Recommendations for a fly fishing day trip out of anchorage

[timberland]

My wife and I are going to spend the 12th and 13th of August in anchorage this summer. Can anyone recommend a guide service that can pick us up at the hotel and put us on some fish. Looking for a whole day, salmon or trout. Drift trip or walk in, doesn't matter, fly out if reasonably priced. If you have any other options or advise, I would be greatly appreciated. We haven't bought our plane tickets yet, so we are open to ideas. Budget limit is $1000.

 

[Bmcox86]

Somewhere on the kenai for sure. Troutfitters and chugach Backcountry are who I've heard good things about

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[Bughalli]

Lots of options. I did it DIY, so can't recommend guides. You will miss the king salmon, but mid August is great for silvers (Coho). All five salmon types will be in the rivers, but in various degrees of slow decay. Although hook a king, even if he's "spent" and he will be a freight train...spool you and break your rod. Each of us broke rods on that trip. Silvers should be prime time and fresh. Rainbows will be fat and sitting behind the salmon. Grayling are fun, but get to the point of being annoying if going for big fish. Drive South on the Kenai towards Homer. There's a number of rivers you can fish DIY. Tons of fish...almost to the point of getting boring because you walk by so many spent fish while trying to find fresh fish. I don't recall the names of the rivers (Anchor might be one of them). On the lower sections the salmon come in during high tide. So gotta time it.

You should be able to do a fly-in day trip for your budget, but you just don't know if the fish will be there. So I like having options to move.

But, I will say this, after 10 days of salmon fishing all over the place we decided to fill our coolers with halibut. So glad we did. We took a day trip out of Homer and each brought back 50lbs. It was flash frozen while we drank a few beers and it stayed solid until we got back to the lower 48 two days later.

 

[Ray]

I'm local, but don't know of any guides that would come into Anchorage and pick you up. I know they probably exist as I have ran into groups of sports in Mountain View Sports with a "wrangler" tooling up.

I recommend any of the Cooper Landing drifting companies on the upper Kenai. Dollies and 'bows with some salmon. The reds are coming in later and later so it is not hard to catch bright fish as late as mid August in the upper river. Silvers will be in the river that far as well.

You can rent a car for two days and enjoy the drive down around the arm and through the mountains.

One "near" town option might be the Talachulitna River. There are several lodges in the area that probably have a pickup and fly out service with a river guide/boat to take you up river. It will probably break your budget even for a day trip.

 

[kodiakfly]

Call this guy. He's a friend of mine and while I can't speak to him picking you up, he's just the kind of guy that if anyone would, he would. Awesome dude. Put it this way, this past summer, I was up in Anchorage and he and I were going fishing. But I had my Wife and (at the time) 6 month old daughter with me, whom I was going to leave at the hotel for a few hours. Wife likes to fish and he said bring her along! I reminded him of having our daughter with us and without skipping a beat, he said, "I've got kids...I know how to hold a baby. I'll hold your daughter while you guys fish." Well, we took our daughter fishing that day.

Alaska Fishing Guide

 

[Julius K]

I have fished with mystic waters (Fred Telleen and Stacy Corbin) out of Cooper Landing. I don't know about pick up, but they are top notch fisherman.