AFC#20 Zimbos Fishing in Alaska

Anchor 3

Zimbos Fishing in Alaska

I have been wanting to go to Alaska for many years to fish and finally realized my dream this year. Myself and very good friends, Steve and Irene Buckle, actually put the time aside three years ago for this trip! Being in the hunting business, I have built up over the years, a good client base from Alaska, with many of these good folks becoming great friends. The Alaskans are very similar to Zimbabweans, loving the outdoors, hunting and fishing - the only difference, they just speak with an accent and reel left handed! I am a firm believer when travelling anywhere one needs to speak with the locals, hence I had my good Alaskan friend, Bob Kean, set the trip up for us. Bob and his wife Electa, advised us to leave the organization up to them and they truly set up a fantastic trip that will never be forgotten.

<<< Click on a cover to

view a previous article

>>> Click on a cover to

view the next article

By Pete Fick

It is not possible to catch all of the salmon species over the same period so the bulk of the trip revolved around silver salmon season, prime time being late August. This also being prime time hunting season for me did not bode well but what the heck, we only live once! Obviously it is a very long flight (Bulawayo, Joburg, New York, Anchorage via Minneapolis) and after a very nasty, hard landing, by an embarrassed captain at Minneapolis, we were excited to arrive. That same day we collected our fishing licenses for the duration of the trip plus some clothes and toiletries for me (as my suitcase had not arrived from Joburg). The bulk of what I needed was kindly loaned by Bob.

No time was wasted as the following day we got all our gear prepared and Bob drove us three and a half hours north of Anchorage to Denali State Park, where Bob and Electa have a very special and exclusive log cabin, overlooking a river that has an even more special fishing paradise. The drive alone is just stunning with spectacular scenery and we took a moment to pull over to get some photographs of Mt. McKinley, also known as Denali, which with a height of 20 320 feet, is the tallest mountain in north America. We were fortunate to see McKinley as most of the year it is covered in clouds. We even spotted moose but generally game was hard to see as the bush is pretty thick. I will never forget arriving at the cabin and looking down at the river below – there were fish just everywhere. And all nice, big fish! As most Zimbos do, the first night around the camp fire we got well and truly inebriated, almost finishing two bottles of Scotch, with the stories getting taller and more outrageous as the night progressed!

Bob's log cabin

Mt. McKinley (Denali) Height of 20 320’ tallest mountain in North America.

We were too excited in the morning to let any hangovers slow us down and after finally getting Bob out of bed, we got our fly
gear ready and walked down to the river to catch our first fish. Bob is an outstanding tutor and he made sure to show us the ropes and went out of his way to ensure we caught loads of fish. It`s difficult to explain seeing all the hundreds and hundreds of fish - silver, red and chum salmon all in spawning colours, in just inches of water. Some of the salmon were already dying and others were dead. The most important factor, most were still alive and they were literally just everywhere! What a freak of nature that every salmon we saw was going to die after breeding. The fry live off their dead parents for a year before going off to sea.

It did not take long for Steve and I to get our first salmon on large blue and silver fl es. Irene is an avid photographer so she was busy with her camera to start but joining us shortly as we all caught salmon after salmon. We are not great at fly fishing but with Bob`s patient tutoring and the amount of fish we were catching, one would have thought we were experts. There were so many fish that often we would even foul hook some, certainly not intentionally. Man it was difficult not to stand on the fish! We even saw a neighbor`s Labrador running in to the water and catching fish faster than we were.

After catching and releasing loads of salmon too numerous to keep count of, Bob decided to turn us on to the holy grail of this spectacular spot – was it even possible to get better fishing? Yes, as it was very shortly to prove. Bob changed our fly rods to a float, with a leader about six to eight foot long with a small hook and above the hook a red bead was attached. We did not know it then but there were a lot of rainbow trout here feasting on the salmon eggs. As they are so camouflaged we did not spot them with all the other fish in the water. We would cast slightly upstream near the furthest bank and let the line float down with the stream. When the rainbows nailed the bead thinking it was a salmon egg, the float disappeared and we would strike. Without a doubt this was even better than the salmon fishing. We were catching nice big trout and they definitely gave a better fight , often peeling line downstream. Steve got the fish of the day with a dream trout of 25 inches long that all trout fishermen would be envious of. Americans go more on the length of the fish as opposed to weight. And so the day went on and on. I was very keen to eat a nice fresh trout but Bob would have none of that and all were released as were the salmon. These salmon would not have been good to eat anyway as they were not far from dying.

Although we did not see bears there was plenty of fresh tracks around and I must admit after wandering off by myself downstream I did not feel comfortable with all the fresh sign, especially without a weapon. Once I returned to the others Bob reminded me what I always tell him, that whilst on safari in Zimbabwe, not to walk off alone without a weapon and it was no different here. He was quite right as we were to learn later during our trip. We were all reluctant to leave but looked forward to the other fishing adventures planned in Alaska. Another pleasant surprise is there were zero bugs and the weather was not nearly as cold as I expected. I had taken a very thick winter jacket but it was never used and on some days we even wore shorts. I genuinely expected to have a torrid time with insects and had heard the mozzies were as big as dragon flies here, but they had all already died!

Once we returned to Bob and Electa`s home at Eagle River they gave us directions to the next fishing destination on the Little Susitna River as they both needed to work the following day. We left very early in the morning in Bob`s truck and arrived at our destination with no problems, to be met by our guide. This river was deeper but we could still see the silver salmon as we sped upstream in the boat. Here the fishing was similar but this time we used spinning reels with similar large flies or floats with a bunch of salmon eggs attached to the hook which was floated downstream.

Our fishing guide with aluminium boat, Little Susitna River

Once again we had very good fishing with all of us catching very nice silvers and we only saw one other fishing boat plus a couple hunting moose. Irene was the king (or queen!) of the day by catching the largest salmon. It was interesting to see all the boats here made of aluminium and it was amazing how we sped over water only two to three inches deep in places. There were differing rules here - we could keep three fish each a day but once anyone had kept three they could not continue fishing, even if the fish were released! We only kept two so kept fishing and released everything else. All the fish caught here were big silvers except one chum salmon.

Something else interesting – we saw how their Fish and Wildlife department dammed off the river with plastic barriers and left a small opening in the middle for fish to swim through. Personnel were stationed here 24 hours a day counting every salmon that went upstream to breed. Another excellent day was had in another great area and we were more than satisfied when we had to stop late afternoon.

The next day Electa took off work and we drove south about three hours to Seward for two days of ocean fishing. Once again the scenery was worth the drive itself, Alaska is really a beautiful part of the world. Of special interest was to see how the terrain had changed from the devastating earthquake during the mid-1900`s. Upon arriving we checked in to our lodging at an old military base now used for tourism for ex-military staff. Both Bob and Electa are ex-military.

The following morning we set off with a large charter boat, accompanied by about eight other fishermen from elsewhere in the States. Once again we were in awe of the scenery and we saw many white goats up in the mountains as well as sheep. Ocean salmon fishing proved a lot tougher and they were actually quite difficult to catch. We used spinners with a fillet attached (very similar to tiger fishing) or just a fillet on a hook but fished very slow and dropped straight down over the edge of the boat. The trick was to try and determine at what depth the silvers were at and then slowly jig the lure or fillet. Each person could keep four salmon and once these were caught one had to stop further salmon fishing. Electa was queen as she had her four well before anyone else. She is an extraordinarily gifted fishing lady! I struggled and did not even land four but some consolation was when I caught the largest salmon of the day and I made sure to rub that fact in! It was also great meeting other Americans as passionate about fishing as we are.

During the two days of ocean fishing we also caught other species such as Halibut (which can grow to over 700 pounds) black rock fish, pacific salmon, pink salmon, sable fish and red snapper. We did not catch any monster halibut and were allowed to keep two each a day, one over 29 inches and one under. The halibut did not give much of a fight and were similar to catching bottle nose or Cornish jack. There were literally thousands of pacific salmon and these were all kamikaze fish that we caught with a small piece of fillet, one after the other. We could have filled the boat with them as there is no limit but it was not very sporting fishing.

Left: Little Susitna River - Silver salmon being released.
Centre: Pete with a silver salmon in spawning colors

Right: Little Susitna River

Left: Largest silver of the day caught by yours truly

Right: Ocean caught Silver Salmon by Steve Buckle

The final fishing destination was at a remote place named the Tsui River and probably one of the very top salmon destinations in Alaska. We chartered an aircraft from Anchorage and after a hour and a half flight landed on the beach between the ocean and the river. The Alaskan bush pilots are reputedly the finest in the world and flying over this country was mesmerizing, with plenty of mountains and huge glaciers. We knew this was going to be good as we could see bears in the river plus large schools of silver salmon. These salmon were just coming out the ocean and up the river and they proved the best fighters of the trip and did not have their spawning colours yet. Bob had to scare off a bear that was not afraid of us and this same bear was to prove a problem later.

Once again we had spinning rods with silver and blue spinners which were retrieved very slowly. Bob advised Steve and I to stay at a spot close to the plane as the salmon would keep coming upstream. He was correct as we stayed there for the day and had incredible fishing. The salmon hit the spinner quite hard and once hooked would speed off downstream and give a very good fight. We all caught many fish and the average size was probably around 10 pounds and often we had multiple fish on at the same time. We could all keep four fish each and these salmon (as the ocean ones) proved the best eating. The fishing was so good that we never even took the time to eat our packed lunches!

Although this was a very remote area we counted a total of 32 fishermen on the river, most of them coming from a lodge nearby, but this did not hinder anybody`s fishing. However, it did emphasize how spoilt we are in Africa when we so often have the waters to ourselves. When the pilot informed us it was time to head back we very reluctantly stopped and started to fillet the fish caught. Whilst sorting the fish a bear started running across the river at us to steal our fish! Fortunately the pilot was in his seat at that time and started the plane and revved the engine to scare it off. At the same time Bob got his .44 magnum revolver ready and shouted at the bear too, who fortunately moved off. I had not come to Alaska to be killed by a bear! Our pilot gave us a special low level tour on our return to Anchorage.

Our last night in Alaska we feasted on Alaska King Crabs, which are huge and taste even better than fresh crayfish from Mozambique. It was a rather sad departure after having such a nice time and both Steve and Irene commented that they knew it was going to be a dream trip but it far exceeded their expectations. A huge thank you to both Bob and Electa Kean for making a dream come true and this fishing expedition will never be forgotten.