Sitka Trip: Day 2

We opted to go fishing today because it was supposed to be the last nice day.  Everything worked perfectly, all day.  The boat fired up and got launched with ease.  At one point dad did unknowingly knock the kill switch out of place, but he got it figured out pretty quick.  We got all the way down to West Crawfish Inlet where dad had luck fishing for coho a couple years ago.

Even the tide was perfect (low, but starting to come in).  We were even seeing a number of coho and dad had one bite, but nobody landed anything.  After a couple hours, we gave up and went to the north arm of West Crawfish Inlet.  By this time the tide was almost high.  Lots of pink salmon, but only a few coho and no bites.  Dad motored up the river a ways and we got to see some beautiful granite sandbars covered with bear tracks.

Still with no fish, we went to Big Bay where we only saw a few coho jumping.  I had never been to the south arm of Big Bay, however, and it was neat to see.  We only hung out for a little bit before heading to the Dorothy Narrows Salt Chuck.

Everything here felt different starting with the large number of coho jumping all over the place.  Because by this time the tide was high, we were able to motor all the way in to the first "lake" where I immediately started catching coho!

Big Bay (above) and the Salt Chuck at Dorothy Narrows (below)

I caught a couple from the boat, then got dropped off on shore where I caught a couple more.  Then back to the boat and caught a couple more.  About this time, my reel that I bought in high school gave up the ghost.  It was a full-on mess and wouldn't even reel.  Dad quickly gave me his pole and I quickly landed another coho.  But the fish was taking out a lot of line and I looked down at the reel and noticed only a few wraps left!  I shouted something, but it was too late and the fish took all the line off the reel and was gone.  We were bummed out for a few seconds, but then, at the same time, dad and I noticed the line floating on the water about 30 feet away.  Dad fired up the motor and zipped over to the line that I then grabbed.  I started pulling in line and sure enough, the fish was still on!  It was such a crazy experience to fight a fish and pull it in with bare hands and no reel!  That particular coho turned out to be the biggest of the day!

The tide had started to turn and we didn't want to end up high and dry, so we motored out and headed home after that excitement.  Got to grandma's house, cleaned the boat and the fish, and called it a night!