4th of July in Fairbanks

For the 4th of July, I had plans to go plane camping with friends. Originally, we planned on going to Beluga Lake where Paul, Verena, and Brianna camped and saw a bear. See http://verenagill.blogspot.com/2008/06/briannas-beluga-bear.html for a description of the area and its attractions. We planned on putting Brianna on bear watch, so there would be no surprises. On the 3rd, I flew out to Beluga to practice landing at the camping spot (so I would look like a pro when I went in there with a passenger) and found it blowing near 40 miles an hour. I didn't even land.

At that point, Verena came up with plan 2. There are three dead whales washed up in Kamishak Bay (across the inlet from Homer) and lots of bears are there feeding on the whales. We could fly down, watch the bears, and then find another beach to camp. That sounded GREAT. I could get some great pictures of bears. I was on board for that trip.

That evening (the 3rd), Paul was on his way back from somewhere to the north and called Verena from Fairbanks. It was 80 degrees and sunny there. Why would we go anyplace else?, Paul asked. No one had a good answer to that question, so it was settled, on the 4th, we would meet at Paul's hanger at 11:00 and head north to Manley or Chena Hot Springs.

Michelle didn't feel up to sitting in the plane for 4 hours, so I was flying solo. A friend of Verena and Paul's (Tamara) was going to ride with them, so she opted to ride with me.



At the time, Tamara probably thought this was a good idea. After landing at Chena Hot Springs, she probably wondered why she didn't fly with Paul. We headed north, and had some great scenery on the way. At one point, we thought we would go high and direct to Chena Hot Springs, but some thunder storms got in our way, so we headed through Windy Pass. It was great for me to fly with Paul and learn about the pass and other routes. We got to Chena Hot Springs and Paul landed first. The strip is in a valley and it was pretty windy. I did one low pass and was too high and fast to land, so I went around. On the second attempt, it all came together (with a hard forward slip on short final).





Once on the ground, we headed in to the resort to do some swimming. Apparently, when I was in the restroom, Paul got chewed out for landing there (they like to have a call and give permission to land). After the guy was done with his scolding, Paul asked, "Where should we park?" "Right there is fine." And, with that, I think we had permission.

We swam in the hot springs and soaked up sun for a couple hours and then, headed to Fairbanks. We flew to Fairbanks International, tied down the planes, and Ed (a friend of Paul, Verena, and Tamara's) came by to pick us up. We headed to Ed and Nikki's, where we had a nice BBQ and conversation until 2am.





The next day, I got up around 7:30 and enjoyed coffee in the sun. As everyone began to stir, we started talking about what we might want to do that day. We discussed everything from going to Kobuk sand dunes (near Kotzebue) to going to Cordova and Lake Minchumina. In the end, we decided that we needed to have lunch, so around 2, we spent an hour trying to figure out what kind of pizza to order. After pizza, we still tried to decide where we might go but didn't come up with a new location. Around 5, we decided that we needed some ice cream. In the end, we headed back to the airport (with a short stop for ice cream). I had a mechanical issue (brake line leaked fluid) so we spent about an hour working on that. Finally, at around 8pm, we were off and headed back to Anchorage.

From Verena's camera:




We got back to Birchwood (Paul's Hanger) at about 11:30 and I dropped Tamara off. I flew on to Lake Hood and landed at about midnight. It was a great trip. We got sun and warm weather. I came back sun-burned.

Chitna Dipnetting 2008

Tuesday, after work, John, Jeff, and I loaded up my truck and headed to Chitna to dip net for salmon. We had a good trip (we caught more fish than anyone else using the charter boats that day). We came home with 46 sockeye salmon. I lost a NICE Chinook salmon and we probably lost at least another 20 fish that fell out of the nets as we tried to lift them from the water. This is truly extreme dip netting as we were tied off to trees with safety ropes and fishing from a spot about 15 - 20 feet above the water. It was a beautiful day, with clear skies and 80 degrees.


Jeff and John Fishing


In line for the charter boat at 4:30 am. The guy sitting on the trailer in the left of the picture was on his third Pabst Blue Ribbon when I took the picture.



Looking up the Copper River and the charter boats that deliver dip netters to fishing spots.



A view of our fishing spot.



Jeff



John fishing



Some of our salmon (we caught 46).



The boat comes to pick us up at 5:00 pm.



By 7:00 pm, we had all the fish filleted, packed the truck, and started driving back to Anchorage. We stopped in Glennallen for dinner. At about midnight, we were just outside Eagle River and I made the comment that I should be extra careful as it seems most moose collisions that I hear about happen as someone is making a late night trip back from dip netting. Just then, I see a moose and calf cross the highway in front of us...no big deal. Luckily, I was watching the right, rather than looking at the moose..as calf number 2 darts out right in front of us. I was able to swerve and we didn't hit the calf.

We had a great trip. I will probably make this an annual trip.