The warm tones of the sun linger over a vast bay at dusk, the water a mirror to the sky’s brilliance. A few short hours later, when the sun rises, those same colors come to life again.
I find myself admiring this staple of an Alaskan summer—the eternal glow of the sun—from a skiff where I stand in waders, ankle deep in salmon, working to pick fresh catches out of a 50 fathom long commercial fishing net.
This is Bristol Bay, Alaska, home to the largest sockeye salmon fishery in the world, and I have spent every summer of my life living and working among its rugged beauty with my family.
I consider this place my second home.
Summers in the Alaskan bush
When a significant portion of your childhood was spent in the Alaskan bush, where a grizzly bear sighting is often more common than a shower and your cabin leans aggressively more each year to the shifting bluff behind it, you learn to adapt quickly.
-Sofie Fransen.
When a significant portion of your childhood was spent in the Alaskan bush, where a grizzly bear sighting is often more common than a shower and your cabin leans aggressively more each year to the shifting bluff behind it, you learn to adapt quickly.
My mom, who never gets enough credit for all of the work she does keeping everyone fed and alive each year, was brave enough to bring my brother Cody and I up when we were little. In fact, both of us haven’t missed a summer since the first year after we were born.
While my dad was out fishing, she watched us turn the tundra, creek, beach, four wheelers and cabin into our personal playground.
I even learned to walk in that endearing cabin, despite constantly falling from the floor’s slight tilt.
As I grew older though, my time spent on the beach shifted significantly to working in my dad’s boat.
Learning the art of fishing young
I became a crew member on his set net site when I turned 10 and then gained even more responsibility at 13 when Cody, four years older than me, started running his own boat and crew.
The two of them taught me everything I know about the industry.
Here’s the other thing about spending summers in the Alaskan bush—you’re expected to pull your weight at a young age.
The years leading up to officially becoming a crew member, my dad would plop me in the boat with my brother, the other hired crewmen and hundreds of fish. It was my job to sit amid the slime and blood and help pitch the impossibly fresh fish into brailer bags.
Although being so little, I was probably more interested in admiring the lively dance of the salmon as they came onto the boat and skipping flounders across the water, than I was in actually helping.
The weight of a fish was still clumsy in my hands, so I always opted for the two-hand grasp or tail clasp, which any fisherman knows is frowned upon.”
-Sofie Fransen.
Besides, at that point, the weight of a fish was still clumsy in my hands, so I always opted for the two-hand grasp or tail clasp, which any fisherman knows is frowned upon.
I remember Cody would teach me the art of holding a salmon, arranging my small hand on top of the head with a thumb in the gills.
I can also visualize admiring the lighting speed at which my dad picked fish out of the net. And even with the intensity of the job, he always took the time to slow it down for me, patiently teaching the right picking techniques.
Over 12 years of experience
Now at 22, with 12 years of experience under my belt (plus years of helping out in the boat even before that) I claim that lightning speed as my own.
I just returned from another fishing season working on my dad’s boat with three other guys, and I can’t help but reflect on the way that I have grown so fond of every inch of that place and the people in it.
The job is a lot of work.
The days can be long, sometimes reaching up to 20 hours in the boat.
But, the interesting thing about being raised in a setting like that, is that you don’t really realize what’s happening to you, or even see the traits that have slowly developed in you until you look at the experience from a removed perspective.
Maybe it’s nostalgia or just me being sappy, but I am so appreciative of the work.
A timeless resource
Every summer I am baffled at the scope of the sockeye salmon resource.
Just last year, Bristol Bay had a sockeye salmon run of 79 million fish, the largest inshore run on a record 81% above the average, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
Although this was an anomaly, the well-regulated salmon run continues to return to Bristol Bay year after year.
I am reminded of my insignificance.
In awe of the Lord, who reflects his own timelessness in this resource—a resource that is not bound to the rhythm of a clock, like every other thing I experience in everyday life.”
-Sofie Fransen.
In awe of the Lord, who reflects his own timelessness in this resource—a resource that is not bound to the rhythm of a clock, like every other thing I experience in everyday life. The endless ticking of a hand defines the movements of an entire society. When to eat, sleep, go to work.
But here, time doesn’t seem to exist. Even daylight refuses to adhere to a normal schedule while the glow of the sun can stretch on for up to 22 hours.
This place is governed entirely by the ebb and flow of the tide, not time.
We always fish right before high tide and continue fishing until low, when the net is dry and the water is out far enough to catch a few hours of rest.
But even then, when the net is not in the water, there are a hundred small details to be on top of so the set runs smoothly when the net is floating again: Are the fish iced? Do the boats have enough fuel? Is the net anchored? Are the lines cleared? Any pulleys stuck?
The mental checklist pings like a pinball machine in my mind constantly. When the peak of the season hits and the long hours of work start to catch up with me, this checklist even runs rampant in my dreams.
Unruly Alaskan water gets best of you
Even now, after coming back at the end of a season and being a staffer at The Coronado News, every once in a while I find myself waking up in the middle of the night convinced that I need to go pick the net.
But sometimes, no matter how much you stay on top of this checklist, the unruly Alaskan water or tundra will get the better of you.
We have countless stories of an unforgiving tide making the final decision. Just this season, two fishermen’s boats flipped and another crew got stuck on a sandbar while trying to make it back in time to beat the water’s depleting levels.
Other times, when low tide is a hold-up, the water doesn’t even go out far enough for us to take a break, so we continue to work through the next tide. (Again, the water working overtime as an executive decision maker).
When the fish hit the net by the hundreds during the peak of the season, my swollen fingers, sore back and tired eyes don’t know whether to cry for joy or sigh in disbelief.
The romance of the sea
But, these stories are just the impossibly stretched tales of a fisherwoman, right?
The well-known character trope who is addicted to the adrenaline of the catch, who is hopelessly in love with the romance of the sea. Who gets a far-off expression in the eyes and an upturned smile talking about the fishing season.
I see this gleam in the eyes of all of the passengers, wearing xtratuf boots, who board the short-haul flight from Anchorage to King Salmon, Alaska. (Although truthfully, it’s mostly men on board since the Bristol Bay fishery is a heavily male-dominated industry).
Unlike a standard flight on a 737 where quiet chatter fizzles out once the plane takes off, this flight is buzzing with voices the entire time.
Sometimes yelling, often swearing, but mostly excitement for the upcoming season. These are the voices of eternal optimists.
The voices of fishermen who every year, regardless of any external predictions, will faithfully declare with conviction that they’ve heard “the run is going to be one of the biggest yet.”
They say this every year.
It’s not about the money
What can this universal sparkle of the eyes be chalked up to?
Passion.
I see the same passion in my dad, who started commercial fishing as a way to pay for school in 1984 but turned it into a lifestyle for himself and his family.
I see it in my brother, Cody, who started running his own boat and crew when he was going into his senior year of high school and since then, has built a successful business selling our pristine sockeye product after the season.
I see it in myself as someone who, full-time job and all, still chooses to make the trek up to Bristol Bay on vacation time.
It has never been about the money. It can’t be.
Because although we’ve had a stretch of really great years recently, the reality is, not every year produces the mass amounts of fish that I highlighted.
To work those long hours and invest so much money into equipment and supplies without the promise of a good season takes something deeper.
There are no fair weather fishermen here. Because although security in the size of the run or the price per pound is not guaranteed, there is security in the details that make Bristol Bay so unique.
Our red-roofed, shingled cabin always leans to one side, we always pick the net an hour before high tide, xtratuf boots will faithfully be the footwear of choice on the flight to King Salmon, and time will always seem to stop, to linger mid breath, as the tide continues to chug along and the sun continues to glow through the night.
To hear more about the Fransen’s story visit https://wildfinseafoods.com/
To check out more of Ben Matthew’s professional photography, visit his website https://www.bentmatthews.com/
