Spring? or Winter?
This past week in Sitka has been absolutely beautiful. We had about 5 days in a row of clear blue sunny skies & no rain or snow. EVERYONE is usually outside when we have weather like this & there are tons of boats out on the water. We have a lot more boats here right now since herring season is about to start. Herring season is something that the Sitka community looks forward to every year & Kolt & I are VERY excited to experience it this year. Boats come in from all over Alaska & even from Washington since Sitka has some of the best herring seasons. Since game & fish announces the season opening only days or hours before it opens, fishermen come to Sitka in the beginning to mid March & wait until it's go time. The commercial herring season is also only open for a few days & there is a lot of money that can be made, sometimes an entire year of income can be earned from just a few days of good herring catches. From what we have heard & seen on tv, there will be A LOT of boats out on the water, some of which hire "spotters" who fly above in their planes to look for & guide the crews to the big schools of herring. All these boats in the water racing to catch all the herring & all the look out planes in the sky make for a very exciting scene for the community to watch.
Kolt has taken our boat out a few times this week & I went out one day for my 2nd time since we have been here. It was a quick trip to check a friends crab pots but Kolt has gone out several more times to actually do some fishing. Even though the weather has been beautiful it is still cold...... too cold for me on the boat. I had to do some serious shopping & invest in a good set of thermals & I have slowly started learning about the "layering" system & the different types of thermals & outerwear.
We now have quite a bit more daylight since we started gaining it back & with the daylight savings time change. The sun comes up around 6am & it is usually dark by 8pm. I have finally invested, ordered, & started hanging blackout curtains in the bedrooms. Our room was the most important, especially because Kolt is going to be working midnights starting April 1st. I have now moved on to the baby/guest room since we have company coming in May.
After a week of sunshine, we are expecting rain & snow in the next few days, according to the weather channel anyways. I'm not quite sure when exactly the weather makes up its mind here in Alaska, but hopefully spring is around the corner & we will have more days of sunshine & beautiful weather.
Kolt's Rock Fish
CRABS!!!!
