Yesterday we made our final jog south in Alaska in preparation for the dash across Dixon Entrance and into Canada. Thankful moseyed the fifteen miles down to Foggy Bay, stopping along the way in a documented halibut hole to donate herring to King Neptune.
Clearly, something needed to change. Thankful is the rockfish catchingest vessel in southeast Alaska, and we were working hard to catch anything else. We've probably caught and thrown back over 100 of the ugly buggers, haven't caught a salmon since Glacier Bay, and don't know what a halibut looks like.
Team Thankful, while still pursuing halibut, has decided to go with the flow and celebrate our apparent Midas touch in catching rockfish. Our saltwater fishing guidebook for the area says that rockfish are "...excellent tasting fish, usually filleted and fried." We kept the two biggest rockfish we caught yesterday at the entrance to Foggy Bay and had them for dinner. Matt deep fried them on Thankful's poop deck along with some sweet potato fries that Vicki prepared. Fish and chips. Excellent.
Our decision to accept the fish that the God of the Sea has chosen to give us was endorsed by the two Fish and Wildlife employees I encounter while beach combing along the shore of Foggy Bay late in the afternoon. One told me that he preferred rockfish to salmon or halibut. "Just pan fry it in butter with a little seasoning salt on it. It's terrific!" These college kids, seasonal employees, were overnighting in a cabin in the bay while monitoring the drift net fishery in a small motor boat.
We had a close call with an uncharted rock while powering in to the anchorage during the afternoon. I was screwing around on the poop deck with the fishing gear and saw the lone submerged obstruction slide by on our port side twenty feet away and five feet below the surface. The chart said the water was fifty feet deep. Too close for comfort!
This morning we departed Foggy Bay just before 5AM to get a jump on Dixon Entrance before the wind came up. It is currently foggy and lumpy out here with the wind out of the south, which wasn't forecast. We'll see...
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