Offshore Conference

Sometimes, work can really be a drag, you know? Meetings, stress, office politics, travel...

Not this week, my friends! I just returned from an 'offshore conference' in Alaska's inside passage, courtesy of my cool boss. The Inside Passage is the series of coastal islands that run the southern panhandle of Alaska, toward British Columbia. The area is loaded with thousands of islands, and it is seriously the most beautiful place I've ever been. I was surprised to learn that the entire area is a rain forest - albeit not a tropical one. It is lush green and JAM-packed with life.

We flew to Juneau and took a float plane to an area called Funter Bay. It is fairly uninhabited, except that it contains the highest density of bears in the world. The entire island is about 1600 square miles - and it contains over 1600 bears (for those who are counting, that means there is about one bear every square mile). As the plane touched down in the water, 2 bears poked their heads out of the woods to greet us.

There was a crew of 5 of us, and we spent 3 days on this 42' tugboat. It was brand new, and loaded with everything we needed for survival (steak, eggs, milk, M&Ms, Pepsi, plasma screen TV, etc.)

Have I mentioned that Alaska is absolutely beautiful?

The main goal of the 'conference' was to catch fish. And we definitely managed to do that.

Coho Salmon

3 Big, Fat Things


Halibut (the pretty side)



Halibut (the ugly side)

Crabbing (don't tell my wife or my mother that I'm not wearing a life jacket)

Crab (we would set crab pots when we anchored at night)

Other Strange Creatures (Irish Lord)

This is some kind of starfish. It grabbed on to my bait, and was moving all around.

We were joined on the conference by a bunch of wild visitors. All day long, we would see bald eagles, deer, bear, whales, sea lions, otters, dolphins, etc. It was unbelievable. Occasionally, a whale (or an entire pod of them) would come to within about 25 feet of us. I was not only blown away by the sight, but also the sound. Unfortunately, I never really grabbed a photo that I considered satisfactory.

Look close. There really are 2 bald eagles in this tree.

Finally, here is a video I shot of a whale breaching. I don't know how to edit the first part of it, or I would have made it shorter. Also, excuse the crappy camera work. I was on a boat on the ocean, for crying out loud. This was by no means the most amazing jump we saw (there was about 30 minutes where about 6 of them would do this at the same time, jaws open). I don't really mind that I wasn't able to capture it all with my camera, because no photo or video could ever do justice to the beauty and majesty of seeing this. The whole ordeal was absolutely stunning.




Yes, I'm keenly aware that I sound like the world's biggest idiot in this audio commentary. I was really caught up in the moment.

When the boat portion of the trip was over, we spent a day and night in this little fishing village. It was an awesome little place, where 850 people live year-round. I hear they got 22 feet of snow 2 years ago...

Hoonah, Alaska

View from the front porch of our cabin


Inside the cabin

Also, I have 100's of other photos I'd love to share. Stop by sometime, and I'll probably talk about it for hours...

Anyone interested in a future vacation to the area? I'm already dying to do it again.

(FYI - I don't know if blogging is my thing. This could be my first and only entry. I really enjoy just leaving snyde comments on other people's blogs)