Commercial Fish With Me (All Season)

Would you like to visit me this summer at my remote Alaskan fishing camp and catch your own salmon? I'd love to have you! Visit with one other person and spend five days learning how to commercial fish sustainably, fillet expertly, and live in the wild like a real Alaskan. When you leave, take a 50 lb. box of sockeye or coho salmon home with you.

Together with my wife and 6-year-old daughter, we own 2 cabins on the Ugashik River about a mile upriver from the town of Pilot Point, Alaska (population 69) in remote western Alaska. This is our working commercial fish camp. Learn the ins and outs of commercial fishing on the beach in front of the cabin. We'll use my skiff to set and tend the net, or we'll fish a short net by hand in the shallows. When we catch salmon, we'll carry them up the beach to my fillet cabin where we'll fillet, vacuum seal, and blast freeze them to perfection. When you head home, you'll bring $1,000 worth of salmon you caught and filleted with you. For an additional charge, I will design a custom label to put on your salmon fillets so if you give salmon away to friends and family they will remember who to thank.

Our fishery is the largest salmon run on earth and it's 100% wild. We are so proud of our fishery! As many as 65 million sockeye return to the bay each summer. It sometimes seems like the river is more salmon than water! I am honored to be a part of this magnificent natural event and I am proud to feed my family from this sustainable resource. You will leave with the same sense of awe, wonder, and respect for wilderness and wild, sustainable food.

There are no roads in or out––we are knee deep in the Alaskan wilderness! You will fly in to Anchorage then charter a single engine plane directly to Pilot Point, or you can fly to King Salmon, Alaska, then take a single engine plane on to Pilot Point. I'll pick you up at the landing strip with my 4-wheeler.

This is a subsistence, wild food, wilderness adventure of a lifetime. But, you must be fit enough to easily get in and out of an open skiff off the beach and walk in rough/muddy terrain in chest waders. Although you can do as little or as much as you like, there is a minimum level of fitness required to visit a remote, working commercial fishing camp. Also remember that this is a working commercial fishing camp in the wilderness. There is mud, blood, and terrible weather. This is not a lodge and you will not be pampered. This is not post card Alaska––this is the real Alaska. If it's raining and blowing and you dont want to be indoors, we'll be outside in rain gear getting after it. If we go somewhere, it will be on a w-wheeler. Lodging is wood bunks in basic cabins and meals are simple, cooked and enjoyed together. Typically camp will consist of 1 or 2 guests, myself, and perhaps 1 or 2 additional crewmen. 

You are responsible for all expenses getting to Pilot Point, Alaska and back home. You are also responsible for getting a 1 week Alaska commercial fishing crewman license for you and your companion. I can help you arrange travel from Anchorage to Pilot Point and help you get your commercial fishing crewman license. The most likely time to visit will be August/September. We can discuss a mutually appropriate time to visit. This is when the weather is (sometimes) best and the salmon are running at a reasonable pace. This is also a great time to see brown bears walk down the beach in front of your cabin.

I look forward to fishing with you this summer!