The White House

The White House

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Tell Me Thursday: Down on the Valdez docks




Tell Me Thursday is where I get the opportunity to tell you about my Wordless Wednesday photos.




After football. After chores. After packing. After Homer worked all day. After what seemed a lifetime we finally loaded into the truck and set off on our 363 mile journey to Valdez and the Best Western Valdez Harbor Inn.
We arrived under the cover of darkness at 2:00am, but on Sunday, just a few steps out the Inn doors to my right I was greeted with beautiful sunshine shimmering off the water and a flurry of boating activity.
To my left down on the dock by the fueling station fisherman were doing their best to land a silver salmon.

In the evening many boats come back into the small boat harbor from a day out in the open sea.

This "small boat" is a sight-seeing cruise.

We spent some of the day out at Allison Point (where Elijah's friend, Forrest, caught a 10 pound silver), but by evening you could find the boys down on the dock trying their luck.

Unfortunately, we were unsuccessful, but a kind man next to us caught four in a very short span of time and gave them to us. At 9:00pm we were down at the cleaning station taking care of business.

Monday morning brought normal Valdez weather. Unlike the beautiful sun-filled day before, I drank my morning coffee in a slight drizzle. The entry to the harbor was completely fogged in.

Fog or not, the fish were jumping. Yesterday was a bust, but this morning I could see fish being caught and felt hopeful.

I gathered up my pole and coffee and went down to the dock. At 9:00am I landed my first salmon!

After 41 years and only my second salmon fishing trip I had the excitement of a small child catching their first fish. This beauty weighed in at 10.5 pounds! I was hooked, pun intended, and we had a tough time dragging ourselves away from the dock for the long ride home.
Tomorrow I'll share some photos of the picturesque drive to Valdez.

12 comments:

B said...

Holy cow that is a HUGE fish!!!

I love to fish, could do it all day. What a beautiful place your at. I think you have me hooked on visitin Alaska someday.

Lori Skoog said...

Gayle! First of all WOWOWOWOWOW! I love your new header and format.
That's the one I use. The black background really shows off the photos. How do you get such huge pictures. Good to see you in one of your posts! Nice that you could get away.

Kim@Snug Harbor said...

Very cool fishing photos and you caught a beauty there! We used to go coho fishing in Lake Michigan. Wait until you get those fish home and eat them - yum! It looked like a fun trip.

Unknown said...

Even Jon sends his congrats on that one!
And love the new look of the blog!Change is good.

Gennasus said...

Wow, that was some size of fish! Looks like you had a great trip. Was that new snow on the mountains or does it stay all year round?

I love the big photos and new format, it really hits you in the eye. I too would like to know how you do it.

Queen-Size funny bone said...

Love the new look. wow your photos are great. thats one big fish.

Danielle said...

Wow I have always wanted to go up to Alaska. It is beautiful!!

Bill S. said...

Nice fish - a real lower 48 state hog. Congrats. Sounds like you had a great time.

Little Black Scrap Cat said...

Okay, you got me jealous now!! You caught an awesome salmon!! Sounds and look like the whole trip was fab!!

Love the new header pic. I need to do a little "house cleaning" on my blog... but I just don't have time right now. Soon, though.... very soon...

Janie said...

What a beautiful place for a family vacation. congratulations on that huge salmon!

Corey~living and loving said...

How fun! so glad you had a nice trip. :)

Catherine @ The Blonde Diaries said...

That is such a beautiful vacation location and what a huge fish! I wouldn't know how to get that out of the water once hooked.