Surrounded by majestic, awe inspiring volcanoes including the Chiginagak and the Aniakchak volcanoes out on the Alaskan peninsula, the Cinder River and Lava Creek provided the setting for my latest fishing trip.

The Chiginagak last erupted in May 2005 and severely impacted the fishing closing Painter Creek Lodge and killing many fish on the King Salmon river with its catastrophic release of acidic water and visibly shows daily apparently continuous fumarolic activity. Since then the area has recovered.

The Cinder River flows into the Bering Sea about � way out on the Alaskan peninsula in full view of those volcanoes and is home to an excellent silver salmon run as well as reportedly a few growing numbers of kings in the early season. Lava Creek is located in the same water shed and contains incredible numbers of hungry char, most of which have never seen an artificial fly.

This trip focused on the Cinder River with silver fishing five of the six days and one of the six days spent on Lava Creek.

The silvers were just beginning their annual run and were difficult to catch on the fly but readily took conventional big spinners. The char were crazy stupid and hit the flies with reckless abandon...catch as many as you want.

The silvers ran average of about 13 pounds with several 15 and 16 pounds. The char averaged 3 to 8 pounds which is large in my experience. Pictured are typical silver and char.





I used a 10 wt TFO TiCrx with sink tip on the silvers along with conventional gear and used a 7 wt floating line on the crazy char.

No place like Alaska.

Pair of great looking fish there ! That first you said was a silver , that the same as a Steelhead ? What reel you using ? Thanks for sharing the pictures !

Awesome trip and pictures

You are living the good life!!!

RonL,

The first picture is of a typical silver salmon....probably about 15 pounds. The steelhead is a rainbow trout that has adapted to spend most of its time in salt water and make spawning runs into freshwater.

For silvers I used 10 wt TFO TiCrx with the Allen Kraken reel spooled with Rio cold water line with a sink tip added.

For the Char, I used a 7 wt TFO TiCRx with Scientific Anglers reel spooled with Rio steelhead line....floating line. The Char is really a terrific fighting fish and under rated in my opinion.

Thanks for the comments all.

Ok , I see what your saying . Did you release or serve on a platter ?

Kept two or three males each day for camp food and released everything else. Fresh from the river salmon is absolutely to die for! We fixed it fried, poached, grilled, and as sashimi....unbelievably delicious.

Solid post with some solid fish. Thanks for sharing.

Bucket list trip....

I can believe that !! Love Salmon . I been buying Fresh Atlantic Salmon from local H.E.B. . Love it ! Got hold of some fresh Steelhead one day and it just melted in my mouth . I cook myself in oven 425 degs for about 16 minutes . Salt&Pepper and lemon slices . Man I'm hungry now !