During the winter of 89 I was in Mexico and met up with some people who worked on a factory fish processor. They talked of all the money you could make plus room and board. The idea of having ten grand free and clear (I had lessons in taxes later) once I got off the boat was very appealing to me. When I got back to Alaska friends who knew more about it thought I was crazy to want to go winter fishing. They talked me down.
“Just wait until summer! Go when it is safer and not so cold.”
Instead I got a job as an expediter for a local construction company in Anchorage. That meant I drove a truck around town as fast as I could to pick up supplies for remote construction jobs. I carried one of those early brick cell phones and would get calls from my boss Chuck wondering why I was so late or why I had not answered his last call. Chuck was one of those guys with gravel in his voice box and whose volume is set to maximum. My favorite quote from Chuck, came one day when he did not realize I had beat him into work “Where is that long haired, tree hug’n, hippy type we got work’n round here anyway?!”
It was a job, but I was not getting anywhere at eight bucks an hour. I mostly lived to ski on the weekends. But even the smell of diesel when I drove equipment in the yard reminded me of being at sea. When the snow melted I gave my two weeks. Chuck was not happy. I always remember his Caterpillar dozer calendar on the wall behind him when he said: “You know you aren’t going to make any money fish’n!”
“Yeah, but I’m not really making any money here…”
I packed up my backpack, tent and mountain bike. Some friends going to Homer who were interviewing for a lodge job on Kachemak Bay gave me a ride. I planned to camp out on the spit and look for a job as a deck hand. The first thing I did when I got to Homer was ride my bike down the ramp by the Salty Dawg and over to the first group of fishermen I saw. I hadn’t even touched the dock. I sat on my bike with my foot on the rail for balanced and stuck up a conversation with one of the guy’s working on deck. Eric was the skipper of the Trina.
I asked “Need some crew? “
I answered his questions: “Nope, I haven’t fished commercially. I grew up on boats sailing and I’ve spent weeks out in deep water.”
He was not impressed.
“I’ve been through a hurricane. Surfed a 150 foot ship in 30 foot seas and I do not get seasick… easily”
All he cared about was the not getting seasick part.
“Great, thanks I’ll be back before we leave on the morning tide!”
What followed were two weeks of some of the hardest work long line fishing for black cod. We did not do so well. Fourteen, twenty plus hour days and I had $112… but hey I was not a total greenhorn anymore. What I learned most on the trip was just get it done. At one point we had to cut the line and Eric wanted me to marry it back together. So I proceeded to splice the line thinking that was what he meant. It was not. “Just tie it, tape it and forget it!” Coming from yachts and tall ships I was used to more fit and polish.
Eric’s mom, Trina and the crew had a surprise twenty-first birthday party for me at the Salty Dawg. Trina had a birthday cake for me. I tried to keep the twenty one part quite since the bartenders already knew me. I was only on the Trina for the one trip so I moved in to the tent city.
The Icicle cannery used to be big there before it burned in 98 and the spit had so many pay for camping spots. The cannery workers all lived out on the beach in tents. It was a fun group of people my age. They would look out for my tent and stuff for me while I was away.
I scored a job with Tommy on the Bonanza because I had been hanging out in the Salty Dawg with some of his crew. It took about five days of gearing up and baiting hooks. I kept my tent home. It was nice to get away from the boat for the nights.
The big day arrived. My first 24 hour Halibut opener… fairly calm water but a few boats went down from overloading. Boats always sank in those crazy, short, get as much as you can openers. Hard work cleaning all those halibut but this time I had put in about a week’s work and had a few thousand dollars for my efforts. I was ahead of Chuck’s prediction and what I could have saved up in Anchorage. Next I wanted a salmon job! See my post: Scoring A Bristol Bay Job In 1990