14. Fishing for Rainbows

June 16, 2009

The rivers in southwest Alaska are famous for their rainbow trout which can grow to well over 24" in length. They are highly protected game fish. Guides are required to attend certification classes and all anglers are required to use only single barbless hooks on lures when fishing for rainbows. It's practically a capital offense to keep or kill a rainbow - only catch and release is allowed in Alaska.

It was early in the season at the Royal Wolf Lodge and we were graciously offered a small cabin where we could stay and visit with Kate and Kev for a few days and go fishing for rainbows if we liked. This was more than we'd expected and we were touched by Chris & Linda's hospitality.

In the morning we suited up with hip waders, felt-soled boots and warm jackets and were paired up with Tyler for a day of dry fly fishing. We met Kevin by the lake and he flew us out to a little river about 10 miles to the east where Chris owned the land and kept a few boats onshore.

Loading up for a ride to the river

Despite our layers of warm clothes the water was frigid. This early in the season, the rivers and lakes had only recently cleared of ice and the water was running cold. This also meant that the fish were just warming up and they were hungry.

That being said, these are also Alaskan Rainbows we're talking about. These are fish that have been around for some time. They've seen plenty of anglers come and go, they've been caught and released for years. Which means they've had the time to develop discerning tastes. Not just any ol' cast with a tasty lookin lure will do for these fish. No, they want to be convinced. So the first hour or so was taken up with a little instruction on casting the 2" dry flies that we'd be using throughout the day.

Trying not to get tangled in the line

I'd never cast a fly in my life. Growing up, the bulk of my fishing was with nightcrawlers and bobbers. I had a couple of spinners and wasn't averse to spearing a minnow on a hook if I could find one, but for the most part I used low tech wiggly worms. Fly fishing was brand new to me. With Tyler's help I moved fairly quickly from completely hopeless (tangled up in floating line) to moderately ok. And then I got lucky and caught the biggest rainbow trout I'd ever seen!




Mark pulled in a respectable 18" rainbow shortly after...



And then he fell in the river. To clarify: he was already in the river, we'd moved upstream to a bend and were casting from a gravel shelf into the waters as they sped up rounding the bend. Mark stepped off the shelf and found himself drifting downstream, near-freezing water pouring into his waders. Thankfully Tyler got the boat fired up and was able to fish him out before he turned completely blue and we rushed upstream to get him warmed up immediately.

At the cabin on Big Ku the guys found some dry clothes and put on hot coffee while Mark thawed out in a hot shower. It took a little while but he finally stopped shivering and the color came back to his lips. We settled in to a good lunch that Kate had packed up for us, had some warm drinks and relaxed enough to decide to head back out for some more fishing.

Staying warm and dry in the boat.

A fish on the line

The afternoon was a little more like fishing than catching. We reeled in a few rainbows but nothing to equal the morning's catch. Even so, they were far larger than any we'd seen in the Lower 48 (even at Pike Place).

Late in the day Kevin tracked us down on the river and we loaded up to head back to the lodge. Kate had been working on a couple pike the boys had caught. After she got over the teeth and through the slime (we all know that pike are scary ferocious, but on top of that once landed they emit a coat of eely slime - eewwwww!) Kate sliced 'em and diced 'em and fried 'em up. After all that trouble they were amazingly delicious appetizers piping hot upon our return.

Kevin offers us a ride

After dinner, while Mark spent time tending to one drowned camera I spent some time with Chris Branham going over the charts. Chris gave me excellent tips on navigating across the taiga where there are few distinct landmarks and few good landings. He also gave us resources that might help us if we were to run into trouble (radio frequencies, lodge locations, owner's names, potential fuel stops). Chris has been flying this terrain for ages and following his recommendations I plotted a course to intersect the Aniak River at its headwaters in the Kuskowin Mountains the next day.

Chris Branham points out 525 hill

As the sun faded towards the horizon we hiked out to Kate and Kevin's cabin for a little wine, a bonfire, and of course s'mores. Kevin's folks were also up that week, and we traded tales of flying and fishing as the sun settled into it's golden nightime glow.

Kate and Kevin's summer home

Kate and Kevin

Golden light around 11:00pm

13. Looking For The K-Team

Route of flight: PAAQ - PAIG via Lake Clark Pass




June 15, 2008

Lake Clark Pass - the entrance is blocked by a prow of rock that you've got to wind around and the exit is forked by another island of rock. The pass itself is a steep sloped narrow gap that twists and turns with few options for a decent landing if the engine quit. It also has a few box canyons off the side that are very alluring - enough to draw you in and trap you. The day we flew it, clouds obscured the peaks and pinched our airspace as the terrain rose. Even so, with sheer slopes on either side coated with blue glaciers tumbling down there's plenty to look at and distract you from your route.

We'd checked the weather cams before leaving Palmer, they showed low clouds at both ends of the pass, opening up on the northwest side towards Lake Clark. The FSS reported lifting skies on the other side and Lake Iliamna was forecast to be high overcast.

Chakochatna River, on the way to Lake Clark Pass

We flew along the northwest shore of the Cook Inlet. Past the Sustina River, there were no roads, and just a few airstrips used mostly to get people and supplies to the oil derricks out in the water. Just past the last of the oil derricks a prow of rock guarded the entrance to the pass. That rock was really the remains of the foothills that hadn't been washed away by the river pouring out of the mountains. It was lush, and at it's base was a small lake - just large enough for a floatplane to land in and with just enough shoreline for a lodge perched on its edge. There was a Beaver at the dock and red Cessna180 on approach as we threaded our way past and into the pass.

The terrrain rose steeply to either side and below us the riverbed climbed fast to meet the glaciers. Fresh snow climbed up into the cloud cover. We kept an eye out for Dall Sheep and bears but to be honest, we kept a brighter eye out on the sectional and the terrain map.

Steep terrain in Lake Clark Pass

Hard to say whether we'd have wanted a perfectly clear day to run Lake Clark Pass. To have done so only would have added to the distraction. Halfway through, we jogged to the south to follow a the higher fork out to the lake. I spotted a bear trundling along the riverbank and we had just enough room to circle for a closer look. This proved to be mildly disorienting. Mark had no problem flying the tight maneuver, but it didn't leave him much bandwith to spot the bear. Figuring there'd be more bears in the Katmai, we headed out the pass.

Approaching Lake Clark

As we flew west from Lake Clark the land opened up, the pines thinned out and we entered the tundra. The Katmai Preserve is found at the eastern end of the Alaska Peninsula. It's most famous for its brown bears, king salmon and rainbow trout. Iliamna Lake is the largest of the many lakes dotting the region (it's about the same size as Great Salt Lake) and it was thereabouts that we hoped to connect with our friends Kate and Kevin who were out on their own Alaskan adventure.


Looking for the K-Team.

Kate and Kev are friends of ours from Seattle. Kate is a chef with CIA credentials and Kevin is a floatplane pilot. Together they got a sweet little summer gig at the Royal Wolf Lodge in the Katmai Preserve and we decided to drop in and say hi.

We had a rough idea of where to find them. They were near Nonvianuk Lake, south of Iliamna and not far from Igiaguig (the closest landing strip). When we crossed Lake Iliamna, we realized that the terrain was more complex than we'd imagined from the charts. The taiga was freckled with numerous small lakes, streams, rivers and very few hills with which to triangulate our position.

Taiga south of Iliamna Lake

Luckily, we'd been in touch via e-mail the week before and had the frequency for the lodge radio. As we flew over one of the lakes around where we thought they might be, we spotted a floatplane on the water and gave a call. The lodge radio was right by the kitchen and Kate picked up right away. After a quick chat, we headed back to Igiuguig to await a pickup from Chris in his Helio.

We landed at Igiugig in a stiff quartering breeze as a DC-3 was running up with a load of passengers. Mark made a sweet short landing and made the first turnoff just to be polite (earning him some friendly compliments from the DC-3 crew). As we tied off on the tarmac we were treated to the rare sight (well, rare for us in the lower 48) of a gleaming DC-3 taking off from a short dirt strip.

DC-3 taxis to the runway at Igiugig

Tail up on takeoff

Chris Branham pulled up in his pickup and took us out to the river where he'd drawn up his Helio.

We took off down stream and climbed out in a few hundred feet heading west flying low over the taiga. 20 miles away we circled over the Royal Wolf Lodge, a collection of buildings that Chris and his wife Linda have built over the last 10 years, stick by stick, all of it imported in that Helio and two other planes that Chris keeps on Little Ku.

Royal Wolf Lodge

It was pretty cool to have tracked down Kate and Kevin way out here. We were just in time for dinner and spent the evening catching up with all their adventures.



We all ate very well thanks to Kate.

12. Separate Ways

Route of flight: PATK-MRI-PAAQ

N322MX and N1669 on the ground at Talkeetna

June 14, 2008

We woke to overcast skies and a slight drizzle, packed our camp and headed to town to find some food. We ate at a small inn filled with all sorts of tourists and climbers and folks just passing through on the only road from Fairbanks to Anchorage. The shelves were full of books and old National Geo’s. We picked through and pulled a few from the 60’s and 70’s and spent the better part of breakfast thumbing through stories and photos of Alaska and trading tales with the other half-dozen or so folks with whom we shared the table.

It was still a little drizzly and we weren’t in any hurry to go fly in the rain so we made our way to the airport and stopped in at the Flight Service Station (FSS) for a weather briefing. Flight Service Stations are located throughout Alaska and the lower 48 and their function is to provide detailed weather information for all pilots - commercial and private. In fact, it’s an FAA requirement that every pilot, prior to taking off on any flight must obtain an official weather briefing for their route of flight. Doesn’t matter if you’re flying a 747 full of paying passengers, a 737 full of cargo or if you’re just going to take a Cessna up for a few practice touch-n-go’s; you’re required to get a briefing first and the folks at the FSS are who you call. They’re fully fluent in all the NOAA weather data available for their area and have local knowledge of the weather trends as well. At least they do in Alaska.

In 2007, as part of a cost-savings initiative the FAA decided to outsource the weather services in the lower 48 and much of that local expertise was lost. I remember clear as a bell the day I called to get a briefing for a local flight out of Boeing Field and found myself talking to a friendly gentleman from Lockheed Services stationed in Georgia. Georgia?!?! The briefing he gave me consisted of what he could read off the computer including winds aloft, temps and dewpoints and the en-route forecast. It was a standard briefing. What I didn’t get was any tips about how the weather was likely to be expressed locally around the foothills of the Olympic Mountains and the Cascades or in the marine areas of the Puget Sound lowlands. The folks I used to talk to at FSS in Seattle had intimate knowledge of our local weather tendencies which the friendly gentleman in Georgia did not.

This fabulous new FAA initiative was not implemented in Alaska, however, and we were able to walk into the FSS at Talkeetna and get a real briefing. Looking at the radar screens, there was a low pressure system parked over southern Alaska and a corresponding marine layer along the Gulf of Alaska generating conditions similar to those we’d flown through along the coast near Cordova. There was a high pressure system to the north of the Alaska Range and the weather cams at Windy Pass showed clear passage. After talking to the FSS weather man, the decision was easy - Steve and Alan would head north through the pass and then follow the Nenana back to Northway. Since the weather was fairly stable, they decided to get on their way. We said our good-byes and watched them take off north heading out for the rest of their Alaskan adventure.

It would take Steve and Allen another four days to get home. After Northway they followed the Al-Can until just before Whitehorse where they hopped a pass to intercept the Cassiar Highway. Following the road they wove between the Cassiar and Coastal ranges south through BC to Prince George, then south to the Fraser River. They followed the river until it met the Sound and they were home by the weekend.

We decided to head back to Anchorage where we’d make a business call, visit a couple friends, and maybe even get a shower. The trip back to Merrill Field was uneventful, the overcast layer obscured the mountains and there were light showers along the way. We parked amid hundreds of light aircraft, most of which were taildraggers with big tires.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get much of a sense of Anchorage except to say that there were roads and traffic and buildings and street signs and street lights and lots of people and lots of noise and cars rushing around. It was like any other small city, though not very tall and very well insulated. I suppose it’s a measure of how easily we’d become accustomed to the lack of civilization that we found Anchorage so jarring.

After taking a little time to visit with some customers there, we took off again to find another friend who lives in the neighborhood. Mark lives out in Palmer, at the far eastern end of Cook Inlet up the Matanuska River a few bends. We had the GPS coordinates for his house so we flew out to look for him. We spotted his house and circled around a few times before joining the pattern to land at Palmer. Mark met us at the airport and took us home to a warm house, a warm meal, a few games of squash, showers, clean laundry and a comfy bed for the night. It was a nice break from our travels and the next day we woke clean, refreshed and ready for the second half of our adventures.

Palmer NOTAM: caution - moose on runway

Oh, one other thing... remember that Citabria from the Trench Route? Well, as we were tossing our gear into Mark's truck a car drove up and there was the friendly Citabria pilot we'd met Mackenzie. He'd managed to avoid all that weather that held us up in Teslin and Whitehorse and made it back to Palmer safe and sound. Small world, even in Alaska.

11. Flightseeing Denali

June 13, 2008

For the last flight of the day, we let someone else fly. We hired a Hudson Air C195 on skis to take us up to the Ruth Glacier on Mt. McKinley. Jock was our pilot and guide and he was happy to have a plane full of pilots that he could show around. It didn't take long before we were flying up glaciers amid the crags. The photos speak for themselves...

























Jock landed lightly on the Ruth Glacier just below Don Sheldon's cabin. We got out, took photos went for a little walk and then spent a good while enjoying the deep silence before flying off again.
























We claimed the last camping spot in the park and slept very well through a night of light rain.