Fall Fishing & Foraging in Wrangell, Alaska
Know Your Food. Live the Experience.
Wrangell, Alaska, sits at the edge of the Tongass National Forest, one of the largest intact temperate rainforests on earth, laced with cold, clear streams and surrounded by waters that still produce wild salmon, halibut, spot prawns, and Dungeness crab in abundance. This is where the fall fishing and foraging program lives.
From late July through September, Chrome Chasers hosts small groups for a week, unlike anything a cruise ship or DIY trip can offer. Days are built around tides, weather, and what the group wants most — ocean fishing for halibut and king salmon, stream fishing for coho and Dolly Varden, mushroom and berry foraging in old-growth forest, crab and shrimp pot pulling, bear viewing at Anan Wildlife Observatory, glacier visits to LeConte, and evenings in the kitchen learning to prepare what the day produced.
No two weeks are the same. Fish runs shift, weather changes, and wildlife shows up unannounced. The schedule bends to fit the conditions and the group, not the other way around.
Small Groups. Personal Experience.
Four to six guests per week — intentionally small. Small enough to move quickly, split into smaller crews, and build a trip around what this particular group cares about most. Guests often describe the week as feeling more like a private expedition than a guided trip, because in most ways, it is.
With two experienced guides, groups can fish together or break into pairs — two or three anglers per guide, working separate water or separate activities on the same day. The setup works well for couples, close friends, families, or any small group looking to share something real in Southeast Alaska.
The Offshore Trip. The Pots.
The Daily Haul.
One day each week — picked for weather, usually Monday through Thursday — the Chromagnum heads offshore. Three hours out to open water, where halibut sit in 200 feet and lingcod, black rockfish, and yelloweye come up on the jig. It's a full day on the water, and it tends to produce the most fish of the week by weight.
The rest of the week keeps you closer to the islands. Crab and shrimp pots go in on Sunday and get pulled throughout the week — Dungeness crab and cold-water spot prawns straight from the bottom of Southeast Alaska's inside passage. Trolling for king salmon runs on days when the tide is right, and ocean jigging for rockfish fills in around everything else.
What comes out of the water each day goes directly into the evening meal — spot prawn crudo, crab pulled and cracked at the dock, halibut prepped in the kitchen by whoever wants to learn. What doesn't get eaten gets processed: vacuum sealed, smoked, or frozen, packed into wax fish boxes for guests to take home on Saturday.
Into the Creeks. Into the Forest.
The same terrain that holds fish holds food. Golden chanterelles push up through the moss in August. Black trumpets and yellowfoot chanterelles follow in September. Huckleberries and blueberries line the trails. Whatever comes out of the forest that day shows up on the dinner table that evening.
On days that call for something different, the Chromagnum runs to Anan Wildlife Observatory — a 45-minute ride from Wrangell, followed by a short walk to one of the best bear viewing platforms in Southeast Alaska — or southeast toward LeConte Glacier, the southernmost active tidewater glacier in North America, where blue ice calves into open water and harbor seals haul out on the floes.
The day is built around the desires of the group and the tides. An optimal incoming tide might mean jigging for halibut in the morning, then running the jet boat into a creek mouth in the afternoon when the water drops and the salmon stack up. Coho, Dolly Varden, cutthroat, pink and sockeye salmon — the target shifts by week and by water, and the schedule bends to fit both the conditions and what the group wants most.
Creek time is productive. Most guests catch far more fish than they expect, and it's not unusual for people to wear themselves out and want to climb back on the boat and switch to something easier. That's a perfectly reasonable call. Rick can get guests well into the creek system by jet boat, so the hiking is far more accessible than what the spring steelhead program demands — guests who aren't up for a long hike on uneven ground can still get on fish.
What's Included
The program is all-inclusive from the moment you land at Wrangell Airport. Transportation to and from the airport, six nights of lodging at the Chrome Chasers lodge, all meals from Sunday dinner through Saturday breakfast, two experienced guides, all fishing gear and tackle, vessel transport aboard the Chromagnum and jet boat, crab and shrimp pots, fish processing, vacuum sealing, and wax fish boxes to take your harvest home.
Not included: airfare to Wrangell, Alaska sport fishing license (~$45), king salmon stamp if applicable (~$45), alcohol, and gratuities.
Program Details
The fall program runs August through September in Wrangell, a small island community in Southeast Alaska and one of the least-pressured corners of the Tongass National Forest.
Limited weeks per season. Four to six guests per week, ideal for couples, close friends, and small families. $8,500 per guest.
Spots fill through word of mouth and returning guests. When a week opens, it tends to go quickly. If you have a group in mind and dates that work, reach out sooner rather than later.