OUR STORY

Soul Mates

Every summer, from June through mid-September, we each run our own salmon fishing set-net sites in Uganik Bay, located on the west side of Kodiak Island (famous for its brown bears) and surrounded by National Wildlife Refuge lands. We have no roads, no telephone service, and no stores. The nearest town is a 20 minute float plane ride or a six hour boat ride away. The waters and land are pristine, peaceful, and completely wild - perfect habitat for our salmon and for us!

After many years of fishing as friendly neighbors six miles across the bay from each other, we fell deeply in love. Our love of the beautiful salmon we catch and commitment to living the simple, physical commercial fishing life intimately connected with the winds, waves, tides, and seasons brought us together as true soul mates. Salmon is the centerpiece of our lives for which we gladly rearrange everything else.

At the close of salmon season, we used to go back to other jobs in "civilization", but now, since we have started Soul Mate Salmon, we don't have to leave Uganik Bay immediately. We pack up our fishing camps and move to our little house located on a sliver of private land deep inside the bay, protected from wild winter storms. Here, we continue to live remotely, and we live truly off the land - gardening, hunting, eating our wonderful salmon, and using wind and solar energy to power it all. From this home base, we organize and prepare to share our salmon during our excursions out of state. It is our dream come true to be able to live in "bush" Alaska, sustained by the salmon we catch and bring to you. Thank you for feeding our dream!

Alaskan Fishing Girls | Soul Mate Salmon

ADELIA'S STORY

I was born into a salmon fishing family. When my twin sister and I were three, my dad started set-net salmon fishing on Uganik Island as a way to fish and live together as a family, in contrast to leaving his family to work on big boats for months at a time. I loved every salmon season and couldn't wait for the summer to begin again, even during the early years when we lived in wall tents. Day to day life was primitive, filled with hard work, but deeply fulfilling. We fished as a family through my college years, and, in my 30's I began taking over management of our fishing site, called Trap-Six, from my father. It was a soft transition, built on his knowledge, mistakes, successes, and love for fishing accrued over the 40 years he fished out of Kodiak. Now I am the owner and caretaker of my family's fishing site and am so humbled and joyful to be able to pour myself into living this life which is fed, both physically and spiritually, by salmon.

Word on the street

TOLLEF'S STORY

It's funny, I never dreamed of being a commercial fisherman while growing up in south Minneapolis on a street where passing city buses rattled the dishes. How the vehicles of life take us to the places of our imaginations is amazing. Fishing started as a hobby in 2001 to fund the rest of the Alaskan year. It was a way to be bodily sore, constantly semi-damp or wet, and to test my ability to thrive on sleep deprivation, all for a small sum of pay! Now, I think of it as being a paid whale watching and marine life tour extravaganza and a chance to test one's fortitude and patience against Alaskan nautical conditions. After spending time on Kodiak boats, fishing different species and seasons of halibut, crab, pot cod and jig cod, my appreciation of how Adelia and I fish has grown. The tides change, the clouds swirl, and our dynamic scenery/home changes due to the fact that we have lots of two things, steep mountains and salty water. Being able to sleep in cabins perched 130 feet up the cliff, at Broken Point, my salmon set-net site, to have a garden, chickens, and a view(!!), is the finest thing on earth every summer.

UGANIK BAY, ALASKA

We both love the fact that people have been fishing Uganik Bay for thousands of years, living lives through community, gathering food, making shelter. How many times has love reached across the bay and brought couples together? We don't have the answers, but we do know there are powerful forces at work, fueled by love, connecting us to Alaska and each other. So, it's all about the love; we want to share it - through our salmon - with you!

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