Deep Sea Fishing - Alaskan Style

Today we headed out for another day of fishing, this time it was a multi-species deep sea adventure. We were targeting Rock Fish to start and then heading to deeper water to go after Ling Cod and Halibut. We started the day off bright and early, waking up at 5 30 a.m. to be at the docks by 6 30 a.m. We had to make a run to Safeway for some lunchtime sandwiches, then made our way down the Homer Spit to meet up with our boat for the day. We arrived at the spit a little early and met our captain and the fourth member of our party. He was a guy who grew up in Homer and lived there his whole life, but never had been out fishing for Ling Cod. He had been a deck hand most of his life and never had gotten the chance to go fishing for himself. Needless to say he was just as excited about the trip as any of us, if not more. We set off from the Spit and again ran into some wildlife right outside the harbor. This time is was another sea otter and then a little later we came across some sea lions hanging out on an island a little off shore. Its amazing to experience how seeing these creatures means as much for our guides as seeing squirrels means to us... From the shore, we had a 3 hour boat ride to get to the deep water. Most of the ride was relatively smooth, though there were some 6 ft. waves every once in a while that made you get a little uneasy. Russ had taken 2 pills of bonine and had 2 anti-nausea bracelets on before we even got off shore. Katie also took one of the bonine pills just in case. I flew solo, trusting that with my many years on the water in Lake Erie I would be fine. In the end we all

escaped unaffected by the sea, so it was a happy ending for everyone in that regard. After our long trek the captain began to slow the boat down and match our coordinates to ones that some of his buddies gave to him back on shore. They promised that this was where the "mother-load" was and that we would not be coming back empty handed... they were right. Within seconds of us dropping our line in the water we had fish on. Originally, the captain told us to go to the bottom, but after 2 minutes, so many fish had begun following our lures to the top, you could look over and see the entire school as thick as the salmon were the day before; only these guys were hungry! Katie was so freaked out by the swiftness of the action that she would not even grab a rod and

put it in the water until the final pass when things slowed down a little. It took us 3 passes and 25 minutes for us to be one fish under our limit each for rock fish. We left one spot open because there was a possibility of pulling in different species of rock fish once we got out into the Halibut and Ling Cod, and since these guys would be bigger, it was worth giving up one spot. By the way, here are the limits for each persons Alaskan fishing license... each person is allowed - 5 rock fish, 2 Halibut, and 2 Ling Cod. This meant that as a boat we could pull in 25 rock fish, 10 Halibut, and 10 Ling Cod. Anyway, after we caught our desired amount of rock fish we took another mile or two drive over to deep water. We had been drifting and jigging at the last spot and we would be doing the same here, only this time we switched out our rods for the big boys and also fitted

them with 1 lb. jigs that were worth $100 a pop. Our first fish up at this location was a Ling Cod, and again Katie stole the show with the first fish. The sight of this monster in the water was amazing and truly gave me a shock. I had never seen a Ling before and had

no idea what to expect. Going deep sea fishing, you always know that the fish will be big, but it still took me by surprise to see this thing come out of the water. From then on the fishing was on! We ended up catching both our limit in Halibut and Ling Cod, sealing the deal on the final pass with Russ and Katie bringing in the 2 biggest Lings of the day. As I said we caught our

limit, but for every one that we kept, we reeled in at least 4 others that were thrown back. Our captain was of the philosophy that "size matters" and he was not into bringing sub-par fish back the the dock. It happened a few times that after a nice long 15 minute battle with a Halibut that the captain would come to take him off the hook and throw him back without even bringing him in the boat. It was a little disheartening at times, but it made the keepers that much more special. We only lost 3 lures to snags on the bottom which was pretty good, and considering they were all within the first half hour, you could really tell that we caught on quick. Though the fishing here was not as chaotic as it was

with the rock bass, there was still plenty of action. It was not uncommon for all 4 of us to have a fish hooked at the same time. It's just when it takes a minimum of 5 minutes to reel one in, things are at a much steadier pace than when we were flipping them in the boat with the rock fish. In the end, we were sore all over with our arms and backs taking the brunt of it. All told, we walked away with 235 lbs. of FILLETS!!! Katie caught the biggest fish, a Ling that weighted in at about 50 lbs. The Halibut all ranged between 30 and 40 lbs. a piece! Though Katie caught the biggest fish, Russ and I reeled in twice as many since Katie

was often seen taking a break to rest her arms.

All in all it was one of the best fishing trips that any of us had ever taken. On the way back to the Spit, Russ and Katie took their token nap while I talked with the captain and watched all the fish get filleted on the back of the boat. Once we got to the Spit, we went to the infamous Salty Dawg Saloon and had a celebratory drink, then went out to dinner before calling it quits on an amazing day.