"Gonna put the world away for a minute..."

Since moving up here  9 months ago, we have been fortunate to add many highlights to our life list – Steve winning a Kelly Cup Championship and me being Jack Hanna for Jack Hanna, just to name a few.  Since the season ended at the end of May, we have filled almost every weekend with amazing Alaskan adventures, each of them becoming one of those highlights.

One of the adventures was fishing on the Prince William Sound.  I have never gone deep sea fishing before, so I was definitely excited, but also a little nervous.  After practically giving myself an ulcer worrying about seasickness the entire week before the trip, turns our I had packed my sea legs.  Phew!  The trip started off Friday night, driving an hour south to Whittier AK.  We launched the boat and took the hour trip to Long Bay, dropping some shrimp pots along the way.  Once we found an awesome spot to camp, we pitched the massive tent (which included a wooden stove – tough, I know) and settled in for the night full of rain.  In the morning, we headed south another 2 hours to our fishing spot, with a few stops along the way to admire the Alaskan scenery and the porpoises giving us quite the show swimming in the wake of the boat.  Within 10 minutes of anchoring and dropping our lines, I caught the first fish of the day… a rockfish.  Not the halibut I was looking for, but I’ll take it! About 5 minutes after that, and with my line only  20 feet deep, I also caught the second fish of the day, a silver salmon.  Beginner’s luck I guess!  After that came a lot more rockfish and finally those halibut we were after!  I think we’re going to need to buy a bigger freezer if we keep this up…

Another Alaskan adventure took place on July 4th weekend.  We definitely went all out for our very first July 4th and were lucky enough to spend it with some awesome friends and their kids.  The weekend started off with a 7 mile hike to a spot called Symphony Lake.  We both knew it was going to be a challenge, especially with a 30 lb and 50 lb pack on our backs, but we also knew that if a 5 year old could make the hike, so could we!  After 4 hours of hiking, with many stops along the way, we finally made it in and set up camp on the ridge between Symphony and Eagle Lakes.  Although it poured rain the second night there, it was an adventure neither of us will forget.

We were meant for this place.

So, until next time… when our Alaskan resume continues to grow…