Alaskan Heaps

REDS - REDS - REDS. . . . . . . . EVERYWHERE!!!!

Wow!! If you ever want the fishing excitement of a lifetime, just come see us the last 2 weeks of July. Forget the King Salmon, you should see and experience the fighting power of the Red (Sockeye) Salmon! Holy Smokes - what a rush!! They say that pound for pound the red salmon is by far the most fiercest fighting of all salmon species. I think it fights harder than the steelhead trout as well. These babies go aerial, flip, they'll run right at you and then scorch off out into the current of the river. . . . all while you try to keep your line from busting! Trust me, I know. Yesterday we fished all day on the Kenai for these guys and I had 12 either pop my line or cut it with their teeth. I only walked away with 4 of them, but what a great time! My largest red salmon has weighed in at 11 pounds (the state record is 16). Everyone is hooked on these fish and they want to fish for them every day this next week. . . . so we are! Can't wait!

I also hooked a King Salmon while fishing for these reds yesterday, but remember, all I was using was a medium weight spin-casting setup with open face reel. When he hit, there were 5 guys around me that saw his "wake" as he turned and shot downstream. I had just tightened my drag from my last large red and this guy could care less! My line was humming off that reel and he took it straight down the river about 200 feet before my line snapped. An older gentleman standing next to me turned to me and says, "Holy @#+!!, you hooked into something big!!" You guys have to come up here next July and experience this! It's a lot of fun.

This is a shot of the Kenai River where we were fishing yesterday. . . we'll be back tomorrow!! I have bought heavier test line and better hooks. . . . none are escaping me tomorrow!!

Here's a couple of smaller reds caught a couple of days ago. Bryson has been an awesome helper with the net. He nets for us and a bunch of other guys around us who would certainly have lost their prized catch without his services! We "combat fish" on the Kenai, meaning you stand with another person on both your sides about 6 feet away. You only have a short distance to let your line float down the river and you better holler "fish on" when you hook one so that everyone can get their lines out of the water quickly.

Bryson and Shelise with a couple of our "minnows".

Here's my 11 pounder. If you want to know what one of these guys feels like, feel free to tie a 10 pound bag of sugar onto one of those poles you fish with in the White Mountains and sling it around a bit! Now you have an idea of what these guys are like, but there is one big difference. . . . your bag of sugar isn't fighting you and taking off downstream with a rapid current! Maybe you better tie a 20 pound bag on!!

Shelise "hanging out" in a tree.

Celeste and Devyn visited us the end of June. Here they are with Shelise, taking our "floating bathtub" out for a spin on the lake. It's a "dingy" . . . it ain't too "perty", but hey. . . . it floats!

A young bald eagle along the edge of a river. Their head doesn't turn white until after they've reached the age of 2 years.

Cool photo! This is Dallas fishing on the Kasiloff river in late June.

Look. . . . . Mom's been hanging out here in Alaska too!

An Alaskan Sunset.

This is a photo of the Russian Falls River. Did I mention that the drive from Anchorage to our little town of Soldotna is one of the TOP 10 MOST SCENIC drives in all of the world! Cool. Trust me. . . . it has to be in the top 5! (Kimberly discovered this small tidbit of trivia on the internet)

Bryson checking the river out from atop a rock for a better spot than Dads!

CABIN PROGRESS!

Above: Late May - Sono Tubes poured with cement and glue lam beams in place.

1st Week of June - floor joists being hung.

End of 1st Week in June - putting in the floor insulation between floor joists.

2nd and 3rd week of June: Flooring and Framing of the walls done.

Here's the crew of helpers: L to R are Dallas, Michael, Bryson and Jacob. None of them have ever built a full house before, so this has been a "fun" experience (thank goodness for framing books and the internet!!).

It took us one day to frame each cabin. Not too bad for a bunch of guys that don't know what they're doing!!

3rd & 4th week in June: 3/8 inch sheathing goes on for all sides of the cabins. Rain and a one week trip to China really slowed us down these two weeks.

1st week of July: Trusses came in and up they went! Irene said she didn't realize I was a monkey! She was a bit surprised an "ole out-of-shape" guy like me could move around like I did. I paid for it with lots of sore muscles!

2nd week of July: OSB plywood and roofing felt went down. I'm glad that jobs over with!!

Waiting for Michael to get our "custom" cut pieces ready.

Hard at work!!!

We haven't done anything for the last week - vacation time! Fishing time!!

Irene and the kids are dreading their trek back to the oven. They would like to stay another month or two!

We'll have a really pretty place once I get all the landscaping done. We have a lot to do in the month of August! We expect to see you all at our place sometime in the next year or two. . . save your pennies for the flight and your rental car (lodging and guide fishing is on us - this ought to save you about $3,000)

When looking for tickets, be sure to check out "craigslist" for great buys. Look for "air tickets" in the states of Alaska, Washington, Oregon and California. I have seen the most in these 4 states. You have to be faithful and look everyday for about 2 weeks. If you do, you can usually find something for about half the cost of a normal airline ticket.

RAIDERS OF THE LOST "FLOWERS"???

Irene was up visiting us at the cabins one day and we saw a mother moose and her 2 calves sitting off in the trees near the cabins. I started up a chainsaw to cut something and she moved off into the forest. Unbeknownst to us, the mother and the 2 calves circled around to the cabin and had a grand ole time eating some of Irene's best flowers! Kimberly was snapping photos with her telephoto lens and got some good shots of the calves.