Читать книгу Never Cry Halibut. and Other Alaska Hunting and Fishing Tales онлайн

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“I caught a smoker load!” She beamed. “I can take you fishing your next day off, if you want.”

I began to steal out in the predawn hours, borrowing her rod and then sneaking it back before she woke. These forays were partially inspired by wounded pride, but I soon found myself enjoying standing on the ocean’s edge, casting in the morning solitude, and quietly chanting, “I am not a Jonah. I am not a Jonah.”

I rarely caught much, but folks seemed more at ease around me now that I’d picked the rod back up. My dad and brothers started inviting me out on their skiff to go to their secret halibut holes; old friends called wanting to know if I wanted to go try for some cohos.

In late July of 2012, with my brothers and MC, we tried for halibut in Lynn Canal. The ocean stretched blue and undulated gently, mountains rose to nearly seven thousand feet in a couple miles, and glaciers cut through rainforest like giant frozen rivers. A pod of Dall’s porpoises played with our skiff, bumping lines as we jigged. Humpback whales plied the waters with gargantuan baleen-plaited mouths spread wide. Bald eagles, gulls, sea ducks, and a host of other birds revolved in and out of vision.