Dutch Harbor lands more seafood by weight than just about any port in the country, nearly all of it on boats the size of apartment buildings. Nobody flies eight hundred miles out the Aleutian chain to fish with a rod. We did, because my friend Marcy had a cousin working at a processing plant there who said the cod fishing from a skiff was so easy it was embarrassing, and Marcy has never in her life turned down a chance to be embarrassed.
The cousin, a quiet man named Pete, borrowed an eighteen foot aluminum skiff and took us out on his day off. Unalaska has almost no trees, only steep green hills that go straight up into the cloud, and the weather changes its mind about every twenty minutes. Pete watched the sky the way other people watch a toddler near a staircase. We ran ten minutes to a rocky point, he cut the motor in ninety feet of water, and he handed each of us a rod with a chrome jig the size of a butter knife.
Pacific cod are not a glamorous fish. They are brown and blotchy, with a little chin whisker and the expression of someone waiting at the DMV. They are also always hungry. My jig hit bottom, I lifted it twice, and something heavy simply stopped it. There is no run with a cod, only weight and a steady head shake, like reeling up a wet sleeping bag that disagrees with you. It came over the rail at about twelve pounds. Marcy already had one on. Pete had not yet picked up a rod and was eating a sandwich.
It went like that for two hours. A bald eagle sat on the rocks watching us the way a regular watches the kitchen door, and a sea otter floated by on its back, cracking something on its chest. We kept enough for a fish fry at the bunkhouse and let the rest go back down. Then the wind swung around, the hills disappeared, and Pete said we were done in a voice that did not invite discussion.
That night half the plant crew showed up for beer battered cod, including people who handle forty tons of it a shift and still went back for thirds. Marcy asked Pete why he did not fish out there more often. He said he works with fish all week. Then he asked if we wanted to go again in the morning.
Cold water days are hoodie days. See our custom boat hoodies and sweatshirts, drawn from a photo of your own boat.