Connectivity

People that know me know that I believe in kismet, sometimes things aren't coincidence but really meant to be. Design of life really, if you notice it's really connections and how you fit in your own atmosphere....know what I mean ? Well, wow, where do I start....I had that on July 24th 2019.  A customer and friend of mine Bill Church invited me months ago to go on a Ling cod / Rockfish trip with him , his brother and a couple friends. I couldn't go, MP's Subby was scheduled for work on July 24 but in true Jethronian style they called and moved us up and walla, I'm going fishing. Here's Bill, my sponsor on one of the best days ever.

We check in with the Charter office and are told the Katchemak King slip L5. I walk up and the skipper Mike and deck hand Ben are on deck to greet us and I say " this is one of the Billy Joe boats " and Mike is astounded, " how do you know that "....Well in the early 80's as I cut my teeth in the Charter business I did a lot of business with Bill, Billy Joe and my friend Jim Thompson who's Thompsons Charters was the creme de la cream of Homer chartering. These three boats of which one is the Katchemak King are 38' Tolleycraft, real boats, vessels actually made for the big water. This one might even have been one of the ones I fished from many a time in 81 thru 85. Thompsons had gas engines in them but Mike had re powered the King with twin John Deere diesels, sweet . So off we go as a feeling of deja vue swept over me. I wish I'd taken a pic of the boat but I didn't. But what the King lacked in speed ( 3 hour run to Pearl Island ) she makes up with steadiness. We ran south and west of Pearl island past every boat in the fleet except one and even though the water was flat for being in the middle of the famous Shelikof Straits I felt good, we're in a 38' Tolley and our only neighbor, a 20 ft trailerable with outboard motors....yikes. Around here we call that a ' Deep Creek ' boat not a ' damn near to Kodiak' boat.

Being a fish hound I've met a few...my friend in Mazatlan Dan Stewart is world class but I gotta say that Captain Mike was in his natural element for sure. . A forty year old skinny guy he's in perpetual motion...notice any thing weird in this pic of him setting up a drift ?

Yup all day long, no shoes. Here's a pic of him looking to see what Chris has coming up on the elevator. One of the connections was his music, unabashed he put it on and put it on loud and wouldn't ya know....red dirt music, my thing. We spent the day listening to Chris Stapelton, Cody Jinks , Roger Creagor , Daryl Dodd, ,man it was perfect......kismet for sure.

AND THE FISH, my goodness , more gorgeous creatures you've never seen. I caught Rock Fish in Seward with Woody as a kid but this day , this day was the land of the giants. Here's Ben and Chris with a huge Yellow Eye. Ben there is a green horn deck hand and he's doing just fine, it felt good I kinda showed him how to lock up the reel without amputating your finger skin like I was afraid he was going to do.

And hows about a China Rock Fish . Is that thing pretty or what ?

So if you think  he's pretty hows about a Greenling.

The staple of the day were the Black Rockfish that the fish hounds call ' jumbos'. These are the ones I remember from Seward with the addition of about 5 pounds....

And the largest of the day , Ling Cod. We had several at 30 pounds I'd guess. I'll just post the pic of the entire catch with all the new Team X recruits. Team X, the most sleep deprived fishing team in Alaska. On the right me and Bill, in the middle Chris and Dave and anchoring the team is Edwardo who is one tough s.o.b....and fishy. At one point he had a hold of a thrashing fish and Ben said " wo wo wo let me get that , I heard ' hey, I got it '.....Look at the side of those Lings.

Of course fish hounds want fish. The jigging is kinda physically challenging and by finally being the Teams elder I had to take a break and was granted permission....of course I could have resorted to the ol flying teeter totter method of  jigging like Dave but I just couldn't bring myself around to doing it, after all , I'm a professional  and I gotta look like one.

Here's a pic of our destination and view for 4 hours of jigging. Pearl Island . This is a place you gotta want to go to and you better have your collective stuff together and have faith in your equipment. It's a long way home.

Some trips for me end up being about fish. Some end up being about friends and some mostly about nature like when we pitch a no hitter on the world famous. Well this trip was about it all...

We stopped at the top of the hill and viewed Homer, icing on the cake for us. I noticed the guys were kinda quiet and I hope I was too. This view deserved it. They say the snow will be as deep as the Fireweed is tall....maybe some of you Alaskans can shoot me an e-mail and let me know if It's true.

It was the first time in 30 years I ever went fishing myself this time of year, so cool. So from me to you fellow fish meisters, mucho gracias, you helped me find the way in retirement. We ain't done with nothing but revenueing.

And in the ' this is weird stuff ' dept. Team X safety and morale officer has this...wash your truck when you park there, then don't do it again. And who ever you are going around Soldotna and giving away matches, stove fuel and vegetable peelers, thanks...but the matches were wet and MP thought she might catch something from the peeler...is this some kind object association game or something we should be picking up on , what gives ? weird .