Issue #1

The Adventure Almanac

Hey there fishermen and women 👋 welcome to our monthly newsletter (or maybe monthly-ish. This is a new thing — give me time to hone my newsletter writing skills, haha!)

My plans for this are still pretty vague and will morph depending on what YOU, our guests, want to read! As for now, I’m thinking: photo features, recipes, fishing tips and tricks, tackle reviews, and some of our off-season adventures.

Or this might just become the Salmon Run Crew diary. And boy, do we have a lot of stories after running this place the past 8 years. We’ve said it before, but this place really would have made a great TV shit-show.

Our methods and minds have obviously improved over the years (we’d be pretty disappointed if they hadn’t..) and the chaos is….well, still there, just maybe better hidden. But gosh, we sure love this place and this life. So, stick around and you’ll get to read about some of the behind the scene magic that makes this lodge the fantastic family-run place you all know and love. Anyway, here goes:

Lodge family update:

Jake and I added another little girl to the crew in April: Piper! She’s the happiest little bundle of joy and Alice is the most amazing big sister!

Ashlynne and Peyton finally gave us a little boy to love and spoil (and I finally became an aunt ♥️) in August.

Both babies are wonderful, so squishy, and SO loved.

Off-season plans:

Sportsmen’s skews we’re currently planning on attending:

February 18-22: Houston, TX

February 19-22: Duluth, MN

March 5-8: Minneapolis, MN

March 12-15: Salt Lake City, UT

April 1-3: West Palm Beach, FL

Boats: the storm trooper and boat four travelled back to Haines with us for the winter. Plans include replacing floorboards, fixing a permanent topper, and general cosmetic fixes. We’ve learned even more about these fantastic little boats after digging through and can’t wait to show you all the new and improved version!

Story time: This is a Kayla and Jessie story! Back in 2020 (or maybe 2019, they all start to blend together!) we purchased a boat in Gustavus, AK. It was sight unseen and we didn’t have ANY idea what we were walking into. It was also the first time we’d ever gone up to the Gustavus public dock.

Now, if you’ve never been there before: the dock is up a river that you have to hit at high tide. There are markers, but no signs so if you’ve never done it before, you REALLY have to watch your depth finder.

Well, our planning wasn’t quite perfect and we found a bunch of sand with our prop. Oops. We made it up the river after a few small detours. When we arrived, the guy we bought the boat from was waiting with the boat on the trailer. I don’t even know if he said hello. He backed the boat into the water, detached the thing from the trailer and chucked us a rope.

The boat floats! But the trim tilt is busted and the motor is turned, and stuck, fully to the right.

Now, remember the narrow part of the river we had to go up? We now had to head back, at a lower tide, with a boat that pulls hard to the right.

We grew up in Montana. We fished a lot of Fort Peck but, never had we ever really been ocean people. Alaska’s learning curve is steep. And this was just another trial by fire for this happy little hell-damn crew.

Jessie stood on the back of our boat and tried his damndest to use the rope to make that boat float straight (ish) in 3’ waves.

But hey, we got the boat home.

We now call it the bathtub 🛁 and it is, to this day, all of the staff’s favorite fishing boat.

We still haven’t solved the mystery of where the boat’s trailer ended up. Eaten by the forest, probably.

Recipe time: I’m working hard on a lodge cookbook and am hoping to be done before the holidays for this year. For now, here is my all time favorite chocolate chip recipe, enjoy!

Anyway, that’s it! Thanks for reading. TTFN. 🐅

– Kayla