman catch the biggest fish of his life with you? Its about as good as it gets, I hate to use this word too much but because I believe in it I will....magic. That guy on the right is Pete Castle, a stand up guy and my new friend. He and his son Chuck decided to spend some quality time together on an Alaska trip in a rented motor home so they hunted me down and stayed in our campground. Although the numbers are way ahead of last year the run is still starting so fishing is kind of fickle. The first day we didn't have a bite, I told my friend Jason Potts it was because I screwed up the math by catching one to fast the morning before. But Chuck and Pete were fun and upbeat so as I frequently do if I have seats available I asked them along on the next day for the bonus trip...and walla, a nice 30 pound female for Pete... They were fishing with my old friend Lowell Franks and his wife Armi and we all agreed that if we could only catch one, it was nice for it to be Pete.

Chuck even got on the board with this hefty Arrowtooth Flounder. You know you've got a cosmic force surrounding your boat when you catch things that are not even supposed to be in fresh water, this guy was 12 miles up the river. Not only was he the first and only flounder I've ever seen in the river its also a really nice one. So now you're wondering if I've never seen one in the river how do I know its a nice one? right?. Well, back in 1973 commercial fishing me and my friend Steve Blossom tried to eat one. Luckily we never got to the tasting part because the skin is so tuff we never even got to the filleting part. We were so tired of eating salmon that with all the flounder around we figured them to be kind of like a 'budget' halibut...Wrong. From what I know about them this might be the only fish in Alaska that nobody anywhere eats. The skin is like armor, the sharpest Cutco knife is the loser in that deal...

I don't know how ever body else's memorial day was but ours was perfecto. Warm and sunny, a Mariner win, fried chicken with real potato salad and a swing in a handmade Mexican hammock chair. We went for a 10 ....well....6 mile bike ride and, just had a great day for the start of our season. Did any of you see the ending to yesterdays 100th Indy 500? Wow, as my friend Ernie would say, 'what a schamoozle'! Poor kid chokes on the last turn of the last lap and loses his chance for stardom, kind of like that 70 pounder that spits the hook at the boat...My dad taught me this simple knowledge, the next best thing to playing and winning is playing and losing.

I printed this last pic to show you the crop, what I've been calling the 'kids'... (for alot of reasons besides that they cost alot). MP has been going huckly buck after the gardening and her knew greenhouse is just chucked full of goodies. We've got the usual tomatoes in all variety's, cukes, squash, tomatios (she loves those) okra, pumpkins, melons, peas, radishes, spinach....well you know. It was all worth the money, two weeks and all the skin off my index finger. I'll print the next pic come harvest time. Thanks for reading Mile 14 !

Like I said....

2011-05-24T15:21:00.000-07:00

never bet a man at his own game. There she is the first and prettiest king salmon yet of the 2011 season. I actually caught him myself only a short time into this morning. My buddy charlie MacDonald and I started at the prerequisite 6 am and had ol slimey in the boat at 7 am, only about 200 feet from my house. Magic is all I can say....

We started out both towing Kwikfish plugs and after an hour and with the sun hitting the water I thought maybe its just to big so I downsized to a smaller plug and walla, fish on. He's only 23 pounds but he ran and jumped, didn't like that hook much and I have to say it was pretty darn exciting. When I was a young guy and before I started guiding I caught many king salmon but this one here is the first is 6 or 7 years I'd say. I just don't have as much time to fish as I'd like.

So as is the tradition here I threw the fish guts out on the gravel bar and made for some really happy birds. Later on in the season when they have more food they wouldn't get this close to us but that's some of the magic of this time of year...few people, fresh fish, lots of wildlife, everybody's happy.

Designing Mile 14

2011-05-22T17:34:00.000-07:00

When we moved to the river in 1996 we decided to run the boat launch with one rule and one rule only...this place is to have fun at. So being fun people we went through the hard work and complex planning it takes to make this property reflect our values and to let people know they came to the right place. So here's a tour of my favorite things here at Mile 14....

This first pic is the gable end of our garage, it faces the check-in station and gives the people something to focus on while the driver is slapping leather to put his tithing into the pay box. We've got a modest license plate collection and we're missing a few states so if any of you can help us out we'd really like that. Barring donations from our friends we'll just have to travel more and collect as we go, no worries, we'll have all fifty states before this program is over. The wall also has some old signs and ski's, my niece Melanies' first moose rack and a couple of swallow nests with honest to goodness real swallows imported from the 48.

This is my beer can collection. I specialize in pre aluminum beer cans mostly from the time of my youth. some of them were actually emptied by me personally, isn't that cool? This is just a small part of my huge collection but you can see the mandatory 'Billie Beer" that every collector has. Then we have a few welded metal Oly cans and on the very end is the malt liquor Stite, we didn't know it at the time but we weren't experienced enough for that Stite deal...But the pic below is by far my favorite can. Its a pre pop top can that was found in the ceiling framing of my aunt Mary Jane's house in Oroville California....Let me recreate the scene....Its Friday July 12th 1962 and it's 95 degrees out as you frame the purloins for a house remodel. Its finally quiting time and your carpenter apprentice throws you up an OLY and with two skilled whacks you open it up with your framing axe....oh baby does that taste gooooood.

The next pic is one of the corners of my guides services office, the garage. This corner here has a a nod to some of the most important people in my life. I have a pic of Jimmy Buffet with the same black Takamine guitar I just had to have. I have plaque that my friend Tom Beneventi made for me that says " the bitterness of poor quality lingers long after the sweetness of a bargain is forgotten". It also has a 2002 Hobo Jim show schedule, Jim's a steady guy so I figure a 2011 schedule is pretty much the same...and it is. Then I got a pic of Dale Earnhart, MP's initials in leftover urethane and a toilet seat.

So we move on to the corner with my TV in it. The Mariners just finished a sweep of Padres and with a little luck will keep this momentum up and arrive at a winning record, we'll see. But , the cool thing in this corner are signed dollar bills I have from betting on fish. Quite often when I'm feeling the qwan just right and the boat is a little quiet I'll bet somebody a buck they'll catch a fish in the next 15 minutes. These are just the truly memorable ones as I had so many I took one entire wall worth with us to Las Vegas a few years back figuring you can't beat lucky money. This wall is testimony to something everyone should know... never gamble with a guy at his own game.

Speaking of games, glued to my flammables locker is this pic of a great American. You know me, I like to be inspired and whats more inspirational than the guy who coined the phrase " it ain't braggin if you can do it". That's how I feel about this program. So every morning as I prep for a day of rain, sun , no fish, lots of fish, ups and downs I go out the door with the great ones message, nothing's impossible.

As you can imagine we have fish everywhere, and I mean everywhere. This four legged chainsaw salmon is one of my favorites. One of my fellow club members, that would be the Maverick club, fell on hard times about 25 years ago and needed a couple hundred bucks. He was trying to make a living doing chainsaw art and well , as you can see he just wasn't very good at it. At first I thought I got a raw deal but now after all these years I'm proud to say that we might have the second ugliest salmon on the peninsula....( the first ugliest is a hands down winner located at the China Seas Buffet in Blazy Mall)

When you come to the front door here at Mile 14 you'll notice three things. The first is that the doorbell has no wires to it from when I jerked them out of the wall because the 2nd thing wasn't noticed....the 'guide is sleeping , please come back later' sign. And of course the 3rd things are these wonderful hand painted salmon swimming through the door. MP has a certain knack for fish, smiling salmon, that's the way I like mine...

Then around the back of the house where I clean and prep fish is some really important stuff. Here you see a freezer and two fridges of which one is for bait only. Next time you're here just fly that baby on the left open and take a deep breath, you'll see why we don't put any food of beverages in it. But the other two are spotless clean, well pretty clean and are for the use of our friends. Here's where I use up all my old guide stickers and magnetic signs...

Right around the corner from here is a pic you've seen before, my legendary fish hanging rack. Its adorned with 15 years of Kenai salvage material including a palm tree, the dashboard from a 1985 Ford , busted fishing rods, a netful of kwikfish lures, props, radios and the world largest rusty pliers collection.

OK...lets get serious. This last pic speaks for itself. Just incredible how fast things happen in the far north. and, its just as incredible that we got this pic before the moose got the tulips. They've made a few runs at them in the last week but that's my job, I run them moose off towards our neighbors tulips. Until they bloom MP uses a glass shower door to protect them but once they bloom its kind of hard to view them through that bathroom glass deal, you men know the problem.

Once again you're probably thinking.....whats with this guy? wheres the fish? whats going on?...Well, I'll be honest, I've not really given the Kenai its first real try yet but I'm fixin to tuesday and weds for sure. The Kenai has been record low and I just don't want to risk it until its showtime. One of our friends who launches here and has as much experience as I hit a rock right out front and is now buying a new lower unit, 1800 bucks worth. But, theres more fish around than usual so please come back, we'll have a real action report real soon.....wanna bet?

It Shows

2011-05-15T14:57:00.000-07:00

Theres no getting around it, when you work hard people notice. That was completely apparent last night when we attended the 3rd annual Kenai Peninsula Natural Bodybuilding Fitness, Figure and Bikini Championships. I suppose some of my readers are chorkling a bit right now but if you haven't attended an event like this you really should. actually I never really thought I'd be the type to engage this sport but after my conversion to life in the gym a few years ago I became to realize just how challenging and difficult a sport this is. Of all the things I've been around in my life this takes drive and discipline that is herculean even by my standards. All these athletes are competing somewhere in the 3% to 10% body fat realm when I've applied all I can and worked as hard as I could just to get to 13 or 14%. It takes the perfect combo of aerobic exercise, weight training and clean, consistent high protein eating ....oh, and that's for 4 to 6 months before a show.

The pic above is the over all winners but I'd have to say that anybody who works that hard and has the courage to show there efforts is a winner for sure. While this is certainly on the extreme side of it, what this whole deal is really about of course is good health. The next pic is of a guy I know real well. Its Darren Hagan who is a fitness trainer at our gym. He's the kind of guy that shares and inspires an entire community to be healthier. It's guys like Darren that help you connect the dots....if he can work THIS hard, well, I can put in some effort. to.

The next pic is us out in the lobby on break with a young guy named Chase Jensen. We've known Chases family for 30 years. As you can seeing he's beaming with pride and confidence and so he should be. He won the Jr. men's competition and also fights in the ring with Mixed Martial Arts. Chase is a young guy who always has time in the gym to chat with us old timers and I'm proud to have guys like him as friends.

For a small town we have a dedicated and hard working fitness core group. The next pic is of my friend Charlie MacDonald who is kind of the cornerstone of that effort. Charlie took the responsibility this year to organise the show and in this pic before the show he looks like he's in total control. Well he is. Charlie is another guy who is inspiring. He's a retired Lineman, rodeo rider and stock man, avid fitness nut and a Sturgis going/harley riding/ son of a gun. I've not met to many people who are more Alaskan than Charlie, he fishes with his boat, hunts moose with his horses and can fix anything that breaks, he's a go to guy. So, thanks Charlie for all you do.

The last body building pic I'll show you was kind of a cool deal. That gal is from our gym, her name is Amy Vincent and she recently won the Ms. Alaska title. The guy is Shawn Wolfe and he is a Pro-Natural body builder, the best of the best. In other shows we've attended you never see women and men together on stage and especially never competing. But, because we do things different on the Kenai the organizers thought it'd be fun for these two athletes to have a 'pose off '. Amy had alot of fun with it and Shawn actually looked a bit intimidated. I guess he knew it would be kind of hard to get more applause than the hometown favorite, he was right.

So that brings us to a pic of me....no speedo, just me in the gym this morning. I came home from Mexico a little bigger than usual so I decided to use the weight to help gain muscle and then try to lean down again in the fall, that was my strategy and kind of still is. I spent March and April lifting consistently heavier, my friend Josh says if you add weight, you add muscle. Part of my goal was to bench press my own weight (200 lbs) and I did that about 10 days ago. Well.....its game over. Even though I know success means working through some pain and injury its gone to far. I've developed carpal tunnel syndrome in my wrists so bad that the tingling wakes me at night and is a constant annoyance. The tendinitis in my elbows that I worked through a few years ago is back as well. The good news is my knees seem to be better, but its time for a break. I had my last lifting session on Monday and now I'll just ride my bike and apply the effort to my cardio-areboic conditioning, then after the fishing season we'll see how I feel and plan a new goal.

So if you've read along this far you're probably wondering where in the heck are the fish. Well, not many anglers have come through the boat launch but I've seen two gorgeous Kings caught already. I hope this bodes well for our season which starts in earnest for me real soon. But I did handle a nice fish the other day. My friend Mike Dinkel who is an award winning taxidermist called and said my Corvina was ready. It's gorgeous and just what I needed to be a touchstone to my Mexican fishermen friends. I have it hanging in my office and daily reminds me, work hard, fish hard, life ain't a dress rehearsal.

Das Boot

2011-05-08T18:19:00.000-07:00

See that boat being hot roded by my good friends Mike Andrews and Chris Fejes? Well that's a 20 foot Alumaweld guide special that I spent 20 years in, friends have jokingly called it the 'million dollar boat' because thats how much money they all figure I made with it. This boat is a real statement for the manufacturer, it was built in 1981 and is on the river to this day, without ever suffering a crack of broken weld. The boat came with a 90 horse Mercury, the venerable 'tower or power', it was an in-line 6 cylinder made in the 70's and early 80's and that baby was flat fast. Then the horsepower limit came along in 85 and it had a 50 horse Merc for a while then 2 different 40/35 horse Johnson's. In 1991 I worked a sponsorship deal with Honda and it then has several of the newest and best, Honda 4-stroke 50 horses. The last Honda on it which is still on it today burns some oil and has 7500 hours on it....But, about 6 years ago it was time to upgrade. All my competitors were driving the nice new Willie boats like this on of my friend Zach's and although I'm not a herd animal I decided a new to me boat would be cool.

That Willie boat is by far the most popular on the river, they're just great serviceable boats for what we do here...but you know me, I gotta be different, I just can't do things the way the rest do. Plus, having learned from the 'million dollar boat' that Alumaweld (which Willie founded) builds a fantastic boat I went out and found this 21' Alumaweld Super Vee. If I'm anything in this old world its loyal, I try to be that way with my relationships and with my business so it fit my honor code perfectly to buy the Alumaweld from my friend Toby Liter who was leaving the State.

Its actually a bit bigger than the Willies and as you can see it has the wide 'coming gunwhale', that combined with the high 30 inch sides it makes you feel that you're 'in' the boat rather than 'on' the boat. The side of the gunwhale matches up vertically with the chine of the boat and is comfortable to lean on and safely stand on the edge of the boat. The boat is equipped with Bentley seats and has all the electronics necessary. There as absolutely no wood in the boat, maintenance free aluminum everywhere. Its called a 'Super Vee' for its 6 degree v that flattens to a 'pad' at the stern that gives it slow speed planing characteristics. The 6 degree V is just enough to flatten the ride when crossing boat wakes or in a chop but is still flat enough to give it good 'tracking' manners.

I didn't do a good job of keeping up on my Honda sponsorship and my friend who was connected to Honda died so in 2007 I re powered with new state of the art Yamaha high thrust motors. The big motor is a 50 horse with a larger prop and lower unit to help it get on step faster, the 'high thrust' is basically gearing, more power less speed. The motor has electronic fuel ignition, it has a slow speed idle button and capability. I use an 8 horsepower high thrust for auxiliary. This motor is really one of the secrets to catching fish on the Kenai river. It allows you to slow down so well that when fishing the tide we're often farther downriver in less current than the rest. Also being tiller handle it is quicker to respond than conventional steering and it doesn't hurt to know that having the redundancy of 2 motors is safety. I have an hour meter on the big motor and as the 2011 season starts its still a spanking new motor with 1200 hours on it.

This last pic was taken in the fall and gives you an idea of the width. Its 6 feet wide at the chine. I comfortably fish 4 people and myself. I routinely take up to 10 fishing rods and tackle boxes, coolers, a garbage can, two nets, extra clothes, an anchor...no worries lots of room for it all. Well that's a tour of the Minnow 4, I've spent all week getting it rigged and ready. A new stereo system, a new was down pump as well as preventative maintenance with a new water pump and spark plugs as well as pressure testing the lower unit to make sure the seals are good...." Proper preparation prevents poor performance"...that's me. All this boat talk has got me ready to go, go , go...

Riverey

2011-04-30T09:37:00.000-07:00

' The river will deliver' is one of my sayings so a riverey is kind of like a delivery but just between me and the river. This first pic is my first riverey of the season, last week when I woke up and didn't have to go to guide school I celebrated with one of my favorite things, J+J salvage at mile 14.

Although not a record this was a pretty good haul. For some reason the Vibrax spinners are always fresh and shiny but the Pixie lures are always rusty, I release them. You notice a fairly high end pair of lineman's pliers, its not hard to imagine that anybody that would get into his tool box before heading to the river might drop things overboard. The other thing that left me wondering is how somebody could lose their flag? However it happened we're going to clean it up and respectfully fly it right here at the river, another story to tell.

You know me, always on the look out for the unusual and this trip was no different. The first pic is a tire frozen in an upright configuration, now how'd mother nature do that? I suspect this tire might have escaped from mile 14 where we routinely use them to buffer the boats so in the spirit of spring cleaning I returned it to its rightful owner. The next pic is....well.....a sign. I've been on kind of a sign jag lately so this baby jumped right out at me. You all know how I feel about signs but don't do it, don't think that....I didn't do it. Honest. This State Park sign is so shot up you can't even read it so let me tell you what it used to say.....' Don't Have Fun Here"..."By Order of the Commissioner".

Somewhere I heard that the first casualty in every battle is the battle plan. That's what happened with my greenhouse project. Over breakfast one day I told MPeasy that I'd get it done it two days and two hundred dollars. Well, two weeks and a 'G' note later there she stands all ready for tomato residence. Kind of a cute little bugger isn't it? Like the ageing athlete when it comes to carpentry I guess I'm beginning to lose a step or two. After making my lists and checking them twice I only made a total of 9 trips to the lumber store...if you think that's alot of windshield time to complete a project you ought to see me do plumbing. I burn a tank of gas and then have enough wrong/leftover parts to plumb a water park.

This week we're getting boats out. I'll be on the river tomorrow looking and I wouldn't be surprised if we have a tug on the line in the next week or two. The river is considerably under the 40 year average for flow so it will be a challenge running the powerboats....just the way I like it. Come back and check it out and thanks for following life here at Mile 14.

Back to School

2011-04-22T17:42:00.000-07:00

Why?...." because I told you so". Man I hated that when I was a kid. Its because it has everything to do with authority and nothing to do with reason. Well this week I got just a taste of that, here's the story.

A few years back when I was on the River Board our guide industry was facing alot of scrutiny because of its impact on the social fabric of the Kenai River. Some were fearful that the guides could lose some fishing days due to regulation so they devised a plan to make the guide industry more professional, a kinder , nicer guide industry....How?...Well lets send them all to school for a week. The plan called for all new guides to have to go to school immediately before they could guide and then a roll in was done with the guys who have been at it the longest being given 5 years or so to take the class. That's me, the last guy to take the class, well me and 24 more like me.

I was actually having anxiety over going to this as I just thought it was nonsense. After all, I've guided 200 to 300 anglers a year for the last two or three decades, whats to learn? But I finally came to the conclusion that all industries usually have a continuing education program and there might be some value here. And there was, just not enough for 4 nine hour days worth with a 5 hour day for testing. The safety concerns you can't hear to often and the science of the river was fascinating, I learned alot. It could all have been done in two days. But you know me, theres always a bright side so here's a snapshot of the class and a list of what I learned....

My class room was number 107 in the Walter Ward building. For years I thought the benefactor was my old friend Walter Ward who owned Wilderness Way Store and used to be a Park Ranger. In fact I often thought my friend Walt was one of these silent unassuming philanthropists never wanting recognition. He was doing it just to do the right thing....Well, at recess of the first day I found out I was flat wrong, this Stately looking gentleman is the 'real' Walter Ward. I don't know his story but he certainly looks like a guy who would and could give jillions to the local community college. Thanks Walt.

I'm not a real fan of signs. I guess its because signs are generally telling you not do things and I'm all about doing lots of things. But the 3 signs in this sequence caught my eye. It kind of underscores what we all know about Alaska, its not like the 48. But it seems to me that the sign about bears should trump the sign about no guns.

Our college (KPC) has a huge oilfield technology curriculum. They have classes for instrument technology and fire and safety and welding. So this huge, gorgeous , rusty moose is the work of the welding technology students. I don't think theres to many campuses with such a unique artwork and us here on the Kenai know one thing about moose...like fish, you can't have to many of them. When you really look at this thing like I did the weirdness goes away and you realize that not only was there an obvious welding lesson in it but the structural design needed and the overall layout makes this a pretty cool project.

When I got to class on Monday morning I naturally picked out the farthest seat away from the podium, I like to talk in class....in fact I like to talk anytime. Well who comes and sits next to me but Tim Hiner, guide #1 on the Kenai River. Of course we've known each other in passing for years, we reallyy didn't know each other well but after having shared our schooling here I can announce that we're friends now. It really was one of the cool unintended results of this deal. Tim is a good christian fellow and about as steady a guy as I know. He laughs easily and I'm impressed with the missionary work he does in Russia. Today when we split up I thanked him for helping me through the course. So the next pic is me and Tim taking notes during the 'what every guide needs to know' section of the class. Don't think the pick below it is a mistake and doesn't fit...its actually the mental imaging exercise I was doing while the guide spoke. Yep, I can still do two things at once just like high school.

So today was graduation day. The next pic is me getting my suitable for framing certificate. On the left is Dave Goggia who is the President of the Guide Association and also Gary Turner, the President of the college. It was pretty cool that a guy that busy would fine time to congratulate all the students personally. When all was said and done I actually had a pretty good time and got to see alot of old friends. The food was healthy and the coffee was hot. Here's a few of the interesting things I learned. I hope to retain as much as I can and in some ways you guys...this deal made me a better guide. It sure couldn't have hurt anything.

1. The 'hyporeuic' is the most important zone in the stream. Its the aerated depths (sometimes as deep as 2 feet) that the hatched out alevins are raised over the winter relying on their yolk sack and then the aquatic creatures that inhabit the hyporeic zone.

2. Silver fry spend 3 years in the fresh and then just one year in the ocean.

3. There are 38 species of fish in the Kenai River. I knew there was alot, but not 38...

4.86 species of midges and chironmidaes, the all important aquatic creatures that the small fish feed on.

5. Our first people to the river were the Kachemak Riverine at 1,000 B.C.

6.I can shoot my shot gun legally 1/4 mile from a house or structure.

Well you get the idea. Everybody's doing alot of work to make the best of the this world famous Kenai River.

Big News

2011-04-16T10:13:00.000-07:00

Just as I predicted, yesterday when we got home from the gym at 9:00 we could here birds....the river is breaking up, same day, same way as last year. I tell people all the time that the river is a living thing, just like the birds and the trees and yesterday was a big day for the creek. Lucky for us change is usually slow in life, it makes it all bearable but sometimes in nature things happen fast. So as I worked on the greenhouse I kept an eye out for just how the break-up was progressing. I took all four shots from the overlook below our house. The first was at 9:00 am yesterday, the second at 1:00 pm, the third at 6:00 pm and the last one 24 hours later at 9:00 am this morning. The view is the Big Eddy of course....pretty cool huh?

So its time of adjustment here at Mile 14, when we walk the Jet-dog we hear things, eagles and mallards and not just a few, there are hundreds and hundreds of ducks. We have fresh Bear skat in the parking lot so now its time to be careful. We see the grass at the launch finally and can access what the voles have done over the winter and a walk through the property shows us how many beetle killed trees blew over while we were in Mexico....its a time of change and I LIKE IT !

Carpenter #003

2011-04-14T18:00:00.000-07:00

As you can see I'm in the process of building a new greenhouse for MP's tomatoes. She starting gnawing on this project about Mexico time and theres just no dodging it anymore. She got on the radio and asked for used windows and the phone rang off the hook, so now we're saving money by framing in for used windows. Its kind of like a trip to costco, man it costs alot to save money. In this case we need headers and trimmers and all that technical stuff that you don't need with just your usual ol garden variety greenhouse.

So I started on the project about noon on Tuesday and it took me exactly 2 nails to smash my pinky with the hammer. The realization settled in on me, my power framing days are over. The problem wasn't that I've lost my moves or that I'm not strong enough to swing the darn thing...its my depth perception. I've got these transitional tri-focal glasses and when I bent over to nail it made my hand look like they were a mile away.

I didn't start out to be a carpenter , like alot of life it just happened to me. When I got back to Alaska the pipeline boom was on and the people that I new were carpenters, not oilfield. So I built houses and let me tell you, I made some money for alot of people. Not being able to see anybody do anything better than me I worked my tail off. Although not the best carpenter I was fast and fearless, the guy that rolled the trusses and walked the walls....but my heart was never really in it and thats how I got into guiding.

It was 1980 and I was building the sewer plant in Kenai, making a ton of doe that bought my first nice boat. But I had use of Woodys old S.S. minnow with a brand spanking new 25 horse Evinrude I had bought. We had a Superintendent named John Manson. John was all business and a hard man that everyone was scared of. But John heard I was catching these Kenai Kings and just had to have some, he loved to fish. Well, one thing lead to another and all that summer on Friday he'd pay me carpenters wage to go fishing. This was the greatest thing that had ever happened to me but I have to say the carpenter foreman got to hating my guts for it. But like all construction jobs this one came to an end and before John Manson left he called me in and said "ya know you're a hell of alot better at that fishing deal than you are at carpentering" In fact he said " you'd of hit the road 4 months ago if you hadn't had that boat".....mmmm......so the next year, 30 years ago, I had a guide sticker on my brand new Klamath boat that the sewer plant had purchased for me, and my first customer was John Manson.

I might have a sore finger and it kind of worries me for my guitar playing but its kind of cool to have life skills that create things...you know me, I don't hire anything, do it all myself and I do it hard.

The Kenai river at Mile 14 is yet to ice out. Last year if you remember it went out on the 15th. So thats my bet, tomorrow its going to go to make it an annual event. It actually looks like a pretty safe bet, the ice is all spongy and theres open water here and there. I'll let you know when she goes....So come back next week, I'll blog about the State mandated guide school I must attend, it should be chuckly.

The King's Speech

2011-04-07T12:06:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been hearing the use of this word 'code' for whats really being said. Well here at Mile 14 we don't speak code but we do have our own unique vocabulary to fit our own unique lives. We lovingly refer to our circle of friends as F-troop and through the years that group has grown to include most of my fishing team. So like everything else we collaborate on the jargon we use, here's some examples.

mismal..... miss-mull...Its like when things are dismal but way worse.

shamoozle......sha-maz-ill....Like yesterday when I used the wrong card in the ATM, I've got two cards that look alike. So, seeing as I was at the bank I had the pin number changed, figureing that was the problem.. So when I changed it on the wrong card and then used the right card naturally the pin was wrong again. That's a mini-shamoozle. It would be used like this, "oh no, another shamoozle".

cheeeekin....cheeeekin.....when you eat as much of it as I do on my high protein diet you can't just call it chicken. It would be used like this " how would you like your skinless, boneless, flavorless baked cheeeeekin?" or " your cheeeekin is ready".

rain locker.....the shower.

Hamite.....ham-eye-t.....someone who loves ham or thinks ham can fix things. You know a hamite when on every single one of the 4 yearly ham holidays or learning of a loss in the family you hear " I'll put a ham in the oven"...that's a hamite.

steamer......jet-dogs droppings.

hand holder....a trip with your wife to any of these places, museum, art gallery, crafts fair, greenhouse , fabric store or thrift store. One hand holder equals three fishing trips with team X.

buckle polisher.....slow dance or a slow song.

bonafeedes......bone-a-feed-ez.....credentials....like when I go to register at State Parks for my guide permit I take along 700 bucks and all my bonafeedes.

Outcome....the opposite of income... "man, this time of year its all outcome and no income".

toad strangler......hard rain

whacked em......good fishing

steady..... used to describe poor fishing...."Bob, wouldn't you say the fishing was awful steady today?" Team X'ers or F troopers never use negative terms like stinks, slow, terrible, dead , boring or sucks.... Team X'ers believe that the fishing is always good, its just the catching that is sometimes problematic.

Lettuce....money...." man, that shamoozle cost me some serious lettuce".

gawker....a guy with a brand new F-350 diesel dually that comes to mile 14 " just to look around" . A good gawker's truck is so long that when he turns around he drives far enough into your lawn that he flattens the sprinkler.

Well, you get the idea. Maybe I'll add to this dictionary as we go along with spring time in Alaska. Speaking of which here's a pic of me on the way to the gym this morning, just your usual spring blizzard with 5 inches of snow....no where near being a shamoozle, just ordinary life at mile 14.

Break - Up

2011-03-30T18:14:00.001-07:00

MP used to say that theres two seasons around here, this winter and next winter. Well, that's just tuff talk because we have a wonderful, although short summer and this season here, break up. The break up season is characterized by huge puddles from melting snow with frozen ground so it has no place to go. Its characterised by huge and instantly appearing pot holes in the road from the same phenomena, frozen below and thawed on top. Its characterized by the worst air you've ever seen, dust and grit from the tons and tons of sand that are applied to the roads each winter. But us Alaskans are liking it real good, after all, fishing season is finally within sight.

So today even though I had alot to do, well, some stuff do, I decided to take a drive and photograph some of the unusual parts of break-up. The first two pics are the scene right here at my house, Rancho Deluxe at mile 14 of the Kenai River. Even though I suspect that puddle will get deeper I figured I'd better get the pic today, we all know how fast things happen in Alaska. Tonight we made sure MP's Suby was in the garage because we have a nice 6 inch layer of ice melting in the driveway that I was afraid that if we left the car out it might just be frozen in tomorrow morning....Oh, today it got up to 46 degrees but it still freezes at night.

That pic there is driving down the Spur into town. I'd hoped it would show the dust better but hey, it shows alot. Like the uniquely Alaskan grooved road from studded snow tires. I'm no engineer but I think they make the road kind of 'crowned' so the water from the middle will run to the side and be gone...Not here. I 'm kind of an idea guy and I got to wondering why we have a gutter and a drain system on both sides that doesn't work so well. Why not have one smack dab in the middle of the road and make the road bowl shaped? AND...then some of my neighbors wouldn't find it so easy to splash that poor guy who has to use the sidewalk. Its brilliant if you ask me.

Snow mountains like this are everywhere and their time is limited. I guess it says something about the whole cycle of life when you think that just a few months ago all this snow was fluffy, clean and exciting, well at least exciting for the snowmachiners who don't go to Mexico every winter. When it falls it kind of muffles the towns sound and leaves a wonderfully clean place, covering up all the gray and brown of fall. So, for me its clean in the fall, dirty in the spring, nice when its young, a pain when its old. That's snow.
This next pic says it all. Its a huge lake next to another snow mountain in front of our 'big box' shop till you drop store. Even though when they come to town and pave 10 acres of wilderness the company mitigates it with this wonderful landscaping we've all seen. Bring in a few Juniper trees from Delaware, maybe try and get some of that Cherry Blossom look going and excavate a 3 foot hole next to the road and walla...that's what ya got. Now....if the water was draining to the middle of the road instead, well maybe,.....guess that's dumb.

This last pic I thought every one should see because I figure if I told you what we're paying for gas you'd think I was exaggerating, like I'm prone to. So this blog here cost me about 5 bucks and its easy to think that's really not that much money. But hey, think of the things...its more than a K-16 Kwikfish costs, and you could buy 5 spin and glows, 3/4's of my favorite lure, a Roberts Ranger. You could buy a reel filler of Trilene Big game....you get the idea. Do you suppose this is all part of what we know as spring fever???

Saturday night live

2011-03-27T15:33:00.001-07:00

Well its kind of that 'not much to do season' here at Mile 14 and I've had a heck of time coming up with something to report. Its not like theres nothing going on here at Mile 14 its just that everything that is seems so normal...Then I got to thinking what Dave Anderson told me when I started the blog and I realized that even everyday life here is a bit different than how most folks live, especially those in the 48. So , today I'm going to walk you through yesterdays events here at the river, live, its Saturday night.

Normally this time of year our salmon supply has dwindled and we're looking forward to some fresh fish real soon. But as it was -20 before we left for Mexico and we couldn't smoke a batch for all our friends we waited and Saturday was the day to get it all taken care of it. One thing about this gift of salmon we have here in Alaska...don't kill it if you ain't going to eat it! So the pic above is one of two batches that MP canned and then the next pic is one of two smokers we tended all day, while we did other important stuff.

The next pic is kind of cool if you ask me. I set the camera up inside the sauna after we'd had a good sweat. As you can see theres still plenty of snow but with temps into the high 30's and low 40's we're finally into the 'break-up' season. Later this week I'll publish pics of the driveway and our road when it gets to be 4-wheel drive only. You can also see that I took time to chain up the 4-wheeler and as we sauna'ed about cocktail thirty I noticed that we broke just about every caution sign on the 4-wheeler...We drove it on a road, without helmets, with another rider and...consumed adult beverages. Oh well, we're big kids and theres not another soul in sight at this time of year at Mile 14.

So that brings me to this pic, the stuff I like from Mexico. Last night I had a few shots of Jimador (pronounced he-ma-door) with a one dollar lime I bought and some nice Mediterranean sea salt. The Jimador is a mid priced tequila in Mexico and I prefer it in the blanco variety. Its produced by the same people that make Herradara and I've seen the Reposada Jimador but not the blanco at my friend Ben Jackinsky's liquor store in Kenai. There a bottle is twenty bucks, in Mazatlan I bought this full liter at the Soriana store for 95 pesos, about 8 bucks... Then, next to the Jimador is another outstanding thing you can't get in the USA, no matter how good your store is. Its genuine Havana Club rum straight from Cuba. This bottle here is expensive even in Mexico but all the refined types I know say its simply the best you can get, anywhere. It's an aged rum and has a hearty taste that I guess I could compare to a really good single malt scotch like my buddy Chris enjoys. Its one of those things that just tastes like nothing else in the world.

So armed with a cold beer and a few shots of Jimador I go to work on my latest project, trying to learn Toby Keith's 'We were in Love' . Toby came to Kenai at the start of his career and only had the red album out and that song anchored the album. When he sang it for us it put goose bumps up my spine and it remained a favorite of for years, although out of reach as I figured I could never, ever, in a thousand years sing it. Well guess what, I finally have enough range and enough practice that I think I'm going to get it. It has a tricky part that builds to the refrain where he hits octave change after octave change. I'm getting it so all you folks in Mexico be ready, I'll have it spit shined by next December.

This pic is of our Saturday night mystery meat meal. Although we have all the fancy stores like WalMart in town now me and MP like to do our shopping at the local IGA. Its kind of a quirky little store and often has specials like this that are dirt cheap but in some ways a little scary. For 3 bucks we got 3 pounds of 'stuffed chicken breasts'. It doesn't say what they're stuffed with but me being naturally optimistic I figured it was Chicken Cor don Blu. Wrong. We baked them and they weren't bad but they certainly weren't chicken Cor don Blu....although there was something inside that resembled ham, kind of. One time we were shopping there and for one dollar they had smoked whole Spanish mackerel. They were in a vac sealed bag and were pretty darn big and impressive. Well, I opened it up when we got home and even the dog wasn't interested in eating something that foul smelling. So I took it out to the garbage and that night it was the first time we had bears in the trash here at mile 14...no kiddin.

I haven't done a book report in 40 years so I figure now is the perfect time. Before I left Mazatlan my friend Tony Mercuro told me that UnBroken is a must read. Tony is a decorated Viet Nam vet and one of the most deliberate people I know, he's a steady guy and when he speaks I listen. So last week I gobbled up this book in just two days, I read until I had double vision, you know the feeling?. Its the story of Louis Zamperini who represented us in Hitlers 1936 Olympics. He was thought to be the runner who would break the 4 minute mile barrier but was side tracked by the war. I read non-fiction alot as I want to know things that can make me better. Well, this book certainly does that, its inspiring, its heart rendering, its about history, its about getting through, getting 'it ' done. Its an action book, its a love story, its about sports and what they teach us....its just great and will make you feel good so give it a read...

Please come back to Mile 14, I'll do a better job of reporting the news from right here, the Kenai river.

March Madness

2011-03-17T17:55:00.001-07:00

That's a picture of the 67 fishing reels I own. This week in between all the other really important stuff I was doing I had the feeling that for the first time ever I'd go through my tackle and cull some of it out. Over the 15 years we've been at Mile 14 its all came in and none has left, I have stuff I didn't even know I had and way more stuff than I'd ever use. So, if you're around the first week of May we're having a 'guys stuff' garage sale. It'll have reels, rods, anchors, original packaged old lures, boots, rain gear....and as they say in Mexico, it will all be "almost free". I know I reported last year on our unique St. Patricks Day parade. We just got home from it and I think it deserves another mention. The first pic is MP waiting for the action to start. March in Alaska here is a confusing season and this pic tells the tale. You'll notice the snowmachine in the back of the one truck and the white truck going the other way was towing a boat, this weekend is the Homer Winter King Salmon tourney. Well, what to do...? We positioned ourselves at the very start of the parade route, it started at 4:30 and was over at 4:40....no kiddin....That's how you can tell its not an election year. But cool stuff was to follow.

The first 'float' of the parade was the American Legions train. I'm Catholic enough to recognise Latin when I see it and although there aren't enough words here I think it means ...we're good people that served our country and have alot of fun at this club....please come by for Karaoke on Friday night".

You know me....all that quest deal right? Well, the very next bunch of kids from the local Martial Arts Club had just the message I needed to see, that's my goal in life as well and it doesn't hurt to be reminded now and then. Not all our kids are cut out for the traditional get your @#^$ kicked football, the politics of basketball or even the endless fund raising to play hockey, some of our kids do just fine with different life skill sports.

Then as the parade was winding down along came this float. My old friends Ray and Gina Debardalaben who's guide service is associated with the local equipment rental company. Ray and Gina were married about 5 years ago and although older than me and MP were when we had kids, they now have 2. At their wedding they gave all the guests a CD of all their favorite Love songs, of which one was Kevin Fowlers ' Hard Man to Love'. Well, this song I fell instantly in love with and now I'm a Kevin Fowler expert. Thanks guys. Like most of us here in Alaska Ray is from somewhere else but Gina is full blown Alaskan and they're living the sport fishing dream. you'll notice his boat says ' Long Live the Kings'....and them kids they're holding tell the whole story why.

Follow me...Its a camera Safari

2011-03-08T18:00:00.001-08:00

That first pic I figured is a good way to start, after all this blog entry is about me and the unusual things I notice, Its actually the sign by which my fishing friends find me here at mile 14 and seeings how we have about 20 guides that use the property I needed a way to be found...well there it is, an upside down - dead fish.

But before we go wandering I have some business to take care of. I told my friend and fishing team mate Jason that I'd cruise the area and report with pictures on the current conditions here at Mile 14. I think one pic will suffice. So Jay, make sure you notice off to the left is the rear view mirror of that trusty 91 Honda Civic that I'm giving you to drive when you land in Alaska, it should be thawed out by then.

This next pic is a kind of 'budget cabana' me and the Mpeasy came across one day. I'd been aimlessly wandering the beach and wondering if I could live off my social security here in Mexico one day when this helped me with the answer. Yes... its do able. It helped direct my thoughts away from the 1/2 million dollar home in the gated community and got me going towards nice clean project house in Centro Mazatlan...then I just walk to the beach and have my own cabana, simple I'd say.

The next pic I staged one day just feeling full of creativity. I set the camera up on the concrete side of the pool, set the timer, ran to the fountain and then went and retrieved my really wet and sprayed brand new camera. I've been going through about one camera every year and I guess this is how you do it. But hey, its a cool shot even if it might have cost me 160 bucks.

The mermaids are toooo cool. Its the official poster of this years Carnaval who's theme is ' The return of the Muses'. As I recall a muse is a gifted person that can kind of mentor you and help you navigate through life by sharing life's secrets and wisdom. So what could be better than to have your muse come in the gorgeous female mermaid variety? And of course where would any Carnaval promotion be without a logo of the real Carnaval inspiration around here...Pacifico beer. This apartment building is where my best buddy Ernie lives, it used to be called 'Angels Paradise' . But a few years back Angel got divorced and the green half is his ex-wifes and the red half is Angels. There was wall built right down the middle and even a chain link fence right through the swimming pool. Its weird enough that theres a physical divide between the two sides but there seems to be a social divide as well. All the upbeat old timers live at Angels and the come and goers stay on the green side...It was here that I was told to shut up and get a haircut right in the middle of Commander Cody's 'Mama hated Diesels'. Of course that came from the green side.....Do you remember that scene in the movie War of the Roses when Michael Douglas was explaining his plan to break up the house in segments to his lawyer Danny Devito? Devito asked him " Oliver does this really make sense to you?" and Oliver replied...."heck yes, I got 2700 square feet and she's only got 2200".

This next pic is something you don't see every day, goats playing basketball. Right down the street from us is a spanking new state of the art basketball court. Its got the shatter proof breakaway rims and glass. Its got the padded support stands. Its got a perfectly flat and painted
playing surface...and goats. I'll leave it at that.

Every now and then I enjoy a nice Tanquery Martini...either shaken or stirred, I don't care. So naturally this wonderful selection of stuffed olives jumped out at me while shopping. My buddy Crisco got me going on the Anchovy stuffed olives years ago and they remain my favorite. But when I saw the salmon stuffed I got to wondering... farmed or wild? Sockeye of Chinook? Alaskan or Canadian? And then I had the brain storm...why not smoked salmon stuffed or even bacon stuffed? I mean theres not to many things in this world that you can't make taste better by adding bacon. So I figure if we can't find them I'll make my own and report back to you on my research, just keep reading Mile 14.

The next two pics are a set I'd say. For some reason the marketing of beer is done entirely different in Mexico than the U. S. of A. Now I know Joe Montana was a big star but hey, that was 20 years ago. I have to figure the answer is simple, its just because he's got a really cool name. Then you'll see Tecate has a strategy to get buyers by adding a few cans. In the states we'd have a sale price, but in Mexico just add a few cans after all...its a better deal. You know 14 cans for those days when 12 ain't enough but 18 is too many.

The next twp pics are set as well. We like to go to the central market and eat either lunch or breakfast. Its a great place to sit and watch the town down below. This day I had the daily special that was a nice chicken soup that was real brothy with one huge piece of chicken and huge pieces of vegetable. It came with beans and tortillas of course and cost 25 pesos, just a little over two bucks. The other pic is the inside of restaurant row above the mercado. They don't see to many gringos here and thats half the fun, the gals are trying to get you in their place kind of like the barkers in Las Vegas...its great and one of our favorite things.

Art is everywhere, you just got to notice. These are the towels sitting on top of the massage table at the Aroma spa. Now I sometimes go to the Mayan Spa as the Aroma is downtown and a bit more expensive. But when they have towels as cool as this I have to say its worth the time and money to get there. Oh, a one hour massage by a trained therapist is 250 pesos, a little over twenty bucks...believe it or not I fished hard enough that a few days it was really needed.

We all know theres certain things you can get in Mexico that you can't in the states, like good vanilla and cheap prescription drugs... and pants like these. As part of this quest I'm on to be a really good person I figure I need to be more helpful so if any of you ladies would like a really cool pair of britches I'll pick them up for you in 10 short months. I know where they sell them, just let me know.

Gotta Go

2011-03-04T04:50:00.000-08:00

I've never been to a party that didn't end and I think we're doing it just right. Our friend Connie shared some wisdom with us when she said " the best time to leave a party is while you're still having fun". So tommorrow on our 34th wedding Anniversary we jump the jet back to Mile 14. Being on final approach around here is a bit like being on death row, you know you gotta go, everybody else knows you gotta go and you spend hours decideing what to have for your last meal. Because Carnaval is starting we'll avoid downtown tonight and just go to the gold zone and pick out a restraunt that has cloth napkins and a wine list. Then manana we'll celebrate our love over one of our favorite things...Ivars clam chowder at the food pavilion in Sea-Tac. Thens its a late night into Anchorage, a quick nap at the Puffin Inn, a short flight to Kenai and its HELLOOOOO Jet-dog.

I'll blog more about Mazatlan and things here when I get home but this was the scene 2 nights ago on Ave Delmar at Cerritoes. So much has happened that the governor had a pep rally with the army and police to fire them up to have a violence free Carnaval. Easily 50 trucks wih Machine gun ready troops and sirens wailing paraded through town to let the bad guys know they mean business. I hope it works and Carnaval comes off without a hitch, my second favorite place in the world doesn't need anymore bad press. Pure La Vida is what we say here....living good. This sunset is just a few hours old. As I was watching it and starting to blues over a bit about leaving I got to thinking. Thats the same sunset we have in Alaska, its the same ocean as we have in Alaska and MP and I are the same people as we are in Alaska...So whats really changing? This year I'll resolve to incorporate what I've learned and what I do in Mexico into my Alaska life, that way it comes with me. New friends, a slower life, share the music, more fruit in my diet, let things go.....see you all soon Alaska.

Perfection

2011-02-26T04:55:00.000-08:00

As you know, I've been on a few fishing trips. I've seen it magic, tragic and points in between. I've fished in a class 5 gale with my buddy Nate and 100 degree heat with Jake Margues. I've caught a few fish, I've caught no fish and I've seen the water turn red behind the boat...but, maybe the best fishing trip of my life was just the other day. It was the perfect combo, all the elements wrapped into one 6 hour trip. Interesting and up beat companions with an international twist, balmy warm with flat seas, good food and some of the most beautiful fish I've ever had the previledge to see.
I usually like to have my feet on tera firma here in Mazatlan. I really enjoy the challenge and athleticism of surf casting and quite frankly I spend enough time in a boat every summer. But my friends had a corvina attack planned so I'm in . The day before the crew lead by Antonio and Thomas had come across some birds right outside the harbor. Thinking toro they slowed down and started to troll metal lures when they looked at the fishfinder and saw huge fish suspended at 20 feet. So the simplest way to get there was with a 20' rapala and in no time the rod goes off...but they're still thinking toro. Well the fish fights and fights and finally comes into view they can't believe their eyes, its a gorgeous yellowtail Corvina just like the one our friend Steve is holding in the first pic. Before stopping at 1 pm they had caught 13 of them for a total weight of over 300 pounds. If records were kept, this would be one, its all the buzz at the harbor, never has a load of corvina came in like this. So the next day we're out and everythings perfect. A half hour in I'm running the boat and see on the screen 5 to 7 large fish, as they hit about mid-screen the rod goes off on the outrigger and its game on. This is no bite, its flat on, the release clacks and clangs and the alarm on the reel goes to rattling. Its a great bite, a bit like when the rod goes off in the holder when you're pulling a K-16 Kwikfish and a 50 pound salmon jumps on it. You hear it as well as see it, the rod kind of stresses and the drag rips out...I'm impressed. The second pic is me and Ern with the double we caught, man that was exciting. Mine hit first and Erns while he was clearing the water. These two fish were the only 'chata's' of the day, as you can see they don't have the yellow and the tail is shaped just a bit different, but gorgeous fish.

No matter where you go its a bit the same, theres no secrets in big time fishing. We're really not far from shore so people see the excitement and of course theres always what I call the seagulling routine...where people look for other people and boats instead of fish. So this 3rd pic is a bit of that, we have a fish on and this panga driver needs to get close to see whats in its mouth. We landed the fish on the other side of the boat of course.

The last pic is Slah moving our load. We had 7 Corvina that ranged between 18 and 30 pounds. I took one home and it was enough to spread around to 6 different people and more for us tonight. Friday night we went to Slah's home in centro Mazatlan. His wife Maria had it prepared Mexican style, baked with nice veggies on top and nice mild red sauce. As we ate Slah asked what I thought about the whole deal....well....I'm thinking those beautiful fish aren't really that far out of my casting distance, I'm just going to have to practice more and work harder, I'll get it out that far next year.

Streeks are made to be Broken

2011-02-18T12:40:00.001-08:00

See that green Ranger lure hanging from that toro's mouth? Well thats my favorite lure in the entire world. With the big rod I'm chucking that 3 ouncer at least 125 yards and then a fast retrieve and it skips along the water driving the Jacks and Roosters crazy. For years I really hadn't used it for toro as I thought they were too big so I only used them for Roosters, lately I've found that was wrong, the Jacks eat them, big time. So this week I kind of deserted the team to stay home and fish the topwater, its the best bite in fishing, sometimes the fish follows for the entire retrieve just to take it at the shoreline once he's run out of water. Plus the Jacks are real school fish and rarely come in ones, when you catch them you catch alot of them. Naturaly I prefer the bigger, prettier Roosters and theres finally been some spottings, but if I can't catch them these 'budget Roosters' will do any time.

But Slah called the other day and it sounded like they had the Corvina surrounded out north. I've been having trouble catching the darn things but today the streek ended, we waxed em pretty good. The next three pics I'm leaving uninterupted and in order. Its Slah landing the first Corvina of the day for Ernie. You really need someone in the surf to help with the gaff, the darn fish have a fairly soft mouth and the extra drag of pulling them up the beach is when they're most often lost. Now Slah is a guy who's always in a hurry, I guess its because he knows exactly what he's doing so watching him land a fish is no different. This one here he sliced, poked and wacked at for a minute then said "%@*&^ it!" and reached down and grabbed it. I was glad it was him and not me, theres alot of responseability with it and I don't need the stress of a 'shamazle' as Ern would say. This one was just a semi-shamazle, happy ending.

The next pic is me with a typical Corvina, its the yellowtail variety and about as good a food fish as you can get. We're fishing the rocks and the metal lures are what they like best so it gets a little expensive. A two and a half ounce Krocodile costs over ten bucks and we routinely snag em or power cast em off the line, but, its the the price of glory eh? The other day I chucked one off on the first cast......emmmm....

The last pic is the boys with the mornings catch of 7 nice Corvina. Our friend Thomas there is in town and holding down the lead off spot while Jay is in California. Pretty chuckly time on the beach, just fog and us.....Its 5 am as I type this so Its out the door in just a second for another run at them, I'll report back. Thanks for stopping at Mile 14.

Life's an Art

2011-02-13T12:18:00.000-08:00

That first pic is MP and our friend Connie doing colaborative research for MP's art. Her talent was really what I first fell in love with, well, that and the fact that she actually liked me. Through the years she's done stained glass, charcoal sketches, oil paints, pottery, water colors but right now she's stuck on sunsets with acrylics and they're turning into a must have for the people here in our building.

Being a guy who grew up drawing tanks and rockets in art class I've always been impressed with real art. MP has an eye for life. She not only blends the colors and sees things some people don't but the way her art captures depth and action is amazing. And...she does all that in no time at all. The beach scene on the right that she just completed might have taken two hours. I watch her as she works and its kind of like film developing in the tray, they just keep getting clearer and prettier and then she just knows the right time to quit fiddling with it and be done. I think thats a part of art that translates to a good life, you gotta know when to quit fiddling with it and MP's got that mastered.

The cool thing about MP's art is its permanency, long after we're pow theres going to be somebody somewhere with one of the thousands of her creations saying " I just love this one"... Or , " my great aunt Patty did this in Alaska"...thats a cool thing. So, unlike her art mine is a one shot deal, you gotta be there. After 40 years of struggling with the guitar I finally like my sound and I finally consider myself a real musician and I guess most folks do to. I've been playing alot here in Mazatlan. Now that I kind of have the music I'm learning that there's way more to it than just belting out a song. Its about entertaining, its about including people in the music, its about emotion and communication and its about sharing...So thats the part I'm working on now. The music is like air for some people, they gotta have it and even though I'm continuely drawn to the next new song I'm learning that theres nothing wrong with belting out an old Hank Williams song for the 10,000th time, some people want their air to be familiar.

For some reason it seems that my generation spawned more than its fair share of musicians. Everywhere I go I'm always impressed with the folks I meet that make magic. This guy I'm singing with below is me and Slah's friend Antonio. He's an amazing guy, art is in his blood. He does oil on ceramic for visitors with only his fingers at the New Riu resort. Oh, and he's one of the best fishermen in Mazatlan...as my old friend Curt Synness used to say...." how DOES he do it???"In this pic we're at a private party singing a ballad together. On this trip to Mazatlan I've had the opportunity to play with alot of people, from proffesionals to local mariachi's. I've had great nights with 100 people and I've been told to shut up and get a hair cut, its all good.

But this last pic is the creme de la creme...One night I learned this hard lesson....never follow a 12 year old. Me and my friends Steve and Brian were doing a kind of guitar circle one night when my friend Bill Turner asked if his grand daughter Clare could play. She confidently strapped on that black guitar of mine and pulled the mic close. Clare took a few practiced strums and them broke into ' This Kiss'....awesome is all I could say...awesome. Thats how I know life's an art. Just share.

The Lost Week

2011-02-09T15:22:00.000-08:00

When we first started in Mazatlan I always said I wanted to stay long enough I could forget what I did the first week. Well, I think we're there, I'm even having trouble remembering just last week. It could be because of the foul weather. I hate to complain and I know with all my friends in the frozen north its hard to get and sympathy but it was flat cold here. The official coldest in 50 years, which wouldn't have been so bad but the northern air hit along with hurricane force winds. The first pic was the view on thursday morning from our headquarters here at mile 5214 south. Our friend Deb Germano lives over on the beach in Sabalo and with leaky windows she cleaned the house the next day with a shovel.

My routine is pretty simple. I go fishing most mornings with the team out north and get home around 11:00. Then I love to nap on the north terrace. With the surf sound and people talking and the warm sun on you it creates this sensational cozy-white noise environment that makes me dream some tremulous dreams. The next pic is what I had to do to get that done last week. I'm reading Dan Browns Lost Symbol and about 10 minutes from la la land.

So what do you do when its indoors time in Mazatlan ? Well....you go to the casino. You get a massage. You have Pacifico and talk about the weather and you go shopping. So the other day found us at my favorite grocery store, Leys. Anybody that knows me knows that for some weird reason I love to grocery shop, even at home, its social and interesting with me. So that part is even better in Mexico where Leys is the most 'mexican' of the big box stores . Where else could you find all the makings of mexico's traditional hangover cure...menudo. Its a briney tripe soup sometimes with pork shank meat and fat. mmmmm....I really like it.

But nothings forever, especially the weather so it cleared the other day and life is back to normal. We were treated to this sunset last night, I thought it was spectacular. Theres always discusions of the famous 'green flash' when the sun just drops out of the sky. But I prefer these semi-cloudy sunsets where the colors reflect and jump from spot to spot. Sometimes the water and the sky are the same color and I'd bet you the guy in that panga boat and me are feeling about the same at the time I took this pic, feeling our place in the world...inspired with the routine beauty.

This next pic gives you an idea of where I spend most mornings. The best I can figure is that we're about 8 miles north what they're calling 'nuevo Mazatlan'. We usually go to one of three spots and to tell you which is which I don't know. Some of the names are ours and some are known by all....Black Rock, Gringo Point, Two Bridges, 3rd Point, 2nd point , 1st point and the Playground. Sometimes theres other fisherman but never more than a couple rigs, mostly its just us. The guy in the middle of the next pic works in Alaska and has fished the Kenai. I believe Slah said his name is Martin and he's throwing a 13' Breakaway rod and the lure is flying the proverbial country mile. Its a gorgeous thing watching the crew at work. Slah casts far enough that he doesn't like to get his feet wet, especially early in the morning. Ernesto is kind of the ironman, he just stands and casts and casts and casts and......Me and Jay kind of like the rythm of the surf, out to cast, climb the beach as the lure sails and then turn and start the retrieve after it sinks a bit. Thats the routine.

Mon De Loan

2011-02-01T15:26:00.000-08:00

I don't know how you spell it but I do know how to pronounce it...It's a Mexican saying that means ' man who wears apron'. And because I sometimes rush home from fishing for a hike with MP or decide not to go fishing twice in one day, I'm that guy...mon de lay. The guys think its pretty chuckly but I kind of figure if people notice that you love your wife well maybe you're doing it right. I actually think its a pretty good trade, my Mexican friends educate me on beach fishing and the Mexican way and I astound them with the simplicity of American success and happiness...it only this 'Happy wife- Happy life'. Our team is a diverse bunch, gringo's and Mexicans, married and single, young and old, we're figurin it out and having alot of fun as we do. The next pic is of the boys this morning as we had breakfeast of fresh Civiche that Slah brought. We've caught several nice Sierra lately and they make the best Civiche. You take a nice big tostado chip and layer on some nice Mayonesa with limon then an inch deep of the civcihe and a little hot sauce....mmmm....it'd make a bulldog break his chain. Today the fishing fell down a bit so it was just kind of a field trip with fishing poles. As we eat theres 8 or ten of us and a couple are talking about girls and few of the guys are having a knot tieing clinic while I'm laying down trying to catch a nap. I get to thinking this is all pretty cool. That guy in the foreground is our friend Caleb. He's a pretty cool young guy, he runs the Schooner Patricia Belle and goes surf fishing in a leather coat. The next pic is of our friend Emelio. Emelio is a guy who is always smiling, always, and he's especially happy to be out on the beach with us. We got some awfully funny guys but Emelio
leads the pack in that department. The next pic is of our designated harvester Slah with a huge Sierra (mackeral) and a Corvina. Even though Slah always eeks out a fish or two the rest of us are struggleing up north so for the next few days the plan is to look for new fish. Tommorrow I'll jump the #2 bus and fish the rocks at the Holiday Inn for robalo and then we need to take a peek at the beach on cerritos in hope of a roosterfish siteing. The water temp is only 6o some degrees and we know the rooster likes it warmer but I'm hoping for a miracle....maybe just one roosterfish this year, that would be enough.

The entire town turned out for the Air Show on Sunday along the malecon. And for being only the 2nd year of the show it was really quite impressive. We had skydivers and hangliders as well as 3 dual engine Navajoe's that flew in formation and a couple of prop stunt planes. The high light of the show was a red Mexican Air force jet that did wing overs and loops...all of which I didn't get a single good picture of. I was useing some zoom and trying to get a good shot for the blog here and all I got was about 10 shots of the same sky and palm trees. I guess its a little like shooting ducks with a shot gun....you have to lead them. Oh well, next time. But as impressed as I was by the airplanes what caught my eye were these pelicans. They're every where here and unlike our Eagles that kind of live off whats left behind from humans these guys work for a living. They fly the beach catching updrafts from the warm water, they seem to draft off each other an even flap their wings in unison. When they see the small fish they want they climb to an altitude to gain speed and then set their wings and dive straight into the water temporarily disappearing...then up with the fish as you see them put the beak up in the air and swallow.....now thats an airshow.