A Can of Worms...

Dick and Dan hard at work in the hangar...

Well, here we are!  Our crew of six BBL veterans is hard at work, braving the elements as I write this.  Rain-drops pounding the lodge windows, "pea-soup" fog, low ceilings and no visibility... sounds like every day last summer.  The 2010 season was the worst weather on record for this region of Alaska.  Looking out the office window, the view this morning looks about the same it did so often last season, but we've got our fingers crossed that we'll have some better weather this summer.  

Opening the can of worms...

We hit the ground running in Dillingham last Sunday and haven't quit since.  With just over two weeks until our guests arrive, we're working around the clock to open up the lodge.  Although this has been a typical, routine spring opening process... we've had some new beginnings and a few things out of the ordinary. 

We've got a new addition to the "first-crew-in" team this year.  "Duke" is Steve's  six month old yellow lab pup.  With so much to investigate, eat, chew, and roll in around the lodge, Duke is in puppy paradise. 

We've eaten better than we EVER have this spring with our caretaker, Bryant whipping up homemade pizza, southwest style burritos, homemade bread, soups, german chocolate cake...we're really roughing it out here!  There's certainly no food shortage, and we're feeling the pressure to walk the hill up to the lodge a few extra times to burn off all the extra calories!

A handsome lab...

Duke's first char derby...

A few miles up the lake is the mouth of the infamous Agulowak River and one of the world's highest concentration of Arctic Char.  Each spring, juvenile salmon enter the smolt phase of their lifecycle and swim down our river systems headed for the ocean.  The Wood-Tikchik system has the largest run of sockeye salmon in the world, and with that comes a lot of smolts... and A TON of char. 

We kicked our season off with a bang last night with our first big char derby!  Many fish were hooked and landed, and we brought a couple home for dinner as well.  All and all, we had a lot of laughs and it presented a great opportunity for some new photos for Fisheye.  We hope you enjoy!

Reflections...

Dan atop the ladder working on removing poles from the hangar...

Eric bombin' line...

Duke meeting Mr. Char for the first time...

Tyler hooked up fishing on the dark side...

Pumping the first load of over 8,000 gallons of fuel we'll haul this spring...

We're getting there!

Well here we are!  This is Fisheye's first post, and the first of many to come in the future.  I'm Nate McDonough and I work for Fisheye Design and Bristol Bay Lodge...two companies run by Fisheye's proprietor- Steve Laurent.

It seems the normal status-quo routine for this situation would be to rant and rave on and on with several informative paragraphs about Fisheye Design.  Truth is, I've been working around the clock for the past three weeks in a desperate attempt to get our website up before we go to Alaska and I'm sick of writing informative paragraphs.

Yeah I said it- Alaska.  Steve is the General Manager at Bristol Bay Lodge, where he's worked for 21 years, I'm our Head Guide at the lodge and my fiancee is our Hostess and Housestaff Manager.  Together and with the help of several key staff members, the three of us keep the train on its tracks for nearly four months of absurdity.  Absurdity?  Yes... absurdity.  I look forward to explaining the use of this term in future posts.

So here we are...Fisheye Design.  Our website will be up in the next day or two and you'll be able to check out our stuff.  This whole thing spun-off an idea to do something with Steve's photography and here's where we ended up.  Now we're creating contemporary photo-art in several "genres" and kicking out some pretty awesome black and white prints as well.  A couple months back we started dabbling in some t-shirt ideas and now we've got that almost ready to launch with stickers and other schwag as well.

We'll be posting on here each week with new photos from Steve and rambling from yours truly.  Check out our site and make sure you sign up for our newsletters as well!

Nate