Wildlife troopers guide two stranded Anchorage boaters off Skilak Lake by text

Two Anchorage boaters spent a night on the shore of Skilak Lake after rough water stopped them from crossing. A wildlife trooper met them at a trailhead the next day and drove them to their vehicle.

Tammi and Brian Graff floated the upper Kenai River on August 2 and found the lake too rough to cross, according to an Alaska Wildlife Troopers dispatch entry posted Monday, more than two weeks later. A family member contacted Soldotna Dispatch. Troopers reached the Graffs by text message and directed them to Hidden Creek Trail, an access point in the Skilak Wildlife Recreation Area. Their boat was picked up later that week.

The reach they floated is closed to motors. State sport fish regulations for the Kenai River drainage prohibit operating a boat by motor year-round from the Skilak Lake inlet upstream to river mile 80.7, so boaters arrive at the lake on current and paddles alone. Skilak Lake itself does allow motorboats.

It was the second Kenai-area stranding troopers coordinated in a week. Dispatches also record the July 27 rescue from an island at mile 73, after the water rose too swiftly to wade back.

The account comes entirely from trooper dispatches, which quote no one and name no trooper.