Dan in Alaska

We're taking the "new" boat out for it's maiden voyage. The weather is supposed to be great, so hopefully I'll get some nice pictures of Seward to post......

We ended up getting the 620 with the Airmar P66 transducer. I know there are better options out there, especially concerning the transducer, but this is what we could afford right now. The unit should be pretty spectacular, compared to the Garmin 160 Blue it will be replacing, so I'm sure we'll be happy with it. The new unit arrived last Thursday, and we're hoping to get the boat on the water this weekend to try it out.

I don't care for the the "1-2-Both" switches. I've used the BEP Marine voltage sensing relays in two boats now. One was a single outboard/two bank set-up (one relay), and the new boat has a dual outboard/three bank configuration (two relays). Once installed, VSR's are a no-muss/no-fuss way to keep your batteries charged. I like 'em!

A 4th for BOE Marine.

I just picked my TWIC up the other day. I don't go anywhere near a "secure" port, so I doubt I'll ever be asked to show my new-fangled, high-tech sign of the times.

I think you've got it backwards. Higher octane gasoline is more resistant to igniting than lower octane gasoline. In high-compression gas engines, a higher octane rated fuel is needed to prevent pre-detonation. Lower-octane rated fuels will actually ignite before the spark, due to the heat & pressure of the compression stroke.

This one isn't as touchy-feely as the other one I posted.

I posted some fish pictures in another thead.

More Alaska photos, this time with some fish in them..... Up here we catch a lot of halibut. My buddy, Bill, with an 80-pounder: My brother with a 115-pounder: Of course the scenery doesn't suck much. Ling cod season opens July 1st, and we catch a bunch of these toothy buggers. A lot of times, they'll hit the rockfish on the way up: My brother-in-law with a decent linger: My dad with a nice one: My buddy, Dave, with a dandy! If I remember correctly, it was 58" long. Here's the biggest one I remember catching, personally. It was 60-pounds or better. A nice catch of ling cod. Of the five, three were over 50 and the other two were over 40 pounds. Silver salmon (coho) show up later in the summer, and Valdez is an awesome place to hook 'em. We get some shellfish up here, too. Here are a few spot prawns: A friend's Dad even managed to catch a king crab. Unfortunately, we had to release it. I have a BBQ grill on the boat now, so things might be a little different. We fish the fresh water sometimes, as well. Here's the Kenai River, dressed in the fall colors. A buddy with a fat Kenai rainbow: My dad and I, a little earlier in the season, with a limit of sockeyes: A little further upstream, off the Russian River, a couple of buddies with a limit of sockeyes: A friend's daughter releasing a king. In the background you can see the "combat fishing" and you soon realize why I don't do much freshwater fishing anymore. It gets pretty crazy in the "combat" zones.

I meant to throw this up in the "photos" section. Mods, feel free to move it accordingly. Sorry about that.

oops, double post. Mods feel free to delete this one. Sorry.

This year's boating season is just around the corner. I'm starting to get antsy, so I figured I'd post some Alaska boating photos from years past. Enjoy! A little corner of Prince William Sound we like frequent during the spring bear hunting season: A Sitka Blacktailed deer enjoying a swim in PWS. We don't see this everyday! An iceburg....a chunk of a glacier that has calved. An ice harvesting mission.... ....for the evening's drinks! How about a whiskey sour, served up on 12,000 year old ice? Here's a photo of Blackstone Glacier, from the air: An autumn view from the shore of Lake Clark And finally, here's a sunset shot of Mt. Redoubt, taken last summer. Of course, Redoubt has been in the news quite a bit lately, as it has been erupting periodically over the last couple of weeks.

I really like those BEP switches & relays. I just installed their dual outboard/3-bank cluster in the "new" boat. I was impress at how well everything was set up and how easy it was to install. My only complaint is the overwhelming number of screws it takes to mount the cluster ---- 2 screws each for the relays, 4 screws each for the switches. That's 20 friggin' screws! I sure hope I don't need to take it off anytime soon. I also put in one of BEP's Contour Gen 2, 6-switch panels on the dash. It looks to be good stuff, too.

Mr. Pat, thanks for the link. The new Airmar transducers sound pretty sweet. I called BOE Marine, and they're not released yet, but Jim did offer me some "ballpark" prices. Now the decision comes down to money. It'll be a FCV620 w/ a P66-style transducer ($840) or a FCV585 w/ a fancy transducer ($1910). I don't know that I've got the interest for a $2000 fish finder in this particular boat, so the smaller 620 will probably get the nod.

Thanks, North Coast. I should have given you guys some more info to work with. Sorry about that. We usually bottom fish in 100 - 400 feet of water, and we drop our shrimp pots in 400 - 500 feet of water. From what I understand, halibut are very difficult (if not impossible) to see on a fish finder, but knowing what kind of bottom you're dealing with (muddy, sandy, rocky, etc) can be extremely helpful. We typically troll for salmon, suspended in 30 - 80 feet of water, and rockfish schools are typically suspended in 80 - 200+ feet of water. Ling cod are usually associated with big rock piles and schools of rockfish. Sometimes they are right on the bottom, and sometimes they are suspended. I typically spend 50+ days on the water, each season, and last year I had just over 70 days on the water. My Garmin 160 Blue has been doing a decent job, but I'm curious to see what I can gain by upgrading to a higher-end fish finder.

Hey folks, I'm in the process of getting the new boat up and running for the season, and we've decided that we're going to upgrade the fish finder sooner than later. Initially, we were just thinking of going with an inexpensive unit (Garmin 400c), but now we're thinking of maybe getting something better (Furuno FCV620). Can someone give me few good reasons to spend twice the money on a fish finder? I've never used a high-end FF, so please help me see the light and clue me in on what I've been missing. Thanks.

We're going to do more of it next time. It was cheap, we caught a lot of fish, and we had a lot of fun. Good times, for sure!

Here's a video I put together of a summers worth of fishing (2007). There are some shots from Deep Creek, Seward, Prince William Sound, and Valdez. Good times!

My wife and another couple went to Cabo San Lucas over Thanksgiving, last year. We spent a couple of days fishing; one day was on a panga boat, and the second day was on a 33-footer with Minerva's. We hooked 16 tuna (boated 12) and a dorado from the panga, and we tied into 9 striped marlin from the big boat. All of the marlin were released, but we kept the dozen tuna we got all the way in the boat, and took home the filets. YUM! Here are some photos:

Nice wally-gators!

Here's a sunset from Puerto Vallarta, taken a couple of years ago: Another from PV: A sunset from the beach at Cabo San Lucas: Closer to home, here's a sunset looking over Cook Inlet at Mt. Redoubt. For those that haven't heard, Redoubt is an active volcano and has been erupting all week. And finally, here's a Denali sunrise:

No, but the ice lasts a lot longer than regular ice. You can get a couple three drinks off one glass of ice. Drinks on glacier ice is just one of the many charms of hanging out in Prince William Sound. Here are a few more........Spot Prawns!

Here's a photo of the dash. I still need to mount my old Garmin 238 on there, and we are planning to replace the switch panel. I can't like the twin 703 controls, but swapping them for a set of 704's probably won't happen. I'll just install more appropriate controls when we re-power. In a year or two. Here's a shot of the shop we're using. It's pretty sweet for working on boats in the cold!

A whiskey sour is the best I could do on short notice. Here's an ice collecting mission: The boat currently has a set of 2001 F115's on it. We'd like to throw a set of Suzuki 150's or 175's on her, but that will have to wait a while. Next year we plan to upgrade the chart plotter/fish finder and add cabin heat. Espar makes a pretty sweet diesel heater, and that's how we prefer to have our air conditioning.

A friend and I picked up a 2001 Hewescraft 26-foot Alaskan Sea Runner. The boat is set up pretty nice for fishing and hunting in Alaskan waters. It has room for 4 people to sleep, a 2-burner cook stove, icebox, and plenty of storage. We got a lucky break in the winter weather and picked it up couple weekends ago, and stuck in another friend's shop to thaw out. Photos are always nice, so I figured I hang a few with my first post on Wiley's new forum. We had to dig the boat out of the snow & ice. It took some salt, ice chippers, propane heaters and a full set of tires chains on the truck, but we eventually got her freed from her winter slumber: A rest stop on the way home. It's a good thing the scenery doesn't suck much. In the spirit of boat ownership, we've spent a fair amount of money in the last couple of weeks on upgrades. We've installed a new Standard Horizon VHF, Sony CD-player, Rule bilge pumps & float switches, BEP battery switches and charging relays, Racor fuel filters, a pair Lowrance LMF 200's with fuel flow sensors & a speed sensor, and lots of rod holders. Still in the works is a new fuse block under the dash, switch panel on the dash, new VHF antenna, an Endurance shrimp pot puller, the Garmin GPS-chartplotter from my current 22-foot boat, trailer brakes & bearings, re-wire/replace the trailer lights, and the usual basic outboard motor maintenance & fluid changes. It's hard to get too excited about boating with several feet of snow on the ground, but we manage. We're hoping to get her splashed in mid-April for the opening weekend of the shrimping season. I'll post more pictures, as we progress.