As the owner of an online Fishing Guide directory, I tend to make a lot of friends in the industry.
One of those friends is George Stek who owns Funny Moose Lodge near Soldotna Alaska on the Kenai River.
George has what is probably the lowest most affordable fishing trips to Alaska around so when I was
invited up to work on some video and an article I decided it was time to get my 50th State under my
collar. (I had been to 49 states including Hawaii, but never to Alaska)

I managed to get tickets to Alaska Round Trip for around $650.00 and George made me feel right at home.
Normal fees for a trip of this nature are $795.00 for 7 days at the lodge AND 3 guided fishing trips.
2 trips are for Salmon, and one is for Halibut. You can take 5 trips for $995 with the same 7 day package.
You can fish right at the camp on your off days or visit local or nearby lakes and rivers to fish for
Rainbow Trout, Lake Trout, Dolly Varden, Grayling and landlocked salmon that are found in some of the lakes.
You can fly in your tackle or on the guided trips use the tackle provided by the guides.
I tend to trust the guys who do the fishing for the most part, though they tend to buy tackle and gear that
is meant to make sure that no fish are lost by anglers with less than great abilities.
Still it is almost always good gear and in the case of the guides I fished with excellent.
My first trip out was with George. We did a little drifting and anchoring near slack water. I managed to hook
and land one Silver Salmon and a smallish Dolly Varden, that I now regret not taking a picture of.
Both were caught on Vibrax Spinner baits in a blue color.

The next day I went on a commercial trip with several gentlemen from South Dakota. They were excellent anglers and we managed to hook and land a full limit of 8 salmon, including 2 over 12 pounds and the guides personal best of 15 pounds. (Personal best this season) You can find video of our trip here: http://one.revver.com/watch/380944/flv/affiliate/98446

The guides make quick work of the Salmon at the dock and you go home with some great Salmon Filets. I can not imagine what a 40 pound King Salmon produces in the way of meat, but the 12 pounder I caught fed 3 people for 2 nights with a salad. I used filets that were a bit over a pound each.

I spent much of the next few days checking out the local area. There is a park down the road at the Funny River where it runs into the Kenai. The water in the Funny River is clear and holds trout, and Dolly Varden and also has a run of Silver Salmon that run up it to spawn. I managed to hook several fish right at the mouth of the river though I did not hook them well and they got off.

The Russian River, famous for its falls where bears feed on jumping salmon are close enough and the river
is full of Rainbow Trout, and Dolly Varden. Chris one of the guys that went on the trip with me, hiked in to the
falls and did some fishing, though he saw no bears at the falls. ON the way  back to the car, he did a little jogging, and looked up to see a black bear running away from him looking over his shoulders as if being chased by the devil. My guess is that he sounded like a brown bear or grizzly coming down the path and the black bear was not in the mood to be dinner. Bank fishing from the bank at the Lodge can be productive, but if you want to catch some of the more exotic fish like Greyling, or land locked salmon, you will need to hit the local lakes.

Skilak Lake, and several others hold a variety of fish and can produce some nice catches. If you are NOT in a fishing mood after catching a limit of Silver Salmon or Kings, then you can play golf at the
Bird Homestead Golf Course. It is just down the road from Soldotna on Funny River Road and between town and the lodge.

Several times we looked over the side of the boat to find Silver Salmon swimming under the boat. While they would go after our jigs they would not hit them. I am guessing because of the 300 pound test line we were using that looked a lot like rope. IN all we caught 26 Halibut and 4 nice Ling Cod. Normally the Ling Cod are cut up for bait, but when I heard they were  better tasting than the Cod we get in the store here, I had to have some to take home. YEP, when you are in Alaska you can ship your entire catch home.

    
Some pictures from the Halibut Fishing Trip.. and there is a video of my catch in the column to the Left.

Captain Lou who is a friend of George's the owner of Funny Moose Lodge owns Ptarmigan lodge right next door and has his own Vacuum Packing operation. He charges .75 cents per pound of meat to vacuum pack the salmon, halibut and any other fish. Then you freeze the fish in a freezer provided by the lodge and buy a box and send the fish home Overnighted by Fed Ex. IN the end you can go home with over a hundred pounds of fish if the Halibut fishing is really good, or if you get your limits each day of Silver Salmon. Next year the Pink Salmon will be running in  with the Silver Salmon and the limit is 6 fish per day. That is about 40 pounds of salmon a day you can send home. George also offers a fly out trip, across the Cook Inlet. That trip allows you to keep more salmon during certain times of the year. You will need to check with the guide, as I have TRIED to understand the Alaska Fishing Regulations, but they include very specific location and size limits that are hard to understand if you are not familiar with the area. On the Fly out trips you will go to secluded rivers on the Aleutian Peninsula. You will see volcanoes, bears, goats, sheep, wolves, whales and more.
A trip well worth the extra $325.00 Be sure to take a camera, and take plenty of pictures. This is wild country, and you may well see something that is unique and wonderful.

Funny Moose Lodge is just basic lodging. No TV's, no phones in the cabins, no laundry. Just a comfortable bed, refrigerator stove, indoor bathroom. All any real fisherman needs. This keeps your cost down and lets you spend more time fishing this fantastic fishery. The Kenai River itself is a bit settled. In other words it is heavily fished. After all it is the river with the largest run of King Salmon in the world. Here the Kings stay out in the Ocean for 6 years instead of 4 years. This means almost double the size of the fish from other runs around the world. The King Run starts in early May at Ice Out and continues through August. The season though ends on July 31. The state protects all of the late run Kings. The world record comes from these waters. The nearby Kasilof also produces fish that will break the World Record.

IN between the Kings and Silver Salmon are the Red Salmon and every 2 years the Pink Salmon. The Kenai is a Trophy Rainbow trout river. It is catch and release only on the lower sections except for on 18 inch Rainbow Trout that can be kept. The Trout and Dolly Varden grow large in this river. That is because they feed heavily on the Salmon Eggs and during the Salmon runs catching them on anything but a Salmon Egg Pattern or a Smolt Pattern (smolts are the fry of salmon) is next to impossible. They will feed exclusively on Salmon Eggs or the Smolts for almost 4 months. 

The one thing to keep in mind about Salmon is this... The salmon is the basic link to almost the entire eco system in Alaska Waters. Salmon run up the river and die. They die because the Glacial Water is basically sterile. No phytoplankton are produced to feed the smolts so the smolts literally feed on the flesh of the parents. They will even feed on the eggs of salmon spawning after they hatch. The Salmon also feed the bears, the eagles, wolves, birds and the entire ecosystem including the trees. Without the Salmon the Alaskan Fishery would not exist and most of the Animals would die without the fat that the Salmon allows them to put on before Winter comes. Land owners are given serious tax deductions if they live on the river and tie down trees and brush to provide places for the smolts to hide while growing to a size that allows them
to move out into saltwater for the remainder of their adult growth.

Now that I have the science out of the way..
Alaska is affordable, and you can do it. The cost can be kept to less than $2000 per person, and YOU TOO can go to Alaska.
Jim Dicken