Friday, July 2, 2010.

Today I had to wash all of the smelly fish clothes because they reek!!! We had to let them sit outside overnight to air out. It still didn't do any good; but at least the smell wasn't in the RV or the car. Tyler was able to wear Daddy's extra pair of boots to fish and Noah wore my boots because I didn't go on the halibut trip. They have also been wearing the boots when they hike up to streams to fly fish. The boys are having a ball and seeing things most people never get to see.
Tonight we did a float trip down the Kenai River to Skilak Lake. We were supposed to see bear along the riversides; but there weren't any. We saw plenty of fishermen, in the water, in boats, and from the banks. There were camps along the way where you could camp out overnight, but there was no road to reach them. You had to float into the camps and bring all of your supplies with you. That is really rustic. I bet those people could see bears. We saw 1 boat that had a huge umbrella over top of it using it as a sail. The current is pretty swift, but all of the rapids were extremely mild. I didn't want even moderate rapids and Noah is too young to go on those. Maybe Daddy and Tyler can take a white water trip in the next few days. Noah and I will have to find something else to do.
Some parts of the Russian River are closed to salmon fishing because too many fishermen left the fish carcasses on the shore and the bears got into them. A few bears have attacked the people because they wanted the fish too. So now those spots are closed. Alaska requires strict rules about the salmon fishing and they are so far ahead of us in being green. This state is truly the last frontier. They are really into preserving the environment. If they weren't doing this, the salmon might have been extinct already.
Many spots on the rivers have fish hatcheries that produce wild salmon fry, not farmed. They are released into the wild as fry, so they can swim out in the ocean. That's where they become the size we can catch now.
There was a family of 4 on this float trip with us who had 2 young boys about 3 years old. They were a set of twins and Noah really enjoyed playing with them. There was 1 spot along the bluff that we passed that had an old, old car buried in the bluff. They assume this occurred when the earthquake hit Alaska in 1964.