Sapsuk guide Mike holds a big male king
salmon adorned with sea lice that was
caught by the author in the lower river.
it landed on the water. This crazed salmon
strained my tackle and nerves to the utmost,
reluctantly surrendering to the net only after
a pitched battle, and dousing us with water
upon release (employing the piscine version
of a raised middle finger). A less glorious—
and considerably more humbling—memory
was of a big hen that slowly approached, then
leisurely ingested my fly as it sank beneath
coils of line stacked atop the surface (the
result of an errant cast thrown back at me by
a gust of wind). As I watched her chewing
on my offering in the clear water, I frantically
stripped in slack before finally coming tight
on this fish; she eventually earned her free-
dom right at the net, swatting the annoying
Prawn loose from her jaw with a disdainful
slap of her huge tail against the outstretched
leader.
We spent our final day parked at the low-
ermost pools where upstream migrating kings
first stopped to rest. This was an “ambush
game” that was rewarded at periodic intervals
between patient waiting, concerted casting ef-
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forts, and frequent fly changes. While I man-
aged to land several hefty kings, including a
32-pound, copepod-decorated brute that im-
mediately blasted downstream and tore line
off the reel following his ferocious grab, Mark
was the hot stick, hooking up on consecutive
passes after he switched to a heavier pattern
(weighted with a large brass cone head) that
enabled him to better entice the fish holding
in the deeper parts of these runs.
Heading back to camp, I asked Mike drop
me off at a favorite spot for a final session. I
fished thoroughly and patiently through the
entire length of this pool, with nary a touch.
Reaching the tailout, I let my Prawn fly dan-
gle, swimming back and forth in the eddying
current, in the hopes of enticing one last fish.
My musings were pleasantly interrupted by a
jolting strike. The enormous, chrome-sided
buck thrashed violently at the surface, then
cartwheeled end over end after feeling the
offending hook. I managed to regain my
wits and somehow remained attached to this
out-of-control salmon, eventually parrying
his wild runs until I was able to slide him
into the gravel shallows. I placed my Winston
Spey alongside, and noted that his snout
extended nearly to the first stripper guide;
back at camp, we used a tape to measure this
length, and concluded that the fish’s weight
was somewhere in the high ’30s.
The return to Nelson Lagoon proceeded
in orderly fashion (which isn’t always the
case; strong winds can result in big waves
on the Lagoon, making it impassable; flight
delays due to nasty weather occur frequently
as well). I bid farewell to Kathy, Mike, and
Joe. We were treated to clear skies during
our flight back to Anchorage. The numerous
streams and rivers flowing into the Bering Sea
that passed beneath our wings sent their siren
beckons to me… surely some of these must
hold little-fished runs of chrome, anadromous
salmonids. My dreams of mounting a scien-
tific expedition to document the distribu-
tion and abundance of chinook, coho, and
steelhead along the Alaska Peninsula will need
to become reality. Someday . . .