We finally went Halibut Fishing

Ever since I have arrived in Alaska, I have been wanting to go fishing. I don't know why I had such a strong desire to go, being that I have never really fished before and have never had a desire to while in Spokane. But the timing has just never worked out. I was starting to lose hope that I would be able to check fishing off my list of things to do while in Alaska. But then Ian happened.

You see, when we first opened the restaurant, the dining room managers (Micky and Brian) decide that they wanted to have a sales contest. Micky tracked the sales of all the servers for six weeks. At the end of those six weeks whoever had the highest would receive a prize. Well, Ian won. So his prize was a day of fishing followed by a stay at a rustic cabin on Pleasant Island (about a 45 minute boat ride from the lodge), (another side note: it is called Pleasant Island because there are no bears on the island, only deer).

The day finally came and we were off. We took Micky, she said that the only stipulation of the prize was that she got to come, Jason, another of the servers and Arron, the head maintenance guy for the lodge, and owner of the boat, the Mary Jane.

The water was pretty choppy and we finally decided on a spot called Gustavus Point. I was the first to drop a line. I was very optimistic. I told Grandpa Fred that I was gonna catch one for him, since it was his birthday and I was going to come through. 

After about 20 minutes of nothing we reeled up my line to make sure that I still had bait because I thought that I had felt a bite and it was. It did have a few nibble marks on it though. Ian had checked it for me and asked if I wanted to continue but I told him that he could have a turn. He didn't have the line in the water for more that 30 seconds and he had a bit. This is where the story gets good.

Whatever was on the other line was putting up a good fight. Sometimes it would really fight him but other times, Erin thought that it probably was maybe 30 pounds. Ian kept at it for about 20 minutes. Now, at the same time this was happening Jason had a line of his own in the water. He was doing his best to keep it away from Ian's line but Ian's fish was all over the place. In a 19 foot boat there isn't much room to "keep away". So it was inevitable. The fish had wrapped Ian's line around Jason's line. So Jason does get credit for helping Ian the last few minutes. Finally we caught a glimpse of it. It was huge. When we finally got it up to the side of the boat, Arron speared it and knock it out. After it was on the boat, Arron measured it and it was 64 inches. We never measured it but Arron had a book that told us for the length it was right around 134 pounds. WAY TO GO IAN! After all that excitement we didn't get anymore bits so we decide to head to a different spot.

On our way to the next fishing spot, we soon discovered that we were being followed by the Nation Forest Service or NPS. So we stopped because they had their lights flashing. Turns out that we were too close to shore. Since were were still in Bartlett Cove (where the lodge is located) we are in what is deemed "whale waters" so there are a lot of restrictions. You can only go so fast and you must stay a mile from the shoreline. Since the water was so rough Arron had been a little closer than he should have. But since it was so rough and the NPS knew Aaron so well (he is a year round resident of Gustavus) they let us go with a warning. 

After we hit our spot we put the lines back into the water. Turned out that Ian had the magic touch and had a few more bits but only was able to hook one more fish. He let me reel it in. It was nowhere near as big as the first. It was a 20 pounds. Jason also caught a fish but we made him throw it back because it was a little one. Non the less, he was very proud of it. What was the most beautiful part of  the trip was sitting there at our second spot was all the sea life that was around us. There were a bunch of harbor porpoise that surrounded the boat. We also saw a few sea otters, and even a humpback whale that came up for breath 25 yards from our boat.

We finally had to head back to the dock. After we go there we got to show off Ian's catch and Arron filleted  the fish.

Then it was off the Pleasant Island for our night in the cabin. But bad weather persisted and we had to turn around to come back. I was fine with that. I had an amazing day. I was on cloud nine. I had wanted to go halibut fishing the entire summer and I finally got to go. We decided that we would wash up and come down for dinner at the lodge. We passed by the lodge (it's on the way to employee lodging from the docks), and saw Brian, the assistant dinning room manager, and told him what had happened and that we'd be back for dinner. So we shower and head back down, and as we came into the lodge we were greeted by Ruth, our hostess, and she says there is a table reserved for us and she lead us to the back room where usually the employees hang out, and there was a single table set up with linens and a vase with flowers and a bottle of champagne. Brian came along and told us that we didn't have to order, that the chef had taken care of it for us. Also hanging out of the chiller that held the champagne was a set of keys. Brian had arranged for us to stay in one of the view rooms at the lodge for the night. WHAT A WONDERFUL SURPRISE. I had not been expecting that at all. So we had a great dinner, and we got to stay in a really nice room for free. All because Ian is a really hard worker.