Guest

Prince of Whales – Part 5

March 13, 2020 Guest Travel

This is part five of our trip to Prince of Whales. If you missed part four you can catch up quickly here.
The kids left early again for hunting. I stayed back and played camp cook. I prepared a beef vegetable soup as the day was rainy and cool. I wanted to warm them from the inside out when they returned for lunch. I also whipped up fix-ins for huckleberry pancakes with some of the berries that I had picked while out in the mountains. Of course there was a little leftover salmon salad – good on crackers with the soup. (What’s a meal without salmon?)

After lunch we cleared the table and left the dirty dishes for later so we could get going out scouting/hunting. We drove up one logging road and Edgar and Leigh left walking to circle up and around and I drove the truck a couple of miles down to wait for them. I was apprehensive about driving on those narrow, steep, gravel logging roads, but it was all just fine. Not even really exhilarating like I thought it would be.

It had been steadily raining all day and it never let up, like a quintessential Prince of Whales forecast. The creeks and rivers were gurgling to a loud roar, very different than the little meandering streams of the day before. Water was running across the roads in several spots. Edgar and Leigh walked right up and around and down to the truck but saw no deer. Lots of sign, deer and bear, but no sightings.

We continued to drive with Edgar at the wheel, checking out other logging roads. There are hundreds of logging roads, some quite old, some blocked off, and some new, with silent logging machinery waiting for a dry day. Numerous clear cuts barely concealed a few does, fawns and spike bucks. In one lovely green grass clearing Edgar spotted a deer, and after glassing decided it truly was a buck.

(A buck like this one, but not this one)

He tip toed then belly crawled to get within a comfortable shooting distance and discovered it was a small forked buck. Just a few days into our trip, it wasn’t big enough to take home. Edgar came back and got me and took me up where the little buck was. No sneaking required. He just stood and looked at us, munching grass. He must have had a feeling there was no danger.

We were loosing our shooting light so we headed on home. Back at the lodge we ate left over vegetable soup, huckleberry pancakes, salmon nuggets and cabbage salad. I tried to come up with interesting meals, using what I had in the cupboards. Fun but challenging. Poor little Leigh had blisters on both heals. She didn’t complain but it was obvious she was uncomfortable.
We all showered and crawled into bed after ten, hoping to rise before the deer in the morning. Day six would bring a drizzling rain, and a welcome visit from a next-door neighbor.

-Kate Riley

Prince of Whales – Part 4

February 15, 2020 Guest Informational, Travel

This is part four of our visit to Prince of Whales. If you missed part three you can catch up quickly here.

Edgar and Leigh left early to go hunting; I stayed home and baked cookies, literally. I found the ingredients for made-from-scratch oatmeal raisin cookies in the kitchen cupboards at the lodge. So I baked up a batch. They are my favorite cookie and I very seldom get the time to bake them at home so I enjoyed the opportunity. I shared some with the father and son hunters in the cabin next door and carried some over to the lodge owner and his son.

Edgar and Leigh came back to the lodge for lunch and we had salmon salad out of left over poached salmon from the night before. Fresh and delicious.

Then we all climbed back in the truck to scout and do a little fishing. We saw several does but no bucks. We stopped at the same river bridge on the way back and caught eight pink salmon. Really, Edgar caught the fish. I was acting like a novice. I couldn’t cast the strange rod and I kept getting snagged every other cast and loosing lures. Oh, he let me reel one in, which felt good, but I’m not nearly the salmon fisherman that I am a bass fisherman back home. Guess I will just have to live with that humiliation.

Back at the lodge we cleaned and vacuum-packed our salmon, and put them in the freezer to await transport home.

Dinner was, you guessed it, salmon tacos. I turned some of the salmon into fried “catfish” nuggets just like I do back home. They were very good on the warm soft shells with raw cabbage and salsa.

Once the table was cleared and the dishes loaded in the dishwasher, all six feet, six legs, and six knees were ready for a hot shower and prone position. The walking and climbing around on unstable, steep, rocky terrain tires the lower extremities. We fell into our beds where sleep came easy and sound.

On day five, we enjoy pancakes fit for the bears and get close enough to a buck to give it a scratch behind the ears.

Kate Riley

Prince of Whales – Part 3

January 28, 2020 Guest Travel

This is part three of our adventure to Prince of Whales, Alaska. If you missed part two you can catch up quickly here.

By 8am, a new installment of cruise ships arrived for a nippy, rainy, foggy morning in Ketchikan. The hotel provided another Sourdough cab ride to our float plane, which was to take us to our destination: Thorne Bay, a tiny town on Prince of Whales Island. A few other customers came into the office to ship packages, and we moved our luggage down to the four-wheeler with a wagon on the back, so it could be rolled down to the plane. One of the pilots came in muttering under his breath, and asking for a magnet. It seems the keys to his favorite plane had dropped into the water.

The flight was a thirty-minute panorama of fantastic postcard views. Breath-taking water ways, mountains, and small islands dotted the landscape.

The Thorne Bay Lodge owner picked us up in a 350 Ford, gas-powered crew cab with a camper cover on the full-size bed. The Ford could have easily been our abode for the week. But instead of camping in a pick-up truck he drove to our newly-constructed, modern, “rustic” home for the week. The cabin was located less than a mile from the one grocery store, gas station and bait shop that make up Thorne Bay.

We stowed our gear, had a hard salami and crackers snack and piled in the truck for a deer scouting afternoon. We drove to higher elevations, around three thousand feet, to get above the muskegs and alpine forrest terrain. We spied nearly a dozen large does and two-year-old fawns, but only one buck with a fork. He was more of a “last day” shooter. Coming back down the mountain we stopped at a river running into the sea, which was plentiful with salmon making their final run. Focused on fun and dinner, we brought five eight-pound fighters home. We cleaned our fish and headed out in a different direction to scout a little more.

Our second expedition didn’t turn up much, just a few more does, so we stopped at the grocery store for supplies for the week. After we organized and stowed our stuff, we enjoyed fresh poached Alaska salmon for dinner, and then turned in, ready to start the hunting and fishing in earnest in the morning.

In part four, I put my baking skills to use, and we find out why the bait shops in Ketchikan sold so many lures.

-Kate Riley

Prince of Whales – Part Two

January 6, 2020 Guest Travel

This is part two of our hunting trip to Prince of Whales, Alaska. If you missed part one you can get caught up quickly here.

The 6:15am flight to Seattle was uneventful except for a delayed start. I napped, entirely missing out on wheels up.
Our late departure made for a late landing in Seattle, and we watched in trepidation as our plane coasted right by our gate and kept on going. We had to sprint it through the airport, peppering our fellow travelers with “excuse mes” to create a path. We made it to the gate with four minutes to spare, partly in thanks to a pilot who saw us running and pointed us in the right direction. En route to Ketchikan, I visited with a couple local ladies and learned a little more about the town.

Ketchikan’s airport is on an island. The mainland is accessible by a seven-minute ferry ride. We carted our suitcases down a ramp and fell in line with the rest of the passengers. It was easy to spot the fisherman headed in the other direction, loaded up with boxes of frozen fish. We dumped our luggage cart and handed it off to a large group, struggling under the weight of their success.

We watched the locals from the ferry and took in the scene. Flannel shirts and rubber muck boots were the common attire on everyone. There were no suits or fancy Dans and the vibe of the city was rustic.

Our reservations were at the Gilmore Hotel, and they had a deal with Sourdough Cab to give us a ride from the ferry dock. Our driver was playing both cabbie and dispatcher, and was quite the character. When we stepped back for a picture of the hotel, he was happy to be featured.

Because we’d left Houston early and changed time zones, we had arrived before noon. We spent the rest of the day exploring Ketchikan, the quaint little sea shore town with a giant influx of tourists. Locals told us some days there were five or six cruise boats at the dock. The giant ships dwarfed the rest of the town, and the tourists flooded the streets, buying fish dinners, Alaska t-shirts, and the occasional totem pole.

Kids were toting fishing poles down to the bridge and we followed them to enjoy their efforts. The water was teeming with salmon, and it was cool to look down from the bridge and encourage the fisherman. “They’re right there!” “Oh, they’re over there now! Big ones!”

All the shops and activities are poised to take advantage of the bee hive of cruise business, with customers only available until the sound of the horn. Shops line the streets selling everything under the Alaskan sun. Orca corn, anyone?

I don’t know what it is, but I’m not putting it on my lips.

By seven pm the ships closed their doors, and the shops did too. Ketchikan returned to a quiet fishing village. We chose a spot for dinner and enjoyed chatting with the waitress about her plans after high school. (Frankly, not specific enough to our liking, and we encouraged more exploration and fine tuning.)

Next up: We take a float plane to Thorne Bay, check out our cabin, dump our gear and discover that the deer are everywhere…. but there’s just one problem…

-Kate Riley

Prince of Whales – Part One

December 27, 2019 Guest Travel

It began the way it always does, with a phone call. “Kate, do you want to go hunting in Alaska?” He sometimes calls me mom, but in recent years mostly “Kate”. It’s not with disrespect— we have become friends.

“Count me in,” came my immediate reply. I even extended my trip by putting two extra days on both ends. Edgar lives on a trawler just outside of the Houston ship channel. I enjoy a little time on that boat. Thursday I flew to Houston and Edgar picked me up at the airport. We drove straight to the Bow Out, the 1973 40-foot DeFever PassageMaker. I dropped off my luggage and he took me out to dinner for some “catching up” and contemplation of the adventure ahead. We were off to hunt sitka deer, the small black-tailed deer native to southeastern Alaska. The conversation drifted from logistics of getting to Prince of Whales Island, our hunting destination, to our hopes for the hunt itself. The “what ifs” and “whens” exhausted, we headed back to the Bow Out for a great night’s sleep. I rest very well on that old boat.

The next morning Edgar got up early and headed off to work. He makes that forty-eight mile rush hour drive every morning to downtown Houston. I didn’t get up until almost eight. I enjoyed a leisurely coffee on the fly bridge in the hot Houston morning. Then I spent some time getting a little “house” cleaning out of the way. The captain will come back to a clean ship.
The one hundred-plus degree afternoon was a good time for me to take care of some business calls inside the comfortable air-conditioned galley…. no matter how much I enjoy the view from the upper deck. Edgar arrived after work and we packed up and went to Leigh’s, through Houston’s Friday night traffic. They took me out for a Vietnamese dinner, then back to the house for packing hunting and fishing gear. Showers and bed did not come nearly as early as that 3AM alarm.

Next up: On the first full day of our adventure, we found ourselves in an all-out airport sprint, and got our first glimpse of the quirky town of Ketchikan… a place where salmon runs and cruise ships oddly intersect.

-Kate Riley

Traveling North

September 30, 2019 Guest Travel

They call it “north of normal” for a reason and you realize why just before entering the Yukon. A grand geographical area it is!

Mountains and hot springs are everywhere and a plethora of tectonic activity lies just beneath the surface. This trip up was my first time laying my eyes on the Northern Rockies, although I’d just spent two months relatively near Rocky Mountain National Park itself in Colorado.

The area of the Northern Rockies is a part of the world where the power of nature is the most authoritative being. In this day and age sometimes we need that visual reminder.

-Marie

Cheers to Santa

December 24, 2018 Guest Uncategorized

A traveling man, plump and grey
Weary and wrung out on Christmas Day
Jolly and hollies all through the night
Up on the rooftops can cause quite a fright
Zinging around spreading the joy
Packing and tracking and giving out toys
When the sleigh’s finally empty, he gives Rudolph a pat
Scarfs down a cookie in one minute flat
Then you can spot him, softly singing a tune
The wind in his beard, south bound to Cancun

Merry Christmas from TSY!

Rides Around: Big Metal Bird

December 12, 2018 Guest Travel

This Rides Around features a closer look at the methods we use to travel across countries, and even across continents. This guest post from our friend Kate Riley offers a sincere thanks to the crews and machines that make our adventures possible.

It has available seating for fifty people, and this “red eye” flight from Helena, Montana to Denver, Colorado was filled to capacity. All fifty passengers sat and relaxed, slept, read or utilized electronics with no burden of responsibility or concerns for snow-packed icy roads this North Western November day. The United crew who maned the ship were helpful and professional.

We all look forward to our trips and vacations but seldom give credence to the “big birds” that get us from point A to point B. This is just a small thank you to the little jet that took me over eight hundred miles in less than ninety minutes, saving me a long day’s drive.
Time is precious to spend with family and friends or doing business.
These silver birds took me three thousand miles in less than eighteen hours.. that’s two days travel instead of six days of driving and four nights in a motel.

Thank you to our winged friends and crews who are often neglected when we salute our Rides Around vehicles.

The Rig: CRJ 200 Canadair Regional Jet
The Location: in the clouds
The Driver: a pilot spending the holidays away from home
The Special Circumstance: a season of thanks

Kate Riley

Rides Around: Long Live the Jeep

October 24, 2018 Guest Travel

Here at TSY we love to showcase your adventures, and the vehicles that drive them. Check out this guest post featuring a vehicle that may not hit the road, but still provides a valuable service.

Someone gave me this great old Jeep to drive the quarter-mile back and forth from my house to the back of my property, the Sangamon River. It was mid summer when the Marty, the local tow truck driver, dropped the friendly beast in my driveway. I was given a quick tutorial on four-wheel drive and was left alone to figure it out on my own.

I prefer to walk during the summer; the Jeep did many weeks of waiting. I did drive it to carry equipment if I was fishing. We worked out some incidentals together. A couple of flat tires and a broken rear brake line were repaired. The decision was made to leave the rusted frame alone for now as it was never going to be a “on the road” vehicle.

As the days got shorter the Jeep was driven more. Daylight after work became less and less each day but by driving, there was still an hour with enough light to rock hunt and find those allusive Indian beads (fossilized crinoid stem). Winter is clambering its way across the north west, and it won’t be long and miss J will be loaded with firewood to warm the house, soul, and body. Long live the Jeep! A short trip but rugged “rides around “.