Alaska

Six days after coming home from Sea Ranch, Nate packed up again and headed to Alaska with his friend Andy.  They spent ten days fishing, bear watching and taking in the beauty that is Alaska.

First stop was King Salmon, where the boys boarded a float plane for Katmai National Park. 

After arriving at Brooks Lodge in Katmai, they transported their gear about a half a mile to the campground.  

Yes, they camped.  Instead of paying thousands of dollars for a few nights in the lodges, Nate and Andy spent $8 a night and camped.

Brooks Camp is one of those legendary places where, at the right time of the year, bears swarm and feed on salmon like crazy.  I mean, BBC was right there filming next to Nate as he took pictures.  This is THE place when it comes to bears.

For three days these bears provided great entertainment for Andy and Nate.

 

 

 

Wait...there's more!

I mean, when you take a trip specifically to see bears, you better come home with several hundred pictures of them, right?

And some video:
After fishing and walking with the bears for a few days, the guys said good-bye to their four-legged friends and flew back to Anchorage.

After stopping for some amazing pizza at The Moose's Tooth and picking up some food at Costco, they drove on to Ninilchik.

A lot of time was spent fishing in their usual favorite places, although the catch this year wasn't nearly as fruitful as in years past.  But, even failure to catch fish is less disappointing when you get to do it in beautiful Alaska.

Nate was definitely disappointed with the halibut catch.  These guys are tiny.  But all of the other guys on the boat were seasick and Nate had to do pretty much all of the work to reel the fish in.

Those same sick guys, didn't want him to throw back the little ones to try for something bigger, because they were just worried that they'd end up with nothing.  Thus, a smaller catch than he expected.  But it was still plenty to bring home and stash in our freezer. Yum!

If Nate is guilty of any addiction, it's Alaska.  He literally craves it.  Every time he's there he thinks about buying land.  If only work had an office in Anchorage...

We missed him like crazy and were glad that he didn't decide to take up permanent residence with those bears.  The next time, he promises that our boys will be up there with him...and maybe mom too.