June 21: The solstice

Today started out overcast with a little blue poking through. Here, that invariably means it will clear up, and clear up it did. It turned into a beautiful morning that we got to go fishing in. There weren’t any fish to catch, but still, it was beautiful.

Despite considerable messing with the pull cord, it remained un-subdued. We decided that Roger should take pictures of the relevant pieces of the puzzle so we could show the picture to Roy or maybe the guy at Charlie's Sport Shop so he could say, "See that thingie? Take it off and there'll be a little thingie under it..." and so on. And we had to pick up Josh from the airport... but actually, we were a day early for that. My mistake.

So after not picking up Josh, and not being able to find anyone at Charlie's, we headed back down to AGS via SeaMar to get the parts for the fuel filter and LFS where we talked to a woman about Pebble Mine and then to AGS to clean and seal the fish, check the post office twice for the gas tank (no, both times)... and head back to the beach 5 hours later. The crew delivered 88 lbs from the morning tide, tried to use the weed-whacker to cut the path to the outhouse and threw rocks at birds. I can't say why Jeff was in this tierce, but Yin got a photo of it. Now you know a little more about Jeff. Ahem.

By the time we were heading home, the weather had turned and a pretty strong wind had come up. Worry about swamping the Bathtub, which was anchored where Roger could work on it without gearing up - but that means in the path of swamping under the influence of a wind. So they dragged that boat out with the ranger and prior to the tide, Jake brought the Ambi in so we wouldn't have to row out to it. But it was then anchored in the path of swamping, so we had to rush out there early and get that bow pointing out into the weather, walking it over to the running line and hang on until the rest of the crew arrived and we could get out of the surf break. Yin got video footage of that adventure.

Harry told me that there were 6-8' breakers (not just peaks and troughs) out in the middle - those are some rough seas. I had just been saying to the crew how tough us setnetters are to be bouncing around in that, working against the wind and the current in these open little tin cans, when Harry told me that his boat broke in the storm. They had electrical problems and their bilge pump went out - water all over the place. He fixed it, though.

Roger still couldn't get the retractor thing to work, but it did figure out how to get the part off, so he and Hugh went back into town and Roy helped them rewind it. (The dreaded "sproing" effect when replacing a cord occurred, but it was hidden from view so Roger didn't know what problem he was trying to solve.)

The wind became quite strong and it brought a lot of fish on the flood - more than 2300 lbs. The crew did really well. Evan is a natural picker - I think it's his logical mind; he thinks it's his stubbornness. In any case, he can see how they're caught and just gets them out.

I really like this crew.

Now, must sleep - up at 7 for the next tide. I think I'll be able to add photos tomorrow.