Lilley In Alaska...

[jdmidwest]

Somebody email me some fresh salmon fillets, all I can find around here are made in China. I really wanted to go back this year....

[Phil Lilley]

The days are long but flying by. Micheal is here- went to Idavain and Islands on Sunday- slow fishing. First time the grayling and rainbows didn't cooperate there. Neither did the fish at the islands. Nothing trolling. Duane and Micheal linited on sockeye after hours (got in at 1 am).

Sockeye are starting to slow down- maybe. We didn't see as many today but that could be just the day. Did land quite a few but had to work for them. Some of us went up Big Creek at noon. My first trip. Very fun ride up- went about 5 miles up. Winds back and forth and fun in a jet boat. Thrwe spinners for kings and landed 2 plus a pink and a chum. Duane and I panned for gold. I ended up with 8 pieces, one small nugget and some nice flakes. Duane strike out. It's addictive! Can't wait to go back.

Weather has cooled off and has been rainy. 50's daytime. I love it.

Brooks and Margot tomorrow from what I've heard. Bears and dollies.

Sorry no pics. Forgot my camera.

[denjac]

Gold panning sure is fun, even if you only find a fleck or two. Gets your heart pumping when you see the glitter in your pan.

[Phil Lilley]

Lots to report... the best, very best, will HAVE to be told by Duane and Micheal. I wouldn't do it justice. Just know this... Micheal doesn't want to see another bear for the rest of his life!!! Great stuff. I do have to tell... Micheal seasoned himself with bear spray this evening. Wait till you hear the REST of the story.

This was the first day of winter here. Wind, rain and barely in the mid 40's. Jim, myself and 3 clients ran up into Big Creek in search for kings and hooked 8 and landed 3, all about 40 pounds. Did catch some jacks, rainbows and char too.

Big Creek is a long, windy river which alot of kings go up and spawn in. It's catch and release from one mile up in the creek and up so we caught and released. We boated 7-8 miles up. Shallow and windy- unbelievable trip in a jet. Very tricky would be putting it mildly. Two days ago, Duane, Micheal and 2 clients boated up for the 2nd time in my life by ourselves and made it up without incident (miracle) but didn't fair so well coming out. I run a 22 foot alum flats boat with a 150 jet. It's heavy and with 6 people I have to keep it over 4500 rpm to keep it on plane. I got too close to a cut dirt bank and slid the boat up on it's side, almost turning it over. Then I missed a Y in the road and ran it up on a mud flat- WA"Y up on the flat. I had a shovel for panning and had to dig us out- took 30 minutes. My nerves were shot and was extremely glad to get out of that place.

Sockeye fishing has been good the last 2 days. AK Fish and Game reported we had 450k sockeye run thru the river yesterday- that's alot of salmon! Already we've had almost 7mil escape and that's the est for this year. We had only 7.7 last year and that was a huge year. Starting to see a bunch of pinks move up too. And still fresh kings. Duane, Micheal and 2 clients went to King Salmon Creek yesterday and both got a couple of 40+ lb kings on a fly rod. Today they went back and fished for dollies and rainbows behind kings spawning and caught "hundreds" on every cast using beads- 2-5 pounds. They're out rainbow fishing today. Hard core!

I went out and rainbow fished last night for about 30 minutes. Windy and rain- not sure why I went but it was only 9:30 and too early to go to bed. Saw one chasing smelt and casted for it- caught him- 29 inch male. Didn't fight well and look skinny, just like the other big bow I caught earlier. Not sure if the smelt numbers are low or very late but I don't think the bows are getting alot to eat- yet. The eggs will be flowing big time soon.

pic of a rainbow we caught the other day at Idavane.

Bear in camp... again. Visits every day, sometimes several times a day.

More pics of the new dining lodge. Adding a shower room next week.

Here's a taste of food prices. Duane and I had fun taking pics at the food store last week-

I leave for Anchorage next Monday, then to the Holitna River on Tuesday morning for a few days.

[flyfshn]

Great reports and pics!!! 94 degrees in STL.....wish I was there!!

[duckydoty]

We had a bear experience this week while out fishing for Sockeye with Michael Kyle from Backcountry Outfitters. It was a rather humorous experience that I'm sure Michael will remember for the rest of his life. I know I will be laughing about it the rest of mine.

Steve Neale, Randy Wagoner both from the Kansas City area, Michael and I were fishing down at Shawback's on the Naknek river late one evening and had a few sockeye laying on the bank. A bear decided to pay us a visit and immediately smelled the fish and came running for them. We did not have time to get to the boat or out of the way of the bear, but Michael did have time to get his fish and move in to the group in the middle of the river. After the bear ran passed us to go up stream 100 yards to check our boat for salmon, the bear returned to our group huddled as deep as possible in the Naknek, about 10 yards from the bear! We then realized the bear was still looking for the fish and noticed that Michael was in possession of the fish. We realized Michael looked like a Sockeye in his orange and green Simms gear. Michael, in a panic state of mind, proceeded to dump the fish in the river while in full retreat from the advancing bear. Randy and I took first line of defense with pepper spray ready while Micheal was hollering every man and fish for himself. I took a test shot in the direction of the bear with the pepper spray and it was a direct hit. It immediately turned the bear for a few seconds and then he came again. Michael was trying to get his bear spay out and make a test shot also without paying attention to wind direction. One quick burst from Michael and all of us had a face full of pepper spray, laughing, coughing and gagging we all had a terrific bear experience. We jumped into the boat and went down stream looking for the beautiful 10.5 pound Sockeye Michael caught earlier and ran across the retreating bear. Once in the safty of the boat, we no longer acted like scared school girls and rostered tailed the bear with the jet prop motor. We were successful in retrieving the sockeye. Final result, fisherman 5, bear zero.

duckydoty

[Terry Beeson]

(In my best "Hans ans Franz" voice)

Ya... you all are "girly men"... ya... and we're gonna crush you like a stewed tomato... ya.... like a little girly grape we're gonna crush you.... ya....

Cuz we're here to PUMP (clap) YOU UP!!!!!

Glad you're OK.... Too bad the video camera wasn't rolling....

Does the Simms guarantee cover brown and yellow stains?

[HeavyC]

LOL!!!! Instant classic!

[loo10]

So, let me get this straight......

Charging hungry bear....

First thing you do is grab the salmon and run with it??????

Hmmm.......

"Hey Moe, watch this...nyuk, nyuk."

Word to self.....Michael left his brain in Missouri.

(I can't wait to hear this one first-hand) ha-haaaaaaaa

[Micheal Kyle]

Hello All

Well I guess you all know about my encounter with the BEAR, I'm pretty sure he was thinking of a nice fish dinner with me. it was a very intense moment but we all survived. Yes I took the fish because I did not want the BEAR to get used to seeing people fishing in this spot and associate them with food. I have brought some Mase back with me for my allergies it clears the sinus right up.

The gang has done a great job re-building the camp when I left on Saturday they were going to try and finish the showers up, so that the guest do not have to travel to take a shower, not bad travel time though it just kind of cuts into the fishing time so I did not shower until we left. I think that might have been the reason the fish were hitting so good we were using stink bait.

Onto the fishing Duane and I started out Saturday and fished until it was not safe to see it gets dark around 1 am, I guess that is why Jim had told both of us that our money was no good in July. We showed him and everyone in camp how to survive on PB&J Mt.Dew. We even got asked by Jerry one of the guest that was up there this week if we did not care for the food because he never saw us at dinner, we told him that we were fishing every night until 12 am he thought that we were going to King Salmon every night for dinner.

Duane and I were trying to see who would cry uncle first well it never happened so we had to call a truce and we will try again when we go back in September. I can't wait it should be awesome the water will be high because there is still some snow on the mountains according to Jim the snow is all gone by this time of the year. I have a lot of pics and even some video I will posts many as I can plus I will post some of the video too, although I am not sure how I will do it the video when I get it up loaded I will let you now.

We caught a lot of Sockeye The biggest of them for both of us was 10.5 pounds. The Sockeye had only been in the river for about a day what a fight .Both of us caught our first Alaskan King Salmon on the fly rod what a blast nothing real big but a very first it was 37 inches, Duane caught was around 42 inches.

The weather was supposed to be bad on Friday so we scheldule a fly out so thta Steve and Randy could see Brooke Falls well the weather held so we went ahead and took the fly out then they brought the boat over latter. it was really cool to see all that from the air. I have to go I'll post more pics latter.

Michael