where's Waldo?

I mean where's Bruce??

Each day I get one or two Spot OK messages from him.  Here is this evening's email.

Alaska is great and we are having a good time. Everything is OK. 
ESN:0-7417967 
Latitude:55.7403 
Longitude:-132.2592 
Nearest Location:not known 
Distance:not known 
Time:06/23/2009 20:30:02 (US/Pacific) 
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=55.7403,-132.2592&ie=UTF8 

He is with friends on a nice boat fishing the waters of Alaska.  He's done this trip a few times and it does sound like a really great experience.  I'm sure he'll post a blog about it when he gets home in a week or so.

I've never been to Alaska but would like to go someday (during the summer of course).  One of my favorite books on the shelf, one I picked up at Books to be Red in Ocracoke years ago, is"Alaska Blues, A Season of Fishing the Inside Passage" by Joe Upton.  It is a great account of the author spending four months fishing along the coast of Alaska.  Interesting life style, interesting people.  I'll loan it to Bruce as I think he'll enjoy it, but not before I read it again.

There are a couple of other Alaska books I've enjoyed over the years.  "Passage to Juneau: A Sea and its Meanings" by Jonathan Raban is a favorite.   This is a nonfiction and very personal journey.  A little painful at times, but an interesting mix of personal and physical geography ( I've always enjoyed his travels by water books, everything from "Old Glory: An American Voyage", a fascinating trip down the Mississippi River, to "Coasting: A Private Voyage", a nonfictional trip about sailing around England and its fictional counterpart "Foreign Land: A Novel".  Those last two books make an interesting comparison of how a writer looks at a non-fiction journey and uses it in a fictional book. ) 

The other Alaska book is "Rowing to Latitude: Journeys Along the Arctic's Edge" by Jill Fredston.  That book is a great read, I could not put it down.  

But back to Bruce.  I'm sure they are catching a lot of fish, they always do.  He keeps telling me they catch enough to eat well on the boat, plus send lots of filets home for grilling out in the backyard.  It is interesting to me that Bruce figured out how to use dry ice to keep meat cold on our trips for days, yet he hasn't figured out how to use dry ice to ship a filet or two back to me on the east coast.  We'll have to discuss that on the next trip.

-Steve