Halibut Fishing

Yesterday we went halibut fishing in Cook Inlet, by Homer, AK. The limit is 2 halibut per day. They get as big as 400 pounds, but most are around 30 pounds. If you catch a small one, you can throw it back and keep trying for a bigger fish. We had 8 people fishing on our boat, and everyone got their 2 fish. The biggest fish was 34 pounds. We got in the water about 6:30 a.m., and got out around 1:00 p.m. Our friend Jan went fishing with us, and a friend of hers said she would take all the halibut Jan caught and the friend would pay for shipping. Then she found out that it costs about $300 to ship, so we ended up with Jan’s fish.

The captain of the boat was Bob. He has a house in Oregon, but leaves his wife for about 5 months each year to come to Alaska and run fishing charter trips. He says when he's up in Alaska he really misses his dog. The first mate on the boat was a girl named Tiffany, from Texas. We asked her if she stayed in Alaska during the winter. She said she usually does, and last winter she lived in an old abandoned school bus near Talkeetna. A musician had lived there, but he told her she was welcome to it since he was moving back to the lower 48 states. She said the people in Talkeetna were very friendly. She would run into them every once in a while when she went into town to take a shower. She said the wood stove didn’t work that well, and when it got to around 60 below, the oil in her oil lamp would gel, so she didn’t have any light source. I think she understated it when she said last winter was kind of rough. But I guess it can be rough for many people in Alaska. Nan wants to move from the campground we are in now because we don’t have TV.

I included a picture of the inside of the Salty Dog bar in Homer, AK, where people sign and stick dollar bills to the wall. If you are a fan of the show Deadliest Catch (about king crab fishing), it was the bar where Mike Rowe interviewed the ship captains on the show. Also, the boat Time Bandit docks in Homer, but it wasn’t in port when we were there.

Martin Buser's facility

Today we went to Martin Buser’s Happy Trails Kennel and Iditarod dog training facility. He usually owns about 90 dogs. From this he gets about 16 dogs that he uses to compete in the Iditarod. He has won this the race several times, and holds the record for completing the race in the shortest amount of time (just under 9 full days). He and I were talking prior to the tour and he gave me some interesting info. First place in the Iditarod pays around $50,000 to $70,000, depending on the number of participants. Second place is around $15,000. The entrance fee is $4,000. The prize money is hardly enough to keep the kennel running. He also gets money from sponsors, and earns some from giving these tours of his facility. When people take a cruise to Alaska, one of the side trips they can take is to have a dog team pull them on a glacier. Martin leases some of his dogs out for this purpose during the cruising season. He also travels around giving motivational speeches to corporations.
During the tour he mentioned that the Iditarod committee wanted the mushers to install GPS trackers on their sleds so that fans could track the progress of each team online. At one checkpoint he ran into a pilot friend of his, so he gave the pilot the tracking device. This caused the website to crash because everyone was logging in to find out why Martin Buser was now traveling 125 miles per hour in the wrong direction. The one picture shows Martin accepting his first place check while his lead dog is peeing on the trophy. He said he didn’t mind. The check was his and the trophy belonged to the dog.
On the way back I took a picture of what was reported to be Sarah Palin’s floatplane. I’ll assume this is true until someone proves me wrong.

Knik River glacier cruise

Today we went on a 3 hour cruise on an airboat to see a glacier on the Knik River. We also hoped to see some wildlife, but the only thing we saw was a squirrel that the guide had made a pet by feeding it peanuts. We also saw some moose poop. The first time I saw that it was exciting, but it's getting kind of boring now. The guide told the story of his dog that is half wolf. It used to live outside until a moose charged the guide and was ready to stomp him to death to protect it's calf. The dog came to his aid and saved his life. The dog now lives inside his house and gets his share of hamburger.

Musk Ox farm

A couple days ago we took a tour of the local Musk Ox farm in the Wasilla, AK area. They raise the musk ox for their fur, which they then spin into yarn and make hats, scars, etc. I could have bought a nice ski cap for around $150, but I passed. We then went to an animal sanctuary that treats injured or sick animals. We saw grizzly bear, caribou, moose, elk, owls, and eagles. After that we stopped at the Iditarod museum. They had a guy giving 2 minute sled dog rides, so Jan, Paul, Nan and I hopped on for a ride around the dirt track. It’s amazing how calm the dogs are until they know they are going to start pulling the cart. Then they start jumping all around and yelping. While in Wasilla we are hoping to get a look at Sarah Palin’s float plane. You can’t go down her road, but we hear if you go to the Best Western and look across the lake, you can see her plane. If I’m lucky I might run into her and she can give me one of her famous winks.

Flight around Mt. McKinley

On Saturday (6/26/10) we signed up to take an airplane ride around Mt. McKinley in the Denali National Park. The plane takes off out of Talkeetna, AK. When our plane returned from a previous trip the pilot said that the mountain was clouding up and it wouldn’t be worth going up right now. So Nan and I, and the other couple going up (Bob and Kris) left our cell numbers so they could call when conditions looked good. No call the rest of Saturday, and no call on Sunday (because it rained all day). Unfortunately, Bob and Kris had to leave on Sunday so they weren’t able take the plane ride. Fortunately, Nan and I were staying until Tuesday morning, and the skies cleared up on Monday. We got the call and were able to take off around 6:00 p.m. After the call, the good news kept coming. Another couple had just signed up for a flight with a glacier landing. I originally didn’t think landing on a glacier would be worth the extra $150 on top of the $400 for the flight, especially since I’ve seen my share of Cleveland snow. But since the other couple had paid for a glacier landing, we tagged along with them for no additional charge. It turned out to be the highlight of the flight.

Monster Truck Tour

We were in Fairbanks for the longest day of the year - June 21st. There’s about 22 hours of daylight. I took a video of how the campground looked at midnight. While in Fairbanks, Nan and I took a 3-hour cruise down the river and got a demonstration on dog sledding from the husband and daughter of the late Susan Butcher. She won 4 iditorods before she died of cancer a few years ago. We then left for Denali National park. While there we took a tour on a monster truck with our friends Paul and Jan. We didn’t see much wildlife, but we did see a pair of ptarmigan (birds like pheasants), some grizzly footprints, and some wolf poop. The next day the four of us drove through Denali. We got a good view of Mt. McKinley, but it didn’t show up on the camera very well, so I didn’t include a picture. While looking at the mountain we came across a young moose that was feeding right by the road. Paul kept getting closer to get a good picture, and I had my video camera aimed right on him in case there was some excitement, but no luck. The moose snorted at Paul, and he decided he had enough close-up shots.

Touring Fairbanks

On Wednesday night I went to the local car races in Fairbanks. They had two classes of cars, Legend cars that are similar to 1937 cars, and Bandelaro. The Bandelaro can’t weigh more than 750 pounds, including the driver, and they had 30 hp engines. The drivers were girls, I believe in their teen years. The Legend cars were for the adults. The next day Nan and I and our two friends (Jan and Paul) went to the Chena Hots Springs, about 60 miles from Fairbanks. They had an ice hotel that we toured. It included ice chandeliers, a chess set, ice sculptures, and an ice toilet (for display purposes only). On the way back we looked at the Alaska pipeline. Most of it is above ground, but some goes underground. The next day we got a tour of the North Pole by Jesse the elf/campground worker/local pastor. Then last night Nan and I went to a 3-hour chef school. We helped prepare halibut encrusted in macadamia nuts, asparagus wrapped in fillo dough, and baked Alaska. I enjoyed it more than Nan. She doesn’t understand why you should go through all that work when you can pop a frozen dinner in the micro and be eating in 10 minutes.