Welcome to KSL Outdoors and welcome back to Alaska, I’m Adam Eakle. You know last week we showed you some of the great fishing that southcentral Alaska has to offer. You know we are staying at the Gone Fishin Lodge that is right along side the Kenai River and that is where today’s adventure begins. This place is amazing. The fish here are incredible. Just the vastness of the place is incredible.
It’s so untouched almost by anybody. If you go on this side of the river, there is nothing until the ocean. There’s 3 million acres over there. No roads, just wilderness.
The upper Kenai River is infamous for its huge sockeye run. Today is the last day of the sockeye season, but salmon is not our target today.
There he is. Get him?
Little better fish.
Nice Dolly.Yea, nice dolly. Fish on. Oh he’s behind the boat!
It’s kind of unique it’s fly fishing. We are doing a little bit on the drift boat as we are drifting down. Some bank fishing.
That’s a good one.
It’s just one of the trips that we do when people come up here that we offer.
Oh, nice fish. Yeah it’s a good one.
That’s a big bow, keep your rod down to the right.
It is a big river and with a big river you get big fish. We have epic king runs and the trout follow the salmon up. The sockeye they are the cornerstone of this whole system. Without the sockeye, we wouldn’t have the bears, we wouldn’t have the trout, we wouldn’t have the birds, the bugs, a lot of the vegetation along the river. I mean they feed everything.
Oh that is a big rainbow. Nice fish.
Take a look at that beautiful bow. What do you think 19 inches? Maybe a little better, twenty? Twenty, twenty one. I would say. You know a lot of people come here to catch a lot of salmon, halibut to take home. I came here for that nice catch. Catch and release is the way to go, especially here on the Kenai River. Look at all the spots on the gill plate, boy they are pretty fish here.
There he is.
Coming at you. This is a good fish. He’s stripping line.
Ok, with a really big fish you want all that line in the water. Put that rod tip down. If that fish comes right at you. You’ll have nothing but slack.
That could be a big sockeye.
With these sockeye’s if you pull them in nice and slow sometimes they come right in.
Until he sees the net of course. Then she’s gone to the other side of the river. Like that.
There you go, he’s off!
Big sockeye, we couldn’t get it in with a six weight so decided to just line it and let it go. Lot of fun still. The tug is the drug right?
The Upper Kenai is known for shoulder to shoulder, combat fishing if you will, during the sockeye run. Today however, we are sharing the river with just a few other boats. The scenery, the company and the fishing is fantastic.
Over my head. That’s a good fish. Oh my God. That’s a great fish. Let’s get to shore.
Yeah I think it’s a good dolly.
Chad has been an awesome guide, teaching us new techniques and keeping a great line to get us into fish. This is by far the biggest fish of the trip.
Nice net job. That’s a nice fish.
See these pinks dots. The closer they get to spawning, the more pink they get and the more orange the belly gets.
That is my trophy of the trip. That’s a beautiful fish. Yeah that’s the biggest I’ll ever catch.
Well a lot of people come up here to catch a lot of fish to take home. This is a beautiful fish to catch, take a picture, put back. How cool is that. It’s really cool, it gets to live. Yeah 22 inch Dolly Varden, that’s a beautiful fish. Something we don’t get to see back home. This is why you come to the Gone Fishin Lodge.
Welcome back to KSL Outdoors, back here in Alaska, I’m Adam Eakle. You know, last week we showed you Big River Lake, we went out with Talon Air Service and caught some beautiful silvers. Today we are headed out on the river.
No doubt some of the best fishing in Alaska is found only by float plane. Up here you find untouched, pristine wilderness with fishing, sightseeing and wildlife. We end up landing on this small slough, adjacent to the river.
We flew out here to the Kustatan River. It’s on the west side of the Cook Inlet.
We are going to take these jet boats up river and we are going to try and catch some silver salmon today.
Here we go.
Should be good, weather is overcast and that is great for silver fishing.
The river has been at flood stage for almost two weeks. We finally have a break in the weather, the river has come down and Ralph thinks we just might catch some silvers headed up to spawn.
We are going to be fishing kind of like trout. Where we are going to get a little bite. It will go tap, tap, tap and then once you get that tap, tap, it’s kind of your wake up and then just like trout fishing in Utah, when they take it down again you set that hook, hold it up and these fish should come top water. Silver salmon, great sportfish, so hopefully we have a great day. Alright. What are we using? Show us what we are using here.
Okay, what we have here, this is salmon eggs it’s their own salmon eggs cured. We call it row. We are going to stick some of this on the lines. We are going to fish with that. It puts off a cloud of scent and it’s pretty effective up here. So let’s get rolling here.
Well, here goes nothing.
Ralph has brought his better half to keep him in line and to show us how to fish.
Give it to him. There you go, fish on! Now easy, easy, take your time.
Ok, you’ve got your rod tip way up. So you’ve got to reel down. You let some slack in it. You are doing find. No! Geez.. Honey I’m sorry. You know you are excellent at doing this. What’s the problem? Be nice we are on TV.
There’s one.
Ok, now we netter please. Now he’s got his line around us, be careful.
Keep the sinkers in the water. Nice.
That’s a silver salmon, a big old buck.
Woo hoo! Fish on! Who got this one?
Nice job woo!
Oh yeah they fight. A lot better than the Wyoming trout we used to hit. A lot bigger and a lot more fight. That was great!
We lost it.
He works hard, people think he has a dream job and he plays all the time, but he works hard.
Sorry guys.
He wants everybody to be happy and catch fish? That’s real important to him.
Nice fish, take your time, take your time.
Keep the rod tip bent Jim.
I’m trying, I’m trying. Oh man he just swam into the net. I couldn’t do anything else.
Tipped it twice and then grabbed it. Was that fun? It was excellent.
There he is get him. Nice, easy, easy.
He’s pretty little. It’s a silver! What do you mean it’s little? Holy Mackerel. I like those little fish baby.
Easy, keep that sinker in the water. Get him, get him. Woo hoo. Finally! Good job it’s a nice hen, good job.
There’s your dinner honey, dinner is on me.
It’s not very often you get to come out and fish. No it’s not, once a year. Once a year. When somebody calls in sick. Then I get to. Then you get the call. It’s a good thing we brought you today? It’s a good thing you brought me because look what I’ve got. Dinner. I’m bringing home dinner. Brought the A team. Hey don’t forget when you come to the International Sportsman’s Expo, you can see Ralph there and come up and enjoy it as well.
Welcome back to KSL Outdoors, I’m Adam Eakle. Well yesterday we had a rainy day and we were fishing for silvers on the Kustatan river. Today we’ve moved back to the Kenai and we are back after some more silvers.
14 miles from where the Kenai terminates in the ocean is where we find ourselves today. We are fishing with Kyle Hall. A Kenai fishing guide with 26 years of experience on the river.
Sometimes it takes a little while, they’ll come up and just sit there and munch on the eggs, munch on the eggs. You know. Let them eat it. If you let them eat it, they’ll reward you.
Nice Chris. Looked like a good hit too.
There’s a fish.
Doubled up.
Wow taking a run.
The Kenai is loaded with thousands of pink salmon. But, pink salmon don’t run every year. They are only found on the Kenai on even numbered years.
This year’s class of pinks that coming into the river are the biggest class I’ve seen in at least 14 years.
I’ve caught many a humpy in my life but never one with a back like that. Kyle says that is one big donkey. What a fight though here on the Kenai River.
Today we caught some fish on plugs and then we’ve been doing some back bouncing. But you can catch them on spinners, you can catch them on flies, you can catch them on bobber and eggs, bobber and jigs.
There he is. Yeah, woo! That is a tan
Nice!
Oh my gosh, look at that run. He just went out into the middle of the current and said “see ya”
Reel down, reel down, reel down and just give me a slow lift, Adam. Keep coming, keep coming. Keep coming up. Straight up, straight up. Straight up. Nice fish.
Just like we like them. Nice and fresh.
Nice fish.
The best thing about the Gone Fishin Lodge is the variety. There’s just no doubt that uh…There is no other place in Alaska, any other area that you can go and invariably do something different every day of the week.
Pretty good fish Kent? Yeah. Looks like it. Reel down, reel down. Keep swinging it slow upstream. Now give me a lift straight up. Nice job Kent. Nice.
The Kenai Peninsula, it’s just a great area, lots of great people around here.
There is million dollar views everywhere you look it seems like.
Very special river.
You know we didn’t catch a lot of fish, but a lot of times it’s the company you are with and got a new friend. You showed us yesterday how to fish, but today we kind of turned the tables a little bit. Still nice fish, nice time. A lot to do when you come up with the Gone Fishin’ Lodge.
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