I can’t upload photos right now, but wanted to continue our journey
We left Surfers Beach heading back into town so we could dump our tanks and get some fresh water. When we approached the turn out at Woman’s Bay (phone booth), my iPhone started dinging and I saw I had a text message from Pete. His text said if we’re in town he was going out on the boat around 1130 if that works let him know. I looked at the time and it was 0930. Perfect I thought, so I called Pete and said yes 1130 works for us! He replied, oh, with a chuckle, he sent that text message two days ago! (wonk wonk).
I said okay, bummer, and thanked Pete for his offer. Of course he figured we did not have any cell service when there was no response. Today was laundry day, so we stayed the night at the Coast Guard campground, for $15 a night so we could do laundry (for free) at their guesthouse.
The next day, I received a text from Pete saying that he’s going to take the boat out at 0800 in the tomorrow morning if we wanted to go for a ride. Heck yeah, so I called him and confirmed that we would be there.
We got to the harbor and parked Bigfoot and Elkhorn overlooking some of the biggest and most diverse fishing fleet in Alaska. The Port of Kodiak has three commercial piers and over 650 boat slips that can accommodate vessels up to 304.8 meters long. The Port is also a hub for Gulf of Alaska container traffic and a distribution center for consumer goods going to communities throughout southwest Alaska. It is, of course, a major export point for fish cargoes destined for markets around the world. Big stuff.
We walked down the covered aluminum ramp to the dock on the right side of the harbor. There we saw Pete’s beautiful aluminum boat with twin 300 engines named the Dues Payer. An absolute gorgeous boat, about a 30 footer or maybe a bit longer. We asked Capt Pete for permission to come aboard which was granted. On board already was Capt Pete’s friend Mike. They have been childhood friends and have stayed in touch. Mike rode his Harley Davison from Texas all the way up to Alaska and the Blue Canoe to Kodiak. Wow what a ride.
Capt Pete graciously and professionally showed us all the safety features of the boat, some of the controls, where we should sit and or stand, emphasizing to “stay low” and have 3 points of contact so no one goes overboard. Yep, we are not at Clarks Hill Lake, this is the Pacific Ocean.
Capt Pete motored the Dues Payer through the harbor, while we were looking at all these fishing boats up close. We passed the Trident fish processor who had converted the WW 2 liberty boat to a canning factory after the 1964 earthquake. We were looking at a commercial fishing boat, but it looked different as it had some large stainless steel cabinets on the deck. Capt Pete explained it was a fish tender. This boat would be centrally located and anchored out in the bay somewhere. When fishing boats would reach their fish capacity, they would moor up to this fish tender and off load their catch. The tender would weigh the fish and provide a ticket to the fishing boat’s Capt so they could get paid. The tender once full, would dock at the Trident Fish Processor, and Trident would “vacuum” out all the fish from the cargo hold of the tender. So how about that, and back to the boat ride.
Capt Pete charted a path through the bay and into open water. We were not too far away from the shores of Emerald Island that we are really learning to love and respect.
Within minutes there were humpback whales all around us, doing what they do best in the open water. They were feeding and providing us with a show. Humpback whales reach lengths of 52 feet and weights of 33 tons! They migrate from winter breeding grounds near Japan, Hawaii or Mexico to summer feeding grounds, which extend from Washington State all the way north to the Chukchi Sea (look it up, it is way north!). They feed mostly on tiny shrimp called krill and various small schooling fishes. A humpback can eat up to 1.5 tons of food per day. That is a lot of shrimp my friends at $8.00 per pound!
We had to keep our head on a swivel, a “spout” looking starboard, then a “tail” (called a flute) on the port side, then a partial breach to the aft as whales were all around feeding. Just incredible to see so many tail-slapping, flipper-slapping, spouting and then seeing their flute go vertical as they dive deep into the ocean blue water. Holy cow, we all just couldn’t believe it, as we were all taking pictures of this non stop action.
Capt Pete did a great job putting the Dues Payer in this location with so many whales to watch ! Funny thing is, just a few days ago I was happy watching the whales as I sat on surfers beach using the binoculars to watch the whales spouting. Binoculars? We didn’t need them on the Dues Payer, we were in the thick of it.
There were many charter boats in the area, some were fishing while others were watching whales. In fact one fishing boat located 300 yards off the Dues Payer port side obscured our view of a humpback breaching out of the water not once, not twice, but three times! We still saw some of the whale and a huge splash but couldn’t get any pictures. Whale watching was absolutely terrific and we all had the time of our lives, Thank you Capt Pete!
Capt Pete put a couple of fishing poles in the aft of Dues Payer as we trolled for salmon. It didn’t take long before we got a pink salmon and a lingcod, both of which we kept. After a little bit more trolling Capt Pete said let’s try for some halibut. The Captain baited a couple of circle hooks, put a large weigh at the end and dropped it to about 110 feet and we waited. We got a couple of big sculpins but no halibut. Virgil and I both managed to get our tackle stuck on the rocks below so Capt Pete had to work at maneuvering the boat to get his rigs back. We lost one, sorry about that Capt Pete.
The Capt knew that the weather was going to change at a certain time and the wind was gonna start to blow. The Dues Payer would motor off to protected areas until even those areas got a little scrappy. So Capt Pete put the hammer down in the Dues Payer back to the harbor. Man, let me tell you, those twin 300 have alot of get up and go, The Dues Payer did what she was built for, as she cut through those waves like butter.
We got back to the harbor and once the Dues Payer was firmly docked, Virgil filleted the two fish for a future supper. The four of us thanked Capt Pete for a terrific time and for his generosity. We really had a great time and we are thankful he’s a part of our journey.
As we were walking back up the covered ramp to Bigfoot in Elkhorn we decided to go grab some lunch at Henry’s restaurant which has been serving food in Kodiak for 60 years. As we sat there at the table we were all euphoric, talking and thinking about what we just experienced on Capt Pete’s Dues Payer. How terrific it was and we couldn’t believe that we saw so many whales and oh by the way, we got a couple fish. What’s wrong with it, move over Spam, here is something fishy-er!
So now our time has come to a close at Kodiak. At 5 PM on 5 August we will be boarding the Tusty to Homer, and arrive in Homer at 6 AM on Saturday morning. Kodiak has been a terrific stop. One of our favorite islands that we have visited over this past 100+ days of traveling the Blue Canoe. We have thoroughly enjoyed the island and we could imagine ourselves actually living here. The kind and generous people that we met through so many different ways, have been awesome and truly memorable.