Experience: Halibut/Salmon Fishing Alaska

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.

Henry David Thoreau

In the summer of 2004, my dad took my brother and I on the outdoor trip of a lifetime, halibut and salmon fishing in Alaska. It was my sophomore year of college, and at the time, I didn’t realize how fortunate I was to have the opportunity, and now, nearly nearly 16 years later, I still dream of going back.

We stayed in a pair of cabins at the Rocky Point Resort along the Wrangell Narrows in southeast Alaska, a nearly 40 year old operation. The trip alone to reach the resort was an adventure requiring a flight from DFW to Seattle, then to Ketchikan and finally to Petersburg, the planes shrinking in size the further we went.

The trip consisted of guided trips out for halibut and salmon. As we arrived in the summer, the Coho or “silver” were running. The other benefit of our timing was that the days were long…the sun barely dipped below the horizon, before it came back up. This afforded us the opportunity to take advantage of the skiffs available to us for some self-guided targeting of spawning King Salmon in the sound.

Shockingly, some folks in our extended party seemed more focused on trips to the local liquor store rather than continuing the fishing experience, an absolute waste of a once in a lifetime experience in my book. Regardless, my father, brother and I spent every moment we could on the water. It was an absolute fishermen’s paradise.

When not fishing from the skiffs or catching a few hours of daylight interrupted sleep, we were with one of the two boat captains, initially targeting halibut. The guided trip took us out to deeper water where we fished amongst humpbacks and orcas…truly amazing.

My personal best was an 87lber that I struggled to curl up for the picture below. One of the more amusing things to watch was the captain gaff our catch and if it was of substantial size, fire a .38 caliber round into its head to subdue it before pulling it aboard with the gaff.

In addition to the halibut, we pulled in multiple rockfish, a few skates and a rarity, a octopus that turned bright red when we pulled it aboard. The crown jewel of our trip was a 137lb halibut my brother wrestled in.

Once we hit our limit of halibut, the captain shifted gears to setup the boat to troll for Coho. I’ve never seen such a large school of fish when we found them…you literally could have grabbed one right out of the water.

By the time we wrapped our trip, we had limited each day on salmon and halibut. When we returned to camp, we watched as the captain cleaned each fish with expert care, showing us how to break down the halibut and commenting on the particular value of the cheeks. Each fish was packed to be frozen and shipped back to Texas.

Once the fish was picked clean, he would toss the carcass up in the air towards the water and before it hit the surface, a bald eagle would swoop in and carry it away. Alaska is unlike any place I’ve ever been…it stills wild..and I can’t wait to get back.