The pictures are still in my camera (yes, film) but I did get a nice silver salmon on Sunday at Bird Creek. It was not as big as it could have been, but it was big enough for a great fight and was happily my first Alaskan salmon caught while standing in the middle of a stream in waders. I also caught 4 Pink Salmon (Humpbacks) but let those go – mushy, bland tasting flesh once then hit the freshwater I understand. “I kept these wild salmon over those wild salmon because they taste better” – purely an uptown problem to have. The one Silver is safely frozen and will soon be joined by many more, not to mention some Halibut in a few weeks.

It took about 3 hours to get all of my fish, which is not bad at all. It’s even nicer when you consider the short 25 minute drive from Anchorage gets you a beautiful view of the Turnagain Arm, the Chugach Mountains, and maybe even a bear or 2. They are fairly common on Bird Creek when the salmon run but thankfully I didn’t see any this time (or sadly?), though I had my pepper spray nonetheless. I’m not that bad at filleting salmon, though I’m still too slow and perhaps a bit wasteful. More practice should solve that problem.