My job consisted of guiding six-day trips, mostly for Salmon. It was really only five days, plus Saturday morning, should any of the guests need help. There wasn’t much preparation. Ken gave me a briefing. I met my guiding partner Dan, who showed me the ropes. I had all my gear, though at Dan’s suggestion, bought a can a bear mace and some Aviators with cable-temples, so they wouldn’t fall in the water, or get tangled in the bush like they do when they’re hanging from Croakies.
The guests arrived and I acted like I knew what I was doing, privately sneaking a look at Chapman’s Piloting or Alaskan Bear Attics whenever possible. (The later was required reading, I was told). The excitement of the Cat-diesel firing up, never dissipated. The whole vessel rumbled as the hollow, base engine came to life and somehow said “I’m going to take you amazing places”.
We pulled up anchor and I joined Ken in the Pilot House, carefully watching him ease the Star Queen out to open waters. The fjords in Southeast Alaska look and often feel more like rivers than the ocean. They’re pathways through the labyrinth of Islands—many that had no human inhabitants. Sometimes the fjords would narrow like the upper Willamette and other times they would widen to the size of the Columbia. The main difference was current. In the fjords, the current changes directions, following the tides. On the flow, current pours around the islands, filling in all the nooks, until, at last it evens at high tide. Then, miraculously, this swollen body of water, slows, then turns around and wanders back to sea. Though at times, in certain channels, it could get treturous, as I’d learn.
The Star Queen had set sail, bearing South, thirty miles to the fabled Anan Creek where I would be initiated as a professional fly-fisherman.
The image used is not 'the' Star Queen, but looks quite a bit like her
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