CHEVIE: The seasons could change fairly fast here.
You can miss the season really quick if you're not out
and in it and doing it.
And the time to move is now.
It's the end of the season.
I'm getting low on bait.
I've already caught one wolverine this season,
I'd like to catch a, another one or two.
Got a lot going on.
It's all about timing right now you just want to be efficient
while I'm out there.
It's the last couple weeks to trapping season.
I have to have these traps out and set to produce some fur.
I have limited time to get these traps set,
that allows me to sell some wolverine to be able to
cover the fuel.
You can do a lot with the fur.
To stay warm, to stay clothed, to be able to survive and thrive
in an arctic environment.
(theme music playing).
CHEVIE: I'll just get this set already.
Put some bait in the hole.
Put this bait in there.
All right, I got my fish stuck down in there.
It's a 220 conibear.
I changed my trigger so Imma put it wide like this.
So, a marten could go between the middle of there and
not set that trap off.
But a wolverine, it's gonna hit it on both of its ears
right there that's how wide its head is.
Bang!
Gets it right behind the neck.
Okay, now you always hold it on the side like this,
you don't want to be screwing around up here anywhere.
This trap when it goes off it reaches out this far,
eight inches this thing collapses, boom!
So, you don't want to be, uh, having your hand around here.
Always on the springs.
There's no reason to, uh, come back into Shageluk with
a trap on your hand.
(bleep), you'll never live it down.
Okay, that trap's looking good.
I'm ready to keep on going.
Set some more.
Hopefully, we'll come back and have wolverine in there,
one of these days.
JOHNNY: Nothing comes easy out here.
Everything's a struggle, everything takes time.
Everything takes a lot of effort.
And in those moments, I gotta stop down.
I gotta rethink and find different ways to do things or
I'm just not going to make it out here.
JOHNNY: Come on!
So, what I do with my firewood is I bring it up here
and I load up the wood, I take it up the hill to the cabin.
Oftentimes it could be a couple 100 pounds.
And taking the snow machine up the hill is
just not really an option for me.
It's noisy, it's smelly and, um,
it scares the game away from my cabin.
Cool.
No matter how I do it, it involves putting it on the sled,
and dragging it up the hill.
I decided I'm not going to do it this time,
I'm going to come up with a method to get this
load of wood up the hill.
You know, when you don't have help out here,
you have nobody else but yourself to rely on,
you gotta create something to help you.
So, I got my path all stomped out here.
It'd be nice to have a pulley system that's some,
something I've always considered, is just having a pulley that
I could pull the sled up the hill.
And I got these three clips here,
putting one here this is gonna be
the first anchor and I'm gonna go down there to
the blue sled and attach one to the blue sled.
Run the line through and then make a third pass down
at the blue sled, into the third clip.
This lake is frozen for about nine months of the year so this
is a system that I can use for nine months.
All right, so here we go, see if we get this firewood up here.
All right, so it's starting to come up the hill there,
that first little initial hill.
(grunts)
And I feel like I already need like a different system of...
Every time I pull, I gotta choke back down it while holding the weight of it.
And it's, it's kind of working,
I feel like I just need to take it and walk.
(grunting)
(pops)
Oh, I just heard a pop.
Damn.
(bleep) I guess I just gotta figure out how to do this.
KALEB: Here in Alaska, weather is crazy.
It's snowing one minute, it's sunny the next.
And it's just impossible to predict what the weather's
gonna do but you just deal with it.
(Brittany barking)
BRITTANY: Got a nice little hole here.
KALEB: Yeah, well when generator's run nonstop,
they kind of melt out all the snow.
BRITTANY: Yup.
KALEB: All the snow that's melting here,
comes into the generator shed, pools up, and then it freezes,
and the generators are frozen in the ground.
And then I can't do what I'm trying to do right now
which is an oil change.
I'm kind of thinking it's about time we, uh, uh,
upgrade this shed.
I don't have a power line running to my house.
I don't have that here.
I have two generators that power my entire house,
and if I don't take care of those generators,
they will not take care of me.
Let's, uh, let's get out and get,
start getting some work done.
BRITTANY: Yeah, it's going to be a fun little project.
KALEB: For me this is a time sensitive project.
I need to get it done as quickly as possible because
I'm gonna have to take my generators out of the shed,
where they're out in the weather.
This can lead to all sorts of issues that I don't like to deal with,
so I wanna get the project done as quickly as possible
before I start having problems.
This figures.
(sighs)
Hate it when stuff goes wrong.
For some reason my chain is cutting wrong and
what it's doing is, it's diving down as it's going.
I start at 3/4 of an inch or so here and by the time
I get only a couple feet I'm down like an inch and a half,
so I need to get it to where it cuts straight.
So, I'm gonna take the old worn-out chain off and
put a new one on, see if that fixes my problems.
Just to build this little eight by ten generator shed,
if I was to buy the material for it,
it's over 5,000 bucks.
Another reason I don't wanna get stuff from the hardware store is,
it's 350 miles away.
I might get stuck, which I did earlier this year.
I got stuck four or five times on one trip going out.
Okay, now I'm in business.
RJ: Even today if all of a sudden everything were to be cut off,
I think it's important to be able to gather what you can and
harvest what you can in order to survive.
It's a important skill set to have.
ROBERT: What you thinking, RJ?
RJ: I like the idea of running two rods on the shallower set.
ROBERT: And then do a deep one on the other side?
RJ: Yeah. ROBERT: Cool.
RJ: Let's get on it. ASHLYNE: Let's do it.
ROBERT: All right, I wanna drive, Ash, you can help him get set up and
we'll get this show on the road.
ASHLYNE: Cool beans.
ROBERT: My daughter came to visit me from Phoenix.
It's been a while since I've seen her,
anytime she comes here it's a special moment in my life.
Today we're going to head out look and look for a winter king salmon.
I only get to see my daughter maybe twice a year.
And if 20 years go by, that's only 40 times for me
at this point in my life is, uh, special, you know.
So, I'm going to take every moment I got with her and
treat it like it's my last.
RJ: What's up? ASHLYNE: It went flat.
ROBERT: Winter king fishing can be tough;
it was pretty good earlier this fall and earlier this winter but
in the last three or four weeks it's been really tough out here.
All we can do is go out, put the hours in,
keep the lines wet, give it our best shot.
You remember going fishing the first time with me?
(laughs)
ASHLYNE: No, but it was probably in your little skiff...
ROBERT: Yeah. ASHLYNE: Freezing cold.
(laughs)
ROBERT: Yeah, when you were growing up,
you and RJ you guys were in the little skiff
with me all the time.
You didn't use to get this cold all the time.
ASHLYNE: No, I was always cold.
I was always the person to be like,
"Okay, we can go home now."
(laughs)
(sighs)
ROBERT: Hey, hey, hey.
Reel, reel, reel, reel, reel!
RJ: Reel, reel, reel, reel!
Oh, here we go.
ROBERT: Oh, another fish, get it.
We got a double header dudes.
RJ: Yeah, go ahead and put her in neutral.
ROBERT: Okay. This is what I'm talking about.
I was watching that when you were watching it.
Something was wiggling it.
RJ: Oh, nope, under size.
Baby king?
ROBERT: Baby king. Oh, halibut.
RJ: Little, but...
ROBERT: Got a halibut and a baby king.
Baby halibut, baby king.
Let me get that sucker off of there, Ash.
Got the blood flowing, that's for sure.
Getting a hit, getting a hit, Ash.
ASHLYNE: Oh, my God.
ROBERT: I think, yeah, set the hook and reel.
Eh, rockfish.
Greenling, kelp greenling, yup.
RJ: Catching a lot of undesirables.
ROBERT: We'll let him go.
Yeah, let's bring them up, try another spot.
RJ: All right.
ROBERT: That was fun though, exciting way to close out this little spot.
JOHNNY: We're human beings and
we're not meant to be alone,
so any excuse I have to make something,
use my hands, open up my brain a little bit,
it helps me stay sane.
JOHNNY: There was a bit of a pop, you could hear,
I don't know if it was, like,
one of these branches.
I should probably check on it real quick honestly before
making more of a mess.
Tie it off on this tree.
Look at this here, this cheap clip is already bent and
that's from the weight of the wood on the sled.
So, every time I'm pulling on this,
the whole weight of this is on this chintzy little clip.
It's a sloppy setup.
Back to the drawing board.
I was about to be on a roll, no pun intended.
I put a lot of time and effort into my first go and
it didn't work, but I'm gonna have to switch gears and flip my plans.
You can never get frustrated trying to
figure these things out.
It's, that's where you kind of learn your limits of like
patience and just perseverance,
always pushing through.
If you get frustrated with this kind of stuff,
then don't live this lifestyle.
The plan is to make a block and tackle,
and with a block and tackle I need wheels.
I've never made a block and tackle before and
having an excuse to make anything new that I've never done before,
they just keep my mind busy, they keep my mind right.
So, while she's entertained with that,
I'm gonna go ahead and start drilling this.
This bit has to line up through all perfectly.
So, these can kind of just like float right in the middle.
Okay.
What do you want?
Hey, get, get outta here.
(laughs)
All right.
So, I got the hole all the way through.
Cool, it can actually move freely.
There it is.
That's the first block and tackle.
I just gotta make a second one and hopefully we'll be able to
pull that sled up no problem.
CHEVIE: Our lifestyle is based around subsistence activities.
We follow the seasons.
Which sometimes can be harsh,
and nature doesn't care, you know.
We just gotta be a few steps in front of nature.
CHEVIE: All right. Mouth of another creek here.
I see a lot of leaning trees here, um,
sometimes those wolverines they like, they, their,
they can climb trees really well and
so they feel like they have the advantage,
if there's something out hanging off a tree.
I'll hang a whole fish off of that tree.
And visually an animal will be able to see that fish swinging
in the, in the, in the tree.
And sometimes it's the visual thing that gets them
before they could smell it.
I've never caught one like that but, uh,
some friends over in another village were telling me
about it, and, uh, I want to try it out.
So, I'm going to hang this fish,
so he has a hard time reaching it.
Up on the log, he thinks he can reach it,
he's close enough to where he doesn't wanna give up,
but he can't reach it from down here, jumping,
and jumping, and jumping.
He probably get damn close to that,
but like I said they win sometimes too.
They're learning my tricks, I'm learning theirs and, uh,
it's part of the game.
So, there it is.
All right, that looks good for now.
I'm gonna see if that produces.
I've never caught a wolverine like that.
Could be good, could be bad.
You just never know till you try.
I'm just going to keep on heading upriver.
BRITTANY: I think anyone who's in a relationship knows that it
is a big deal when you can work together.
You both have the things that you need to get done,
if you're taking care of each other,
then your needs are met.
Relationship advice from Brittany.
BRITTANY: Why don't we do projects like this in the summer?
KALEB: Um, because I'm too busy in the summer.
BRITTANY: Oh, right.
KALEB: Now it's time to go start getting the generator shed ready
to yank out of the hole with two snow machines.
I have a, a leftover sheet of UHMW from a previous project
and I think if I rip a couple runners off of it,
I can shove those under the building,
and it should slide easy.
If anything, it might be difficult to get it to stop moving.
BRITTANY: This is very precise, right?
KALEB: Very. I'm measuring and everything.
BRITTANY: Yeah, you know measure once cut five times.
KALEB: These runners are 12 inches wide which
should give us adequate flotation.
Cool. Center runner's done.
Now we can go lift the building up.
Handyman Jack to the rescue as always.
We just have to be really careful when we're feeding these
runners under, that we don't get anywhere we could get hurt.
BRITTANY: Yeah.
KALEB: Okay, nobody touch this jack, it's sketchy.
(laughs)
KALEB: Now we gotta get these runners underneath there.
All right, let's do this one.
Now we have runners on our generator shed, tool shed.
We've got the snow all packed down,
we've got a good ramp, all we gotta do is hook it up to
this building and yank it out of the hole.
Worst case scenario is, I yank on this building,
and it completely gets torn apart.
(engine turns on)
All right, you ready?
BRITTANY: Okay. KALEB: All right, let’s go.
Oh, careful. Slow, slow.
BRITTANY: What? Do what?
KALEB: Slow, slow. Stop! Stop!
KALEB: You’re going too fast.
Maybe we should try and just put one machine on it,
now that it’s out.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: 'Cause we’re not doing a very good job at staying tandem.
BRITTANY: Sorry.
(beeping)
KALEB: All right, you keep an eye on it.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: This went very, very well.
I had to pull my two-house generators out of the shed
so they're out in the elements now,
so the clock is ticking.
It's time to get this other building built as quick as
possible before my generators start having issues.
Gotta get my skid set and then start stacking logs.
Out with the old, in with the new.
CHEVIE: The cold weather,
blowing snow, there's gonna be opportunity but
there's gonna be a lot of missed opportunity.
Takes a lot of work being able to capitalize on
something in the wintertime.
CHEVIE: The wind’s blowing like a son of a bitch today
out of the north, I’m getting hammered on the river.
I was looking for a beaver house to get some fur
and also some good wolverine bait.
Usually there's a hole, but it's so damn windy and
blowing so much it's just covered.
I’m going to start checking this ice now,
gotta be real careful.
It’s why you always have a big stick.
It's so deceiving 'cause it just looks like perfectly hard ice
with snow over the top of it.
That snow could be an insulator, we just get cocky and the ice is
only half an inch or an inch thick and you, you go down, you get wet and
you're 20 miles an hour away from home.
It can turn into a (bleep) situation.
You don't want to go out and not come in.
(thudding)
(thuds)
I'm wondering if this water dropped too much.
There might not be any beaver in this house.
They might have froze in there or had to move
'cause the water dropped.
This isn’t worth putting in the effort,
right here at this place.
I can have a day and a half wrapped up in trapping a dead beaver house,
so I didn't know what the hell I was doing.
There’s no beaver in here.
All right, I know this beaver house is dead dry.
No good, so I'm gonna move on.
I'll just keep on setting wolverine sets.
To see what else the river has to offer though.
I just don't know until I get on it,
gonna keep on heading upriver and try to catch a wolverine.
ROBERT: Alaska's tough.
I've raised my children to love the outdoors and be passionate
about the outdoors and respect the outdoors,
all at the same time.
But spending that time with my family,
that's all where it's at right there.
ROBERT: Kinda foggy.
ASHLYNE: With all the trees and the fog.
It just gives me scary movie vibes.
ROBERT: Let's turn this scary movie into a great day.
A couple king salmon.
We’ll make your own ending.
RJ: All right.
I think I'm, uh, we're gonna do shallow for this first one, right?
ROBERT: I think so. RJ: Do like 30 feet and up?
ROBERT: Well, I don't know about...
RJ: Just trail real close to the rocks?
Or what are you thinking?
ROBERT: We’ll put a hoochie on this side and
a light herring on this side for a while.
And I'll, I’ll have Ash drive for a bit,
I’ll get this ticker started for you.
ASHLYNE: Beautiful.
ROBERT: You can do that.
Try following the inside contour line, inside the blue, Ash.
ASHLYNE: I'm, I’m getting there. ROBERT: (inaudible) there.
ASHLYNE: Driving the boat’s definitely my favorite.
Nice and warm in here.
It can be very frustrating not catching fish.
I am definitely willing to take whatever I get,
but hopefully one will bite.
And it'll be a good bite.
RJ: Come on, come on, fish.
(beeping)
Yeah, that one looked like a salmon or...
ROBERT: It did. It was a...
RJ: Fish on, fish on. ASHLYNE: Fish.
RJ: Oh. ROBERT: Something was on there.
RJ: Oh, yeah. ROBERT: Still on?
RJ: Yeah, it's on.
ROBERT: Was it a salmon? RJ: It was taking line.
ROBERT: It's taking line? RJ: It was.
In the rod holder.
ROBERT: Let's see what you got.
RJ: It's swimming out the side.
It's a freaking salmon.
ASHLYNE: Ay!
(laughs)
ROBERT: And it's about 12 inches long,
but it's a salmon.
Got one.
RJ: Oh, yeah, baby king. ROBERT: Baby king, yeah.
RJ: There he goes.
ROBERT: That was a king.
RJ: That was a baby king salmon.
(laughs)
RJ: It was too small.
ASHLYNE: You know , we may not get anything out of this hole,
but at least the scenery's been beautiful.
ROBERT: What about the whales, and the birds,
and the sea lions and the seagulls?
ASHLYNE: It's the sun too. ROBERT: The sun felt good.
ASHLYNE: Nice little break from the cold.
ROBERT: Fishing and subsistence living.
That's what she grew up doing.
If I can just give her that opportunity,
to do that a few times a year when she comes and visits that,
I know that makes her happy.
ASHLYNE: There she goes.
ROBERT: If she's happy, I'm happy.
But the pressure's on.
We gotta get out there and find what we can.
What do you miss the most up here, Ash?
ASHLYNE: I really just miss family and the views and...
ROBERT: Do you miss your brother?
ASHLYNE: I do miss my brother.
RJ: Sometimes.
ROBERT: All right, guys, we'll hit the next spot.
I got one more honey hole, I wanna try.
I think it's gonna be the ticket.
But, we gotta get going if we're gonna be able to fish it in time.
BRITTANY: Kaleb is an amazing builder.
He's been doing construction and logging since he was a kid.
The sky is the limit when it comes to Kaleb.
KALEB: Now that I've got my floor down,
the logs have to be cut to length.
And then screw it down.
Do it over and over again.
And before long I'll have a completed building.
My generators are the key to life on this property.
They keep the freezers cold,
which keeps the moose meat frozen,
and preserved for the entire winter.
I can't afford to have generators breaking down
on me all the time.
The way I am solving the problem with generators breaking down
is by giving them a heated building.
They deserve it. They work hard.
24 hours a day, seven days a week,
365 days a year, they run.
Working by myself on projects like this takes a certain skill set.
You have to learn how to get around problems that
a second set of hands would make really easy to solve.
(grunting)
I've gotten past the point of this project where
I can really use help.
Everything's heavy now, and it's all too heavy for
my wife and my kids to handle.
So, at this point it's just, I gotta put my head down.
I gotta get the work done.
This is my last log for the side walls,
and I'll be able to frame my roof.
I am a magician. I make piles disappear.
JOHNNY: When you live in the natural world,
you gotta go with your feelings and instincts.
Whenever you're messing with animals,
you're a threat to them,
and they're not scared of you for (bleep).
This is me against nature.
ROBERT: Maybe that'll catch one.
JOHNNY: There's no one out here gonna help you.
KALEB: Mm. Okay, back over and I think we have it.
JOHNNY: The only way to keep my mind in line without going off
the rails is to always be challenging myself.
Idle hands are the devil's hands.
JOHNNY: So, got the old
block and tackle.
And I'm gonna mount it to this string on the tree here.
All right, it's rigged up.
So that one's in place, so all I gotta do is take this down to
the blue sled, rig it up.
Start running the line back and forth.
Okay, so it's hooked up to the sled,
and I gotta start running line through it.
So, I'll go through the first wheel,
and I'll walk up the hill,
stretch it through the wheel on the block up there.
One thing that all Alaskans have in common is the ability to act quick,
to think on their feet, no matter how stressful
the situation is.
You know, it's just trying to save my back.
It's trying to work a little bit smarter.
So, this one's gonna go right through that first wheel.
And save my energy for other tasks.
Okay, I got it through one wheel up there,
two wheels here.
All I have to do is take it up there, hop through that second wheel,
and bring it down here.
Cool. All right.
So I got it through both wheels in this block,
both wheels down there.
I just gotta finish stretching it down to the lake and start pulling.
See if these block and tackles work.
(laughs)
Cool, man, it's already working.
I definitely feel the ratio working and it's very easy,
but this line is like, it's kinda stretchy.
Maybe if I just like walk with it.
Man, this thing's caught on something, man.
Look at that, I'm pulling hard.
It feels like I'm just break something
so I'm gonna abandon ship
and just go check it out before I do break something.
I put a lot of time into this,
and I don't wanna bust something up if I don't have to.
Look at this, (bleep).
JOHNNY: Check this out right here.
The first thing I'm noticing is this wheel right here
all along the edge of it.
It just burned a hole in it.
That line was just rubbing inside there,
incessantly and it just created that little burn which broke it,
so that's not gonna work.
All right, onto the next thing,
making this thing a little bit more efficient.
BRITTANY: Living out here, the only option to have power is to
have a generator, and the best way to have a generator is
making sure that it has shelter.
KALEB: The point of this whole generator shed is to get
the generators out of the weather and now here
they are sitting in not ideal weather.
Getting snowed on.
One generator's running like crap.
I already have to work on it.
I need to get this done so I can get them back
in the building where they're happy.
Working in the snow on a project like this kinda makes
everything just take more time.
It builds up on the work surface.
It gets in the way.
Has to be swept out. It has to be shoveled.
All you can do is work around it.
Every single piece of log that needs to go onto this building
has screwed down, leveled, shimmed,
and correctly fastened to this building.
So now I need to make my roof,
which I'm just gonna do conventional rafter framing.
Four rafters, one cut.
I'm very happy with how this generator shed is turning out.
This building for me is a permanent structure.
So, I build it strong, and I build it to last for years.
Well, there I go.
Rafters are in, and for the first time I can see
the shape of my building and I'm pleased.
But I can't sheet this roof with the snow falling.
It makes it slippery and unsafe.
And hopefully, this snow stops.
And get those generators out of the elements.
CHEVIE: There's no guarantee but it's part of the journey
and the fun of just getting out.
We are opportunists, but you just never know
what nature's gonna throw your way.
CHEVIE: This is my first trap on my line.
Last check of the year here.
All right, looks like my traps here just blew in with a big drift.
Part of all these winter storms
so I'm gonna have to shovel it out.
We could get lucky.
Maybe something got in there before.
Nothing here.
This is my first of many sets I have out,
but I'm just gonna keep on heading up the line and
hope that I, uh, pick something up.
Nothing here, um, my trap's still active though,
so I'm just gonna start snapping traps, and, uh,
picking up.
Sometimes you push hard, and you don't catch anything
but it's just part of it.
So, I'm just gonna keep on running my line,
hopefully get lucky and pick up something.
For me, I do this with marten a lot but with wolverine
I've always caught 'em on the ground in boxes and
natural cubbies and all that.
But you've always gotta be learning.
I can't see any tracks here, but what I see here is some hair.
That's gotta be a wolverine.
You can just tell how coarse it is.
It's just marten hair is way softer than that.
Anytime you don't catch 'em like this,
you're educating 'em.
And I'm learning different ways to catch 'em,
and they're learning how not to get caught.
And right now, that wolverine's a step ahead of me.
If you can't catch 'em, you might as well let 'em eat.
A lot of empty traps.
But there's always that next one.
There's always that next trap until there isn't.
Okay, nothing in that one either.
I had high hopes for a set like this.
It looks good.
Uh, I got one more trap.
Not looking good though.
It's all right.
It's always onto the next thing.
Can't win 'em all.
It's kind of a bittersweet moment.
You know, you're, you've been trapping hard all year.
You're checking your line for the last time,
and trapping season is coming to a close.
Onto my last trap.
What the hell do we got going on here?
Holy smokes.
CHEVIE: Oh, (bleep).
Dang picked up a little fox.
Happy to see some fur hanging.
It's been a pretty dry spell of, uh,
trapping but it's, fox fur is better than no fur.
No wolverine this year, but it's, uh,
nice to finish the trapping season.
It's the last trap produced, uh,
nice little fox here.
I'll tan it and, uh, Sonta will use it sewing.
It's a nice little fox, so it's a win.
(hammering)
JOHNNY: Here we go.
That's basically it, and that'll be the reel system to
reel line in as that sled goes up.
All that's left to do is to string up the cordage.
I got a couple strands of cord and I'm gonna replace
that other cordage I was using
because that stuff is just too stretchy.
It wasn't working well.
Start up at the top,
start putting it through the block and tackle.
KALEB: I think we're gonna get it done.
I had my doubts this morning but not so much anymore.
BRITTANY: Oh, yoo-hoo. KALEB: Hey.
BRITTANY: Hi. KALEB: Yup.
ELOVIE: Daddy, this is so lovely.
BRITTANY: It is so lovely.
KALEB: Good night.
BRITTANY: Wow, hun, you've been working hard.
It is such a good thing that this generator shed
is done and built.
KALEB: Next.
BRITTANY: And we can get these little generators back inside.
We don't have to worry.
We are more secure with our electricity.
I think it's cuter than I thought it was going to be.
Uh, but Kaleb doesn't build small things and
he doesn't build ugly things, so I don't know why I'm surprised.
KALEB: Awesome. Last sheet is on.
BRITTANY: Are you jumping down, or do you need the ladder?
KALEB: I'm gonna jump.
BRITTANY: Oh, Gilbert would be so jealous.
KALEB: Nice roof.
ROBERT: Getting a bite.
Got some lunch, RJ.
RJ: What'd you get? ROBERT: Black bomber.
We can keep this and eat it.
RJ: Nice. ROBERT: That'll be good, huh?
RJ: Oh, yeah.
ROBERT: Ash, do you wanna open that up for me?
We'll throw them right into the live well.
Yeah, what do you think about going and frying up
this rock fish for a snack and heading home?
RJ: Sure. ASHLYNE: Sure.
ROBERT: It was a really beautiful day,
but it's time to go home.
She's going home with some king salmon,
then she's going home with some deer meat and stuff like that
but for her to take fish home that we caught together today,
it would've just meant that much more to her knowing she was part of it,
but she's certainly not gonna go home empty handed.
We'll find us a nice calm place out of the wind and
cook up some rock fish.
RJ: Sounds good. ROBERT: I'm hungry.
RJ: Let's get out of here. ROBERT: All right.
You know, when we're out on the ocean and we're on the land,
we're giving it the utmost respect and we're trying to
harvest the animals that we're after.
Or harvest the fish that we're after.
If we don't get 'em, we're still out here
living our Alaskan dream.
CHEVIE: All right.
Well, it's always good to end the season with a catch.
So, uh, happy to have an animal,
no matter what it is.
JOHNNY: All right, everything's looking sound,
everything's looking good.
All right, so cranking this bad boy up.
This pulley system's helping me both physically and mentally.
I pushed myself outside the box.
I've made things I've never made before and there's something
about crafting things with your own hands versus buying things.
It's going pretty good so far.
And when those things worked the way you intended them to work, you,
you get a true sense of satisfaction.
And not everything always does work.
It's almost to the top.
But I'm not looking for perfection.
You know, what I'm looking for is to stay busy, occupy my mind.
To problem solve. To create things.
These really give me a place out here in the arctic.
(laughs)
There it is, that's it man, that's awesome,
and now I don't have to drag a sled up that hill.
All I had to do was crank and simply next thing to do
is just walk up the stairs.
That's it.
BRITTANY: Yay. KALEB: All right.
The generators are on. The house is back online.
We have accomplished our goal.
BRITTANY: Woo-hoo! KALEB: Good generators.
Thank you.
RJ: Yummy, nothing better than a good black bass.
You know, we may not have got a king but at the end of the day,
you know, we come out here and put all this effort in,
it's not always about the fish.
ROBERT: It's about family. RJ: Yup.
ROBERT: I love you, Arge.
Very much.
Ash, high five. Good, huh?
ASHLYNE: Mm-hmm.
Ended it off with a fish at least, you know?
Not the one we wanted, but it's still good.
ROBERT: I wish we'd caught a couple more.
I'm hungry.
It tastes good.
JOHNNY: I feel like, uh...
(laughs)
Like a prince going up his staircase right now.
It's gonna save me a lot of pain in my back.
I'll tell you that right now.
And look it, boom, sled's right here.
This is the way it's supposed to be, easy.
ROBERT: Living the subsistence lifestyle,
it ain't easy, that's for sure.
I live this lifestyle, 'cause it's something I wanna do,
something I'm passionate about.
This is me. This is who I am.
This is what I love.
Out here harvesting my own food.
Doing it my way, knowing where it comes from,
that's all I need.
This is who I am.
This is what I'm gonna be, and this what I'm always gonna do.
Captioned by Cotter Media Group.