It’s little wonder why thousands of people every summer make the journey to Southern Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula. The drive here alone is worth the trip in and of itself. With its endless, breathtaking panorama and abundant wildlife, you will never be at a loss for that Kodak moment. Combine all of this scenic beauty with world-class fishing and you have the makings for the road trip of a lifetime.
While fair amounts of people come for the nature, even more are here for the sport fishing, looking to hook into Alaska’s largest export… halibut and salmon. Since I neither fall into the camp of avid nature lover (first week here I was chased by a moose), nor die hard fisherman (last time river fishing a grizzly strolled up and stole my catch), I decide to forgo the bears and moose, and head out to the ocean to discover, just what these icy blue waters hold.
Located 160 miles south of Anchorage, the Kenai Peninsula is flanked on the east side by the Prince William Sound and the west by the Cook Inlet. We head to the ruggedness off the Cook Inlet, home to sea worn Charter Captains and world record halibut and salmon fishing. In fact, every year here king salmon are caught upwards of 80 pounds and halibut the size of baby whales weigh in at up to four hundred pounds. I call up Steve Moe, owner of Deep Creek Fishing Club, and an old friend of mine to take us to what he claims is the best fishing hole in Alaska.
We all head out on a sun filled-balmy summer morning, the water is as calm as glass, a stunning shade of aqua blue and hopefully chock full of hungry fish. Looming mightily in the distance, the horizon is filled with five awe inspiring, glacier capped mountains, one of which, an active volcano, is puffing out clouds of dirty white smoke at frequent intervals. Every so often a cloud of dull-gray ash omits itself from its ancient belly, adding to its overall immensity. Noisy seagulls hitch a ride in our tail wind and a family of whales enjoys the sunny day.
We start off trolling for King Salmon, using fresh herring and cured salmon eggs as our bait. After a few hours without a single bite I start to question the validity of the Captains claims. Sensing my, and everyone else’s developing frustration he barks out orders for us to reel in the lines and pack up the gear.
An hour later we drop anchor at what he calls Ling land, which I assume is named after the Ling cod located below. An hour passes-nothing, another hour passes, same results. At this point I am silently cursing Alaska, daydreaming of warm beaches and ironically craving sushi. As if on cue Meghan’s rod starts bobbing excitedly, she reels-and the fish fights, after fifteen minutes of battle the fish appears. To my surprise it is neither a halibut nor salmon but what looks like a cod. Steve walks up, issues a few curse words and throws it back. Astonished I question his motives and he waves me off, muttering something under his breath about grey cod and fish sticks. Before I can argue, the rest of us have fish on our lines. All of them cod, back in the water. Meghan has another bite and soon lands a beautiful sixty-pound plus halibut. Her smile makes the day worth it.
Soon after that first fish, everyone is at attention, working the reels furiously, landing black bass, yellow eye rockfish, skate, lingcod, black cod, red-banded rockfish, sole and even an extremely rare white king salmon. Not a minute passes that we are not catching, reeling in or gutting a fish. I had no idea that this many varieties of fish resided in these waters. To look at menus around the country you would think that halibut, salmon and king crab were the sole (forgive the pun) species here. All summer, in almost every fine dining restaurant you see the same thing, halibut and salmon. Even though they are quite delicious, I quite frankly am a little bored with them. So staring down at the colorful, kaleidoscope of fish in front of me my mind is racing with the possibilities, I can’t wait to get to a stove, but before that Steve points out we will be coming in at low tide, the perfect time for digging razor clams.