Last Chance Fishing

Our trip to Alaska had great luck regards weather, less so with fishing.  Hey, what ya gonna do? Salmon runs can be predicted but not down to the day.  We were a little late for the sockeye and a little early for the silver (coho).  So we made our return journey to Anchorage with but a single box of frozen fillets.  We had at least gotten some nice King salmon.

But my eldest son is not easily deterred.  He has invariably caught fish even when doing so seemed implausible.  We checked into our downtown Anchorage hotel the night before our flight out and he immediately went down to a small creek a block away.  He had to wander through an industrial park and along some railroad tracks but eventually he found a spot where salmon were running....and fishermen were catching them next to a pile of steel cargo containers.

Behold, the scenic beauty of Ship Creek, downtown Anchorage.  A little less majestic than Prince William Sound had been the day before.

The silver salmon were running well and the fishermen were lined up.

My son and his wife waded out through slimy tidal mud to try their luck.  She stuck it out for an hour and a half, showing impressive devotion to her spouse.  My son kept slogging away until he had his limit of silvers which he cleaned on the spot and brought back to the hotel.  Our other fish were in cold storage at the airport so we "McGyvered" some improvised transport with ziplocks, freezer bags, water bottles full of crushed hotel ice and an insulating layer of clothes!

The determined fisherman, muddy but successful.