Fishing

Me and My 1st King Salmon - 26 lbs. Our guide, Greg, smiling in the background.

Abby and her 1st King - a 24-25 lber (yes SMALLER than mine!)

We had another fisherman from California on our boat who caught the smaller one. You can clearly see from this picture that MY fish is BIGGER.

We had a blast. We left the house at 4AM to get out to the Little Susitna river by 5:30. We arrived at 5AM, in time to eat a sandwich, collect our rain gear (did not need it, YAY!) and go to the bathroom one last time. We couldn't legally start fishing until 6AM, but we were out in the first spot by 5:50AM and ready. We got a bite about every 30 minutes. Abby caught the first fish, what they call a Jack. Its a King Salmon, but its a baby one. He was less than 20 inches in length, so she got to keep him as a freebie. Over the next 2-4 hours Rodney and I both got bites and I got 1 WHOPPER on the line who was a bit smarter than your average King. He wrapped himself around a log on the bottom of the river and got away from me. He had to be HUGE cause I really had a hard time fighting him. (At least that is what I will believe since I never got him to the surface for a look.) After Rodney and I both had 3 or so bites, Abby finally got another bite and hooked it. I think she was pretty happy that she got the first 2 fish in the boat on only 2 bites.
Then it was my turn. About a half hour later, I got the bite. This fish did not fight as hard as the first one I had on the line. I didn't feel like my arms were about to fall off. It was really fun fighting with it to get it up to the boat close enough to net it. Once it was in the boat and we got our pictures taken, I really wished I could do it all over again. Limit is 1 King per day and 5 total per year though. Can't even put a line in the water again for the rest of that day.
I was feeling bad for Rodney....both these 2 girls caught fish before him. He finally got his bite and when he brought in the smaller fish, the guide gave him the option of throwing it back and trying for a bigger one. We only had about an hour and a half left of the trip though and Rodney didn't want to take a chance at no fish.
When we got back to shore we took some more pictures and Greg proceeded to filet our fish. Another boat pulled up with a 47 lb King that looked like a monster. I bet that is the one I lost!!!